State of Decay 2 - Xbox One / PC (Play Anywhere & Game Pass)

[CHokKA]

Hey everyone

I'm surprised that there's not more about this on here. State of Decay 2 releases next week (18th, and it looks pretty damn good. I didn't ever play the first one. I always meant to, but reading up it seems that State of Decay 2 has taken all the things that they did right in the first, fixed the things that they did wrong, and added co-operative play which would be amazing in a game like this!

It's available on the Xbox One and the Microsoft Store on the PC at the moment, and coming to Steam later. It's Play Anywhere enabled, which means you can play it on both PC and console, and you keep your save game across both devices, which is pretty damn awesome! It's also available on Xbox Game Pass, which is the monthly subscription service. If you sign up to Game Pass, you can play it on both the Xbox and the PC as well. It's also £24.99 to buy on the MS store, which really surprised me. I'd have thought it would be at least £40 for the standard and more for the Ultimate.

Standard Edition: (£24.99 on the MS / Xbox Store)

Contains the game and the Prepper’s Pack unlock. Includes the Grasscutter melee weapon, an exclusive vehicle and an assortment of necessary survival supplies and abilities.

Ultimate Edition: (£39.99 on the MS / Xbox Store)

State of Decay 2: Ultimate Edition includes early access to the full game four days before the standard release date, a code for the original State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition*, and codes for two add-on content packs**: Independence Pack and Daybreak Pack.

It's worth adding that you can also play the game four days earlier if you purchase the Ultimate Edition.

Official State of Decay 2 Site

For the price, I'm tempted to buy the full version (CDKeys.com have the Standard Edition for £20.99 and the Ultimate Edition for £36.99 which is pretty good), although I was originally planning on trying it on Game Pass first. There are a few other games that I'd play on that as well, and it finally doesn't matter if friends of mine will be playing on Xbox or on the PC because I can play on both as well!

 

[CHokKA]

I neglected to mention that the co-op play is cross-platform as well, so Xbox players can play with PC players and vice versa.

 

[CHokKA]

I was eyeing this up last night. I saw the standard version for 15Euros on one site.

I don't really play online though and it sounds like a big part of the game is this whole linking up with friends to create a community.

I think they're just highlighting this aspect because it was something lacking in the first game that loads of players really wanted in the game. They're pushing it this time around because it's quite a big selling point for them.

 

[CHokKA]

I posted about this weeks ago but no replies, and like you was a little surprised.

However, I've seen some streams of the game now and I don't think it's going to be that good. There were a few bugs in the streams that I watched, AI getting stuck in doors etc. It will probably be acceptable for the price, especially as a month play cost £1 with last game pass offer and it's pretty much an indie game so I'll set my expectations around that. Think I'll be fed up of it with a couple of days but will give it a go.

Bugs will always be in a game on release. I’d be worried if there weren’t any tbh! Obviously game-breaking bugs can do one though! I’ve watched a few videos and I’m really interested. I’d like to know a bit more about the single player side of things though as that’s how I’d mostly be playing it. I don’t really have much time to commit to playing with others right now.

 

[CHokKA]

CDKeys price has changed for the Standard edition. It has now gone up to £22.99. I think I'm probably going to Game Pass it for a bit and see, as there are some other games on the Game Pass offer that I'd be interested in giving a go. I no longer have Gold at the moment though. Does anyone know if that's required to be able to play it online on the PC?

 

[CHokKA]

You don't need gold to play online on the PC.

Ok cool, thanks The more I think about this, the more I feel that I'll be buying the game outright instead of playing it on Game Pass. There's not a huge amount of other games on the Game Pass list that I want to play right now, and I don't have Gold so a few of the newer releases (like Sea of Thieves) are not any good to me because they rely heavily on being played online.

£24.99 seems a reasonable price for a new release.

 

[CHokKA]

Seems like game pass is the smarter option actually even though I have the ultimate edition pre ordered. I'm very concerned regarding the fact the developers had been asked if it was coming to steam on a live stream and on the actual game it said something about linking steam. The developers failed to comment I think about it.

Why is that a problem though? If it didn’t release on Steam, would that be a major concern? The price point now is pretty good for a game that can be played on both console and Windows, even if it’s through the MS store. I’d imagine that the Steam version might be a little more difficult to implement because of the Play Anywhere functionality. It wouldn’t be able to support that through Steam so perhaps the game needs to be altered just for that and that’s possibly why there’s a delay, or perhaps they simply want to offer it to PC and Xbox users on the same ecosystem first before they involve Steam. At the low price, it’s in their interests to sell it on their platform first before allowing others to take a cut.

 

[CHokKA]

I take no notice of the EuroGamer reviews these days. Recently they've shown that they're nothing but a bunch of opinionated, uneducated morons that don't actually hit on anything useful about the games they're reviewing. Their review is also the only one that says to completely avoid the game. Not surprised there given it's them though. All games have bugs on release. It's how they're handled that makes or breaks a game and studio, so hopefully they roll out fixes asap.

I've got it pre-ordered and arriving by Amazon tomorrow. I ordered the Ultimate Edition. It has the first game which I never played and would like to have a go on sometime, and it also has the earlier unlock of this weekend so I can give it a go before it releases, which may suit me nicely for this weekend, although I'm not sure just yet. I plan on leaving the game unopened so that if I don't get to play this weekend, I can send it back and buy Game Pass instead Either way, it's still way under the price of most games released these days at £39.99, and with Amazon Prime I got an additional £2 off for ordering from them so it was a no-brainer for me. £1 more than CDKeys.com but I get a physical copy rather than having to download the entire game. All good If I decide to use Game Pass instead, then I will have access to a few other games that I haven't played yet as well. I like having all these options though

 

[CHokKA]

But they're far from the only one that mentions game-breaking bugs, and yet you're still confident about pre-ordering it? Sounds like the sort of game that you should pick up later down the line after some significant patching, not playing even earlier than the official release date.

Allow me to clarify

I pre-ordered the game hastily the other night because I thought that I may have some time to give it a go this weekend, and I really like what I've seen of it so far. I never played the first but the idea behind the game is one I like, having to survive and everything that having to do so brings to the gameplay. I've watched a few streams but only bits here and there and didn't notice any game-breaking issues, so figured all would be ok. Today, I've ignored the EuroGamer review because they tend to blow things out of proportion quite significantly, but obviously the other reviews paint a steadier picture and I see what they're saying. So now, after pre-ordering, I'm not confident in the game, hence me posting up the bit about possibly leaving the game unopened this weekend to return it if I don't get time to play it, or indeed decide I shall not play it right now. I'll probably watch some streams on release day and then re-assess. I wouldn't be able to play until Saturday anyway, so by then I'll know whether returning it or giving it a go is the real option. I was always leaning heavily toward Game Pass until a spur of the moment decision was made to pre-order. I know that this might prove to be a bad idea and so I'm leaving my options open

At a push, I can always hang onto the game until it fully releases next week, sign up for Game Pass and then try it on that and decide where to go from there. As I said above, I like the options available to me now

 

[CHokKA]

My copy is going back. I left it unopened all weekend and kept up with a few streams and reviews, and it's a big disappointment at the moment. I'm not wasting £38 on something that clearly shouldn't have been released right now. What a shame as well, it looked very promising...