![]() What strikes me as remarkable is the believability not of the situation, but of the reactions to the situation. The lead in is pretty standard fare for your contemporary zombie plot, complete with apocalyptic viral scenarios, but Yates overcomes the near cliche open by focusing on immersion. This is fine because even though some thought and work was put into the amenities, what really shines in Outbreak is the story and your role in it. The music, which is well chosen, does get repetitive, but the only way you're getting rid of that is to turn down or mute your computer's volume. You can click the screen to cut off the voice-over and bring up the entirety of the text immediately, but if the voice is getting on your nerves, there's no way to mute it. No, the great sin with the sounds, both the music and the voice acting, is that you can't turn them off. This is excusable at least in part because zombie stories are rarely seen of as high art, and some flaws are not only allowed but expected. Largely, this voice acting is okay, we've definitely heard worse, but it just feels a tad shy of being just right. You're afforded this chance to take in the scenery by the voice acting that actually reads the text for you. Your ears are treated to a suitably eerie musical track, whilst your eyes are allowed to wonder over various settings rendered in monochromatic hues that pulse subtly in the background. Aside from the writing (which I'll get to in a bit), Outbreak seeks to suck you in with plenty of ambient goodies. ![]() If this is the case, it isn't for a lack of trying on Outbreak's part. Hardcore IF enthusiasts, as a result, may crave a level of immersion that is deeper than Outbreak provides. Thus, like Llama Adventure, Outbreak can be viewed as Interactive Fiction for those who just never really quite developed the knack for it. Unlike Interactive Fiction, though, all of your options are multiple choice and merely a mouse click away. In some ways, Outbreak is somewhat like Interactive Fiction, the strength of the writing combining with the strength of your imagination to create your own private landscape of fantasy. Also, Outbreak can get pretty gory and is not for the squeamish.įor those who aren't put off by the gore and don't mind a game that is mostly reading, Dead Frontier: Outbreak has an awful lot to offer. For one, it's text based so there's all kinds of reading and not a lot of physical action to be carried out on your part. Actually, you better get going anyway, lest you join the ranks of the living dead.Īnalysis: First it should be mentioned that Outbreak isn't for everyone. ![]() What will be tested is your imagination and your judgment. Nor will you have to pick out ammo from unlikely places or practice sniper like aim. You won't be needing lightning fast reflexes for this zombie romp, though. Choose poorly, and you're either zombie, or zombie food, I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter which. Choose wisely, and the hero lives at least for a few more moments until the next life and death decision comes along. At just about every turning point in the narrative, you will be required to decide between several actions the protagonist can take. This blissfully ignorant world view doesn't survive much longer before it is shattered by the dark reality of what has happened a virus is rampaging its way through the populace, turning all who become infected into mindless, deadly, zombies.Īs the horror of the moment sets in, our anonymous protagonist can think only of his wife and hopefully getting to her before she too falls victim to the rapidly spreading epidemic. Indeed, his humdrum life is so unprepared for what is about to happen that when the scream comes, he at first thinks it's someone over reacting to a spider or something. Outbreak follows an unnamed cubicle slave just grinding his way through another day at work, the worst possible future he could imagine being some inconsiderate co-worker failing to refill the coffee pot. ![]() With Dead Frontier: Outbreak, creator Neil Yates resurrects the gamebook and updates it for a more adult (and less squeamish) audience. And then, as so many other aspects of our childhood, they faded away like ghosts, transforming from late night nail-biting adventures into little more than fond vague memories. The world of the familiar would slowly melt away as we picked our way through ancient tombs, crept through alien spaceships, or explored foreboding castles. Countless lazy Sunday afternoons, unending car rides on family vacations, and late nights spent with the sheets pulled over our heads and flashlights illuminating the yellowing pages were the backdrops to these adventures. For many of us, Choose Your Own Adventure books (" gamebook") hold a special place in the muddled mess of nostalgia and memory that was once our childhood. ![]()
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