Undead Labs had built up a pretty good legacy with the State of Decay series. The simple setup of surviving a zombie apocalypse is pretty good. Over the course of the franchise, zombies have shambled all over the place, chewing their way through many a survivor. The idea of trying to keep a growing survivor community together is great, and both main games in the franchise did pretty well.
Undead Labs expanded the first game with various story-focused addons and some special scenario DLC. The various DLC released for the first game helped propel it to a pretty surprising amount of success. The second game had a little less success on launch. Reviews cited a stale feeling of some of the mechanics as a primary cause. The other major contribution to that drop in visibility for the second game is the exclusivity that Microsoft saddled it with.
Microsoft has previously kept State of Decay 2 all to themselves. The sequel to the hit zombie sim launched in 2018. State of Decay 2 was released in May 2018, to modest reviews. The game was exclusive to the Windows 10 store, before being ported to the Xbox One as part of Game Pass. It’s been in that PC/Xbox library for around a year, and is free as part of Game Pass or Game Pass Ultimate.
The company has also teased the update around the web. The Steam page also features a message from the Seattle-based developer, now part of the Xbox Game Studios team, where it states that “Undead Labs is proud to present our best-ever vision of the zombie apocalypse, coming to Steam in early 2020.”
Somewhat oddly, the Steam page lists the State of Decay 2 launch date as April 1, 2022, but that’s obviously not correct. The developer is teasing that “some wild surprises” are on their way “in the coming months,” no idea what that means though. Keep an eye out to see what that means in the future. State of Decay 2 has already gotten some themed DLC, so it will be intriguing to see what comes next.
More information about the Steam release will be revealed in a livestream beginning at 3 pm PT/6 pm ET on November 25, on Twitch, YouTube, and Mixer.
