Rebuild 3: Gangs of Deadsville Review
:: BYE SOCIETYPrice: $4.99
Version Reviewed: 1.2.0
App Reviewed on: iPhone 5
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My first experience with Rebuild came from reviewing the first game (technically the second) when it was released on the App Store - and it kind of consumed my life for a while. It took some time to kick the habit, but I was finally clean. Then along comes Rebuild 3: Gangs of Deadsville to pull me right back into it again.
Rebuild 3 in’t really what I’d call a sequel so much as a significantly improved remake of the earlier game(s). The general concept remains the same: manage a small band of zombie apocalypse survivors while trying to expand your colony, scavenge for supplies, recruit new members, keep morale high (ish), fight off hordes of zombies and no-good raiders, and otherwise try to bring society back from the brink. Of course now there are even more things to worry about such as random events and other factions to maintain relationships with (or fight it out with).
I expect the new art style might be a bit divisive seeing as the more realistic look has been scrapped in favor of something a bit more cartoony, but I’d definitely still call it an overall improvement. The little character moments are also a great addition and they help to give each of the survivors more of a personality. However my favorite change has to be the interface. You can still awkwardly navigate through lots of menus to get people to perform various tasks, but now you can also drag and drop their character icon to different buildings and pick a job from a pop-up radial menu. This is so much more intuitive, and a lot faster to boot.
Really I only have three problems with Rebuild 3. First, the near-constant pop-up events can be a tad irritating, and I don’t like that they only pause the in-game clock while they’re up on screen (I’d have preferred it if they kept the action paused and let you restart the clock when you’re ready). Second, the on-screen text is just a bit too small on an iPhone screen. And finally, it’s too dang habit-forming. Seriously, I have stuff to do and sleep to have but instead I’m shuffling survivors around in an attempt to reclaim a parking lot to then convert into a farm while also trying to convince some survivors holed up in a church to join us and mounting a defense against a zombie horde approaching from the North. But just a few more minutes and I’ll stop, I swear.
If you’ve never played any of the Rebuild games before (and you should), Rebuild 3: Gangs of Deadsvilleis the best place to start. If you have played them before, well then you should still check it out because it’s a serious refinement to the formula. Just remember to pace yourself.