Bundle of Fun, But... Review written after the major 1.5 Patch released on July 19th. The campaign has been finalized, launch issues (slow progression) were sorted, many UI complaints were addressed, and some cards were balanced. There are/were 3 major decks accessible as of this point and 3 secondary 'deck' options at this point, leaving roughly ~9 options to start a game with.. though you do just start with 1 major and 1 secondary by default. TLDR : Game Experience is fun, unique gimmick is intuitive, and art is gorgeous. Gameplay is bittersweet and short. Zet Zillions is a genuinely novel deckbuilder experience with catchy music, silly humor, and interesting gameplay. It's greatest issues are found in its humor and its short nature. It is still a fun game experience first and foremost. The humor will bother those who dislike, or are offended, by juvenile stuff. For example, you simultaneously are fighting pirates, space bugs, angry planets, cosmic monsters, and giant space turds . For deckbuilder fans, equate the gimmick of the turds to encounters/enemies that fill your deck with curses and dilute your card draw. They have a mechanical purpose. I found it funny and silly. The short nature is a problem for the mechanical deckbuilder purist who values 100's of hours of gameplay over a gameplay experience. You will likely be 100% done with this game at 15-20 hours max. Sooner if you do not game over or just focus on using the same strategy that wins you your first run. Very Enjoyable If... ... you are looking for: [*] A Fun Deckbuilder. There are various distinct strategies that can lead to victory. A current top review says there are limited strategies, but I do not believe that was true before the 1.5 patch, and especially not after. The patch was released July 19th. This isn't a flame of that review though since the unlock pace of new content at launch was silly slow, whereas now that has been adjusted significantly. [*] Studio Trigger Artstyle. Look, if you know you know. And if you know and do not see it you may be blind. [*] A Novel Experience. The entire package of the interesting mechanics, art, campy story, voice acting, and bopping music is a complete package. Everything was put together with one vision and experience in mind. It is short and simple. [*] Something Just Fun I touched on it a little with the last point, but the game just wants to be fun. There is occasional serious plot stuff, but its tone as a whole is absurd and goofy. Look at the steam page art, you should see exactly what I mean. [*] A Cool Gimmick. The gimmick is fusion, which lets you combine two different cards in your hand. You can drag two different cards together and get a special card. In StS terms, imagine if you could combine a strike and block temporarily into a third card. Maybe it gives energy, draws, inflicts a debuff, or whatever. Combining is free, but you still need to pay for the resulting card. If the gimmick seems bad, your deck may not support fusion or have good fusions. May Not Be Enjoyable If... ... you are looking for: [*] Longevity.* There is no ascension or prestige system... yet? The team is talking about a challenge mode that may target this exact comment. Depending on its implementation and if it has some fun gimmicks, small amounts of new enemies, or something special that could change things up. [*] A Pure Deckbuilder. There is narrative system which treats each run as a chapter. Often, that means ending it with a boss as you'd want and expect. Some sort of obstacle. There are also different bosses. Other times it may just be a free win without a boss... or a boss rush. The pure deckbuilder player enjoys focusing on the run, having some obstacles, and will enjoy one or more bosses. But a run ending with no boss because story is probably lame after you set up a super sick deck. Depending on the nature of challenge mode, this may not matter, but yeah. [*] A Serious Game. The game is silly, and I enjoy that. I mentioned the space turds, but there is other silly things like fighting planets by trying to colonize them before they kill you(cool)... and the same colonize mechanic is used to also swarm non-planets so you can stun them for one turn. Your initial signature move (starter deck) can detonate all of the trash (thats what the colonizer units are called, they are actually not humans) to do massive damage. There is actual strategy behind the jokes and naming conventions, but I know for certain some people don't want any silly stuff in their games. What I Want For its price, it is easily a valuable $10 experience since I like Trigger style art, the music was sweet, the gameplay was novel, and I got to win with multiple archetypes (discard, poison/burn, big deck, shuffle poison/burn, pulverize, etc). There were some stinkers and deck building traps, but the number of viable picks outweighed those. By the time I started to think critically about the balance, I was nearing the end of the campaign, and had gotten my value from the game. That being said, if there were more chapters (different captain/story/crew) or a genuinely interesting challenge mode (new archetypes, cards, bosses, events, and/or interesting balance/progression) that would be great. A continuation, even if that is silly, would still make me laugh if I got to see credits every two chapters after the story 'ended' each time. Would remind me of MGS5, and seeing 'Kojima' in the opening credits of each mission every-time. But, elaborating further: [*]DLC for the former would be totally fine if it had similar production and new mechanics. I'd still want whatever it added to be transferable to the upcoming challenge mode. [*]A patch for the latter with post-launch would make the most sense. If there was additional stuff included for challenge mode, I'd want it to cater towards the more purist style player who wants to push limits... without relying on a single broken strategy. Regardless, fun game!
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