For an older zombie game it's not bad at all. Got it on sale for 3$ and it was worth the price, but a 30$ price after this many years is a little less worth it... I'd wait for a sale if you want to get into State of Decay before the third game releases.

The game play loop is pretty simple, albeit way more difficult on higher difficulties. You start by getting a base and then scrounging for materials, and eventually as you build up some strength you finally go to fight a plague heart. In the greenhorn difficulty you can do this extremely easily... playing solo I went from start to finish on greenhorn as a Builder leader in about 20 hours. There are unlockable boons that you can get by completing legacies (the map) with different leader archetypes and each one for different difficulties. Completing Builder on Greenhorn provides a boon on Greenhorn difficulty to any new community (new game), but doesn't provide it on any later difficulty until you complete them with that difficulty. The unlocks are also retroactive for other difficulties, complete a higher difficulty and you'll unlock all previous difficulty boons in addition to that one. With four archetypes to play with you can choose two boons from your unlocked difficulties, and are able to select from Builder, Trader, Sheriff, and Warlord. Builder and Sheriff boons seem the most long term useful.

Higher difficulties change more than just damage, and the final difficulty of Lethal Zone is filled with "freaks" or special zombies. These are vastly different than the greenhorn variants... although a bloater (similar to a boomer from L4D) is pretty much the same, a Feral Zombie is way harder... I got rag dolled and murdered by one quickly. In Lethal Zone you'll spend a lot of time sneaking as gunfire draws Zombies and they will zone in on you quite quickly... it's tougher and pretty fun but also extremely disappointing when you end up dead.

A few cons that bothered me:

• Outposts - You can upgrade them for better returns and skill training... but it does nothing to the outpost. It is no different visually. You can't station anyone at an outpost. All bonuses go back to your base. It's essentially a drop off point and scouting point.
  
• Storage - On Greenhorn I spent an enormous amount of time playing inventory simulator trying to move around goods. On Lethal Zone I sneaked around everywhere which took forever, and cars were way too risky to drive around with the insane amount of special zombies around me... this forced me to evaluate what to bring back. Personal and car storage gets obnoxious at times but luckily base storage is infinite for everything but base materials/food/ammo/meds. One thing that makes no sense, you can't move things around in your inventory... can't sort your ammo into your pockets or not have it scattered around your bag.
  
• Bases - Bases make almost no sense in terms of defense. Your walls can't be upgraded and the layouts are senseless. I took an auto base on the first map, theres a side room which would be perfect for a storage room or workshop... but it isn't accessible and just remains empty... on another map I took a house, which has a garage that you can do nothing with and a huge bathroom area that could have been converted into something else but instead it sits empty and useless. On greenhorn the computer AI was fine as zombies were not a greater threat than the computer AI, but once I went to Lethal they were extremely dumb. They'd open doors to attack with melee weapons and just let a flood of zombies in.
  
• Difficulty - Increasing difficulty causes material usage to increase. Food usage scale is 1.5x for Nightmare and 2x for Lethal... but it doesn't increase gains from Gardens, Farms, or Outposts... which means you're playing an even worse inventory simulator as you now have to scrounge food everywhere to meet requirements so your three idiots don't starve to death because they're eating twice as much. It's doable, but god its a stupid system... trying to get more people to ensure you don't suffer a catastrophic loss from one of your people dying while managing a food system gets annoying. I've spent most of my time in lethal trying to scrounge and then ended up losing people. Finally, you are limited to specific base locations and can't just throw down a claim flag and start building, there is no creative aspect or defensive construction... you take over a firehouse or a strip mall and hope for the best.

A decent game without a real end game loop that seems like just surviving and completing legacies is your goal. Playing with friends is fun, although more difficult than just dropping in and playing... you have to start your own community and populate it with characters before you can just join your friends.

For an older zombie game it's not bad at all. Got it on sale for 3$ and it was worth the price, but a 30$ price after this many years is a little less worth it... I'd wait for a sale if you want to get into State of Decay before the third game releases. The game play loop is pretty simple, albeit way more difficult on higher difficulties. You start by getting a base and then scrounging for materials, and eventually as you build up some strength you finally go to fight a plague heart. In the greenhorn difficulty you can do this extremely easily... playing solo I went from start to finish on greenhorn as a Builder leader in about 20 hours. There are unlockable boons that you can get by completing legacies (the map) with different leader archetypes and each one for different difficulties. Completing Builder on Greenhorn provides a boon on Greenhorn difficulty to any new community (new game), but doesn't provide it on any later difficulty until you complete them with that difficulty. The unlocks are also retroactive for other difficulties, complete a higher difficulty and you'll unlock all previous difficulty boons in addition to that one. With four archetypes to play with you can choose two boons from your unlocked difficulties, and are able to select from Builder, Trader, Sheriff, and Warlord. Builder and Sheriff boons seem the most long term useful. Higher difficulties change more than just damage, and the final difficulty of Lethal Zone is filled with "freaks" or special zombies. These are vastly different than the greenhorn variants... although a bloater (similar to a boomer from L4D) is pretty much the same, a Feral Zombie is way harder... I got rag dolled and murdered by one quickly. In Lethal Zone you'll spend a lot of time sneaking as gunfire draws Zombies and they will zone in on you quite quickly... it's tougher and pretty fun but also extremely disappointing when you end up dead. A few cons that bothered me:[list] [*] Outposts - You can upgrade them for better returns and skill training... but it does nothing to the outpost. It is no different visually. You can't station anyone at an outpost. All bonuses go back to your base. It's essentially a drop off point and scouting point. [*] Storage - On Greenhorn I spent an enormous amount of time playing inventory simulator trying to move around goods. On Lethal Zone I sneaked around everywhere which took forever, and cars were way too risky to drive around with the insane amount of special zombies around me... this forced me to evaluate what to bring back. Personal and car storage gets obnoxious at times but luckily base storage is infinite for everything but base materials/food/ammo/meds. One thing that makes no sense, you can't move things around in your inventory... can't sort your ammo into your pockets or not have it scattered around your bag. [*] Bases - Bases make almost no sense in terms of defense. Your walls can't be upgraded and the layouts are senseless. I took an auto base on the first map, theres a side room which would be perfect for a storage room or workshop... but it isn't accessible and just remains empty... on another map I took a house, which has a garage that you can do nothing with and a huge bathroom area that could have been converted into something else but instead it sits empty and useless. On greenhorn the computer AI was fine as zombies were not a greater threat than the computer AI, but once I went to Lethal they were extremely dumb. They'd open doors to attack with melee weapons and just let a flood of zombies in. [*] Difficulty - Increasing difficulty causes material usage to increase. Food usage scale is 1.5x for Nightmare and 2x for Lethal... but it doesn't increase gains from Gardens, Farms, or Outposts... which means you're playing an even worse inventory simulator as you now have to scrounge food everywhere to meet requirements so your three idiots don't starve to death because they're eating twice as much. It's doable, but god its a stupid system... trying to get more people to ensure you don't suffer a catastrophic loss from one of your people dying while managing a food system gets annoying. I've spent most of my time in lethal trying to scrounge and then ended up losing people. Finally, you are limited to specific base locations and can't just throw down a claim flag and start building, there is no creative aspect or defensive construction... you take over a firehouse or a strip mall and hope for the best. [/list] A decent game without a real end game loop that seems like just surviving and completing legacies is your goal. Playing with friends is fun, although more difficult than just dropping in and playing... you have to start your own community and populate it with characters before you can just join your friends.