At times the plot of Days Gone can be difficult to track. You play as Deacon, a hardass biker navigating a zombie-infested open world. For the most part youre on a quest to find your missing girlfriend Sarah.

However, your motorcycle parts are nicked early on (Deacons bike functions as the games second lead character; personalising it is half the fun), and much of the action consists of taking on missions at nearby camps in order to rebuild it.

The early missions are standard survival-game fare, a slightly monotonous mix of bounty-hunting and rescue jobs. They become more interesting when Deacon begins investigating the shadowy government agency NERO, which is in charge of supplying aid to the beleaguered countryside. From here on, the game is pleasingly difficult, with stealth missions especially requiring almost total mastery to complete.

Unfortunately, the action is underserved by a hacky and uninteresting central character. When we are introduced to Deacon, he is sending his wounded girlfriend to safety in an aid helicopter, refusing her pleas to come with in order to stay and help his similarly wounded friend Boozer. These are the actions of a Mensch, but over the rest of the game Deacon acts in ways seemingly unconnected by any guiding motivation. Early on, he performs a mercy killing; later, he murders in cold blood while sermonising on the uselessness of mercy in an unforgiving world. Were supposed to believe that hes motivated by a desire to see Sarah again, but theres nothing meaningful to be gleaned about their relationship from the few brief flashbacks were given of it. Deacon is a bundle of contradictions, none of them ever amounting to character. A couple of hours in, I realised I was more invested in his bike than in him.

However, the nature of zombie games is such that a dud lead can be redeemed by a satisfying enemy. You dont need to be engrossed in a characters arc to enjoy using him to massacre hordes of the undead. The zombies – sorry, freakers – are cleverly and lovingly designed, with different enemy types distinguished in intricate ways Read More – Source