Developer Rebellion Developments has unleashed Hitler’s zombie soldiers upon Europe and the world. Should you fight through them and win the ultimate battle with the undead or is this game best left alone?

Read on to find out

In April 1945 (in an alternate universe), German dictator Adolf Hitler, who is hiding in the Führerbunker is informed by a Wehrmacht officer that the war is lost and Berlin will soon fall, leaving surrender as their only option. Enraged, Hitler executes the officer and declares that the Fatherland will not fall. He then orders the execution of Plan Z: the resurrection of all the Wehrmacht’s fallen soldiers as zombies.

Fast forward to 1946 after demon Hitler’s defeat, and Zombie Army 4: Dead War continues the zombie killing saga as it it up to you or you and your teammates, to eradicate the world of the undead.

Blasting through the Undead

The Zombie Army series is a spin off of the Sniper Elite series and originated as DLC. The DLC was such a hit, that developer Rebellion opted to make it a stand alone series, and it has been a pretty successful move. The game originally wanted you to use more stealth tactics than just blasting through the undead, but Zombie Army 4 seems to move away from that and is better played in a Rambo style, just with somewhat limited ammo. It’s not too hard to find, you just can’t carry a whole lot of it.

The multiplayer mode opens the game up to a four person team, and worked pretty nicely. You can set private slots reserved for friends or just have the team filled out by random people online. If you are playing solo through the campaign, levels are locked until you complete the level prior to it, but online all levels are readily available. The main complaint we have for multiplayer is that if the host of the game quits, all players are disconnected. Honestly, we aren’t sure why they didn’t opt for a player migration model, as this would allow players to continue on if the host quits half way through a mission.

More Players Means More Zombies

You would think having more players would make the game a little easier, but the developer decided to make sure that wasn’t the case. The more players you have, the more zombies you have. That’s definitely not a bad thing, as blasting through zombies is a load of fun. Just shooting the undead won’t necessarily take them out, as they can and will be resurrected if you don’t blast their head off or blow them to smithereens. A shotgun at point blank range is usually a good remedy of that, but a well placed round from your M1911 will do the trick as well.

Your sniper rifle is great for longer shots, and the death cam video is as satisfying as always, but for the most part, we found ourselves using either the shotgun or the MP-44 machine gun. Weapons are upgraded by finding or earning upgrade kits, and upgrading everything is the key to running a successful solo campaign. Ammo capacity is increased as you upgrade, as well as the damage for each weapon. Your sniper rifle has an upgradeable scope which does come in handy on some missions, but upgrading both the shotgun and the machine gun was our main priority. You can turn the scope off and just use iron sights on your rifle of choice, so that was a plus.

Heavy Zombies and Heavy Weapons

Occasionally you’ll come across some heavier zombies that carry flame throwers, large machine guns, or even a huge saw. Taking these guys out will allow you to pick up their weapon, but don’t expect to run around too fast carrying them and don’t expect to have a lot of ammo. The flame thrower is a nice toasty weapon, with limited range and a slow zombie death, but that slow death means they can actually hurt you with the fire you set upon them.

The developer added a little bit of RPG flair via unlockable Perks that can aid you along your journey through the undead. As you earn XP and slowly rank up, you’ll unlock more and more perks and unlock up to 5 perk slots (reaching level 35 gives you this max number). Perks can allow you to carry more ammo, give you more resistance to incoming damage, or even make your melee damages more powerful. We found that using the Heavy perk, which allows you to pick up mounted weapons and gives you more heavy weapon ammo, to be one of our favorite.

Horde Mode and Weekly Events

If you are looking to jump in and just kill loads of zombies, Horde Mode is a great way to do just that. Wave after wave of ever increasing zombies are unleashed upon you or you and your friends. It’s a great way to earn XP and slowly climb up the rank ladder. There’s also a Weekly Even that gives bonus XP and a bonus reward such as weapons skins. The developer sets the rules and can include things like unlimited rifle ammo but no secondary weapon, must be played on a specific level and on a specific difficulty, etc. New challenges refresh every Tuesday so we look forward to these weekly events.

Rebellion’s Zombie Army 4: Dead War isn’t a groundbreaking experience, as there are many zombie killing games available to you, but it’s still a lot of fun to play. We played on a PS4 Pro and had zero issues as far as glitching or game breaking bugs. The graphics are top notch and watching a zombie get blasted into mush at point blank range with a shotgun is disturbingly satisfying.

So grab a friend, grab your guns, and go have some fun. Zombies are waiting.

7

Zombie Army 4: Dead War review code provided by publisher and reviewed on a PS4 Pro. For more information on scoring, please read What our review scores really mean.