I’m not talking about some twisted version of the Wizard of Oz, although that would be supremely cool. I’m talking about ZP2K9. What is ZP2K9. you ask? Glad you asked that. ZP2K9. or Zombies verses Pirates 2009 by Ska Studios is a platform-scrolling, gun toting, zombie marching, pirate plundering, shoot-fest for XBox Live Community Games!
ZP2K9. is basically a death-match style 2d platform-scrolling shooter. You take on the role of the titular zombie or pirate and attempt to blast other players or bots (AI agents). That’s pretty much it. When you setup your player you can choose either the human team, or the zombie team. Each “team” has seven skins – A dude, a Ninja, a chick, a Pirate, a “crusader” or knight, a Viking, and a Samurai. There are three game types, single player, xbox live multiplayer, and system link multiplayer. Unfortunately I was only able to review the single player, and only 8 minutes at a time. But I believe this was enough.
Single player options include: Number of bots (up to 5); Four different game types (Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, and King of the Hill); And Frag Limit (10, 20, 50, 100). Deathmatch is just a no-holds-barred frag-fest. Team Deathmatch and King of the Hill aren’t really any different or at least not that I saw. If you want to correct me go ahead and do it in comments. Capture The Flag is simple, you capture the other guys flag, and frag him along the way. Please note that if you choose 0 bots on single player, you won’t be playing anything. However, this is good for getting used to the controls…
…And you really need to get used to the controls, they’re a bit complex. Not that it’s totally complicated, but just the game uses most of the xbox gamepad’s buttons. Here’s a rundown: Left Trigger: Roll/Acrobatics, Left Bumper: jump, Right trigger: Prime grenade 1, Right Bumper: Prime grenade 2, A: Accept/Jump, B: Cancel, X: Reload, Y: Pick up (switch out) suit/weapon, D-Pad: Select Weapon — Please keep in mind that to switch which weapon you are using is the D-Pad, to switch out weapons you’re holding with one in the game is the Y button, Use the left thumbstick to move, right thumbstick initiates attacks, Clicking the right thumbstick like a button causes you to do a melee attack (essentially kicking). Back button shows some of the current games stats. And start brings up a menu which you can change options or exit back to the main menu. That being said, you can get used to the controls.
The graphics are adequate, again, there’s a certain charm to the graphical style of the game. They are not that great though. Sometimes the “tiles” (or segments or chunks, or whatever you want to call them) seem to expose their seems, but it’s not really that bad. The music is really cool, kind of techn-ish, designed, no doubt, to get your blood pumping. And I really like the sound effects. Blowing stuff up, and loud machine gun sounds. The game has alot of violence, but most of it is cartoon violence, thus I don’t think it’s necesserily inappropriate for anyone. This game reminds me a bit of Soldat.
The major flaw in this game seems to me to be control. You can stick to walls but it’s hard sometimes to move to where you want, or stick to a particular wall. Also the fact that you can’t run in the game. The walking seems to plod a bit. I’m sure the real power of this game is shown in the multiplayer aspect. But since I don’t have the funds to unlock this game, or use xbox live multiplayer, I will probably never see this. Another annoyance is the fact that it doesn’t seem like you can play on the same system with more than one controller, which is surprising, maybe it’s there when you unlock the game or something. The part I was able to play was pretty fun. I got toasted several times, but then managed to make a few kills after I played it a bit.
Name: ZP2K9.
Developer: Ska Studios
Price: 200 MSP / about $2.50
Final analysis: Deathmatch. shoot-fest. fun!
Where you can get it: XBox Live Community Games (On the XBox 360 console)
Tags: fun, game, games, independent, Indie, jump'n'run, Platformer, scroller, scrolling, Shooter, Ska Studios, xbla, xblig, xbox, xbox live, xbox live community games