User Score
8.0 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 23 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 18 out of 23
  2. Negative: 2 out of 23

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  1. LAFAVITA
    Oct 1, 2009
    5
    I gave ZOmbie Apocalipse the medium vote, which here is 5. The idea is great, arcade games are great, the whole concept of a 3d third view shooter about zombies is great. MInd that it is not a full size behind th eshoulders view, you see th ewhole game form above, its kinda old isometric view of the old 16 - bit consoles game, only with very defined anf pleasant graphics. But after the whole idea and graphic rendering th egame does not deliver the gaming fun it should have been becosu eof the exellent premises. The problems are several: 1 - The game is missing a decent online multiplayer, it would be perfect with ten players, insetad of four, which makes the musltiplayer boring as hell. 2 - The characters must have been designed cool people, divided in five cool males and five cool females, all with a winning attitutes. After all if you have to defeat hordes of zombies you must look like any hero must look, cool and awesome goodloking. Instead we have four characters complete losers, it is impossible to identify with them as heroes who would save the day. The verdict is mainly 5 becosue it must be divided in two parts, 5 for overall game idea and design, and game easy and paerfect arcade controls. 0 is for the multiplayer let down and losers as characters. Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  2. JamyzG
    Dec 7, 2009
    9
    awesome game when playing with other people and alot of gore and funny moments like blasting knife wielding granny's into a planes engine and it's really hard difficulty when playing later levels but they should improve on making more levels and make the zombie seem more different from eachother and making a plot into it but aprt from that you got a real awesome game it's worth the 800 microsoft points Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  3. ZambeeK
    Oct 1, 2009
    8
    Fantastic SmashTV type gameplay with 4-player live or co-op for $10. Simple, but fun twin-stick shooting with lots of gore, chainsaws and ZAMBEES!!
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  4. EmersonGuitar
    Oct 1, 2009
    9
    Simple fun of point and shoot combined with co-op play and frantic zombie dodging goodness.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  5. CalebH
    Oct 27, 2009
    7
    These days, it seems that us gamers just can’t get enough of zombies. With blockbuster titles such as Left 4 Dead, Resident Evil 5, and Dead Rising selling rapidly, we certainly have had our fill of decaying flesh and maggots. It seems like every month or so there’s a game released that deals with, in some shape or form, the undead. The month of September and the Summer of Arcade, has brought us just that with an arcade title hailing back to the glory days of Zombies Ate My Neighbors. Zombie Apocalypse comes to us from developer, Nihilistic Software, and publisher, Konami. If you’re looking for some gory, good, old-fashioned zombie destruction at a low price, you came to the right place. If you’re looking for something deeper in your zombie game such as story or depth, it’s best you pass this on this rotting corpse fest. Zombie Apocalypse is the zombie shoot’em up for the simple man. Easy controls with a top-down view, and an even easier objective: kill anything that moves. It is a tried and true method which has been done time and time again, but it’s a formula that always finds a way to work. It’s easy to say this game is a carbon copy of games before it such as Robotron 2084, Smash-TV, or even more recently, I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1 (which, by the way, everyone should get), but that wouldn’t be giving this game any credit, which it deserves. Zombie Apocalypse offers hardcore gamers a chance to enjoy the now casual world of top-down shooters, but because of this amp in difficulty it could scare away its core audience (no pun intended). One could say that top-down games are only for those looking for a challenge. It could also be said that it has crossed over into the casual genre with its simplistic controls and addictive gameplay. In recent years, developers have picked up on the trend and it has started leaning more to the side of casual gaming leaving players in it for the difficult aspect behind with the old classics. This is not the case with Zombie Apocalypse. As you progress through the 50 stages of the story mode, it becomes more and more evident that skill is a necessity to excel in the game, or for that matter, beat it. The tools you are given to take down the badies is not that big of an arsenal, either. You start off with just a machine gun and chainsaw. The chainsaw is incredibly satisfying, dedicating a button just for an execution method. However, I would use it wisely considering it takes up a lot of time and, in this game, it’s easy to get surrounded. You can torch your enemies with a flamethrower and you can light em’ up with double oozies. The most pointless weapons are the sniper rifle and molitave cocktails. Each take way to long to fire and don’t do enough damage to stop the ever-increasing onslaught of zombies. Even worse, the game developers seem to think they are the best thing to use for total annihilation and near the end, it’s some of the only weapons you are given to fight with. For me, this is an annoyance, but for others, it could all be a part of the challenge. As for enemies, no other game before it has had such a maddening cast of little hellions. In the difficult levels, you will be surrounded by a horde of speed zombies that dodge your every attack, while a granny zombie tosses homing knives from afar that kill you in one hit, while sheriffs drifts ever closer with a spread shotgun followed by construction workers that take you down in one grab. Not only that, but several queen zombies will stumble around shooting bee’s from their stomachs, while kamikazes will come out of nowhere and blow up your whole team with a ridiculously large explosive range. All of which have their health doubled about half way through the game. You go down in one hit; always. I guess what I’m trying to say is that this game doesn’t play around. What really makes this game a blast to play isn’t the fact you can shoot up zombies by the hundreds, it’s that you can do it with friends. Cooperative gameplay is what makes Zombie Apocalypse shine. Nothing is more fun than getting a few friends on the couch and blowing up some undead. But that is to be expected with 4-player top- down shooters. Although the game is cooperative, which is by far the best part about the game, it keeps its competitive edge by scoring players based on their own performance, although it does keep a collective score for purposes of earning extra lives. While this may seem like a good idea, the scoring system in which it grades your destruction is, for the most part, flawed. The categories in which you are graded range from limbs removed to environmental kills, and nowhere is it explained the value of these traits. Multipliers are placed throughout the stage and bonus points are awarded for consecutive kills, but the way in which it keeps count is utterly confusing, and doesn’t help towards the experience. At the end of each round a winner is assigned based on who killed the most zombies, not by who had the most points, which would make the most sense considering all of the ‘extra points’ you can earn through not dying or avoiding getting grabbed. You would also thing that the person who killed the most zombies would have the most points, but that’s where you’re wrong! All in all, the scoring system, whether it be faulty or not, is still a pain to keep up with and should be ignored. At least you and your friends can get a good laugh whenever the worst player on the team wins the round. Graphically, the game is nothing special and pretty much meets that standard set, but if gore is your graphical forte, you are in for a bloody treat. Every enemy explodes in a glorious shower of blood that splatters across the floor, recreating a Jackson Pollock painting (if you can even call it that). The seven environments that span across 50 levels are your standard horror flick locals: Graveyard, carnival, junkyard, you know the drill. What makes each setting different are the environmental executions. In one level, you can shoot a zombie into a car compactor and in another you can shove one of them into a tree chipper. This adds variety to the game play and especially the level design. However, in the ladder levels these features are ignored because the struggle to survive takes precedence over killing a zombie with pizzazz. When all of these elements are put together, you get what you pay for; a mindless experience meant to be enjoyed with a couple of friends. Forget the flaws, forget the ludicrous difficulty range, and forget the unashamed copying of Left 4 Dead characters. At its core, Zombie Apocalypse is an infuriating, maddening, and wildly good time. Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  6. cjensen
    Sep 23, 2009
    8
    Very nice dynamic gameplay. Alot deeper then at first glance. Nice with local co-op. Even my girldfriend likes It.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  7. Russ
    Sep 23, 2009
    10
    An absolute blast. It's basically a twin stick Left 4 Dead. even the characters strongly resemble Louis, Zoey, Francis, and Bill. With 55 waves and multiple modes to unlock, it's an addictive addition to XBLA.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  8. BeatL
    Sep 24, 2009
    10
    Awesome game for you and 3 of your friends for $10. Keep your expectations in line... it's onl $10... so the different maps get old after a while, but it's still a hoot!
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  9. JohnnyT
    Sep 25, 2009
    6
    Starts off nice and fun but you burn through it very fast and then gets old very quickly. Would say it's a "Rent It" if it wasn't a downloadabel title.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  10. DaveW
    Sep 28, 2009
    10
    Awesome game - worth 800 points, just. Would like to see some (free) downloadable maps for it though, as I feel the content was a little light in that respect.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  11. Bandicoot12Studios
    Sep 30, 2009
    7
    While the game is fairly simplistic and repetitive, it manages to mix up the basic dual-stick arena shooter formula by gradually adding in new enemy types and weapons. 75 percent of the characters is sheer plagiarism (bald black guy, brunette white female, veteran) and the "zombie bait" item is an obvious copy of World at War's own "monkey bomb," from its function to the cheerful dialogue it spouts before detonating. However, with a sharp gore engine, a satisfying zombie aesthetic and visual design, and 4 player local or online co-op make for a fun, frantic romp for any zombie fan. Expand
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  12. AlexO
    Jan 18, 2010
    4
    The game is boring and repetitive. Its not original. I get better quality games on my iPod. That said it is the first zombie killer for the xBox Live Arcade. So that warrants an above zero score.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  13. AnthonyB
    Sep 26, 2009
    10
    If you're a fan of all-things Zombies, I highly recommend this game. It's fast, frantic, plenty of modes, and assuming you've got friends to play with, ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE will last you a while, for it's best in multiplayer. Even 4-Player Local-Play is a heck-a-lot-a-fun!
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  14. KeithV
    Sep 29, 2009
    9
    Great game. I love everything about this game other than it can get repetitive. Great online for up to 4 people, and its a blast. Another problem is people quit your group almost instantly in online co-op. then your stuck with just yourself, if you can find some friends to play the whole way through, I highly recommend it.
    • 0 of 0 users said yes
  15. Nov 29, 2010
    3
    It starts out like it is going to be fun but this game is one of the most tedious, repetitive, annoying games I have ever played. Only 5 or 6 areas. No big difference between the 4 players you get to choose from. Just really really annoying and tedious. Especially past level 7. It isn't even fun! The only reason I even went through this hell hole of a game was to get the achievement at the end. The 7 days of hell was The regular game!! Expand
  16. Aug 27, 2011
    8
    I think the guys form Left 4 Dead got their dark side, Zombie Apocalypse like Geometry Wars only with blood, humor and well , cool entertainment. For the price , is worth checking it.
Metascore

Mixed or average reviews - based on 28 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 28
  2. Negative: 5 out of 28
  1. 65
    Perhaps if Zombie Apocalypse wasn't so repetitive -- and blatantly so -- it would be easier to recommend as a way to blow off an afternoon with friends. Instead, it just serves as a reminder that there are better zombie-killing multiplayer games out there.
  2. The co-op multiplayer experience, well-implemented theme, and arcade price means it's a nice bit of valuable fun to pull out when your buddies come calling.
  3. The game might provide a fun, visceral thrill, at first. But by the end it becomes to mind-numbingly repetitive you may as well go gnaw on some flesh yourself.