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1472220cookie-checkJungle Z, Isometric Zombie-Survival Game Silently Crawled Onto The Nintendo Switch
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2019/05

Jungle Z, Isometric Zombie-Survival Game Silently Crawled Onto The Nintendo Switch

Taiwanese development outfit Rising Win Tech has been dipping its toes into the console market with its two latest releases, Jungle Z and Rolling Sky. The two games follow up on the studio’s previous outing called Destruction, which came out in Japan back in November of 2018 for the Switch. While Rolling Sky is more of a puzzle-action title, Jungle Z takes the stylings and control mechanisms from Destruction and applies them toward the zombie-survival genre.

Jungle Z originally came out in the middle of April, but there was practically zero fanfare for the game’s release, mostly because Rising Win Tech doesn’t have any clout in the gaming industry, and they aren’t hovering around the inner circles of the Left-wing media clique. So quite naturally a game like Jungle Z would be ignored by bigger media outlets.

Recently, however, Rising Win Tech has been sending out notices to some media publications to offer review copies of their recently released Switch titles. The company originally got its start in the mobile sector and now they’re trying to focus on home console titles, so it’s like they’re trying to build up their name all over again within the core console sector. Obviously it’s going to be a lot more difficult due to console gamers being far more discerning about the quality of games they purchase compared to casuals in the mobile market.

In the case of Jungle Z, the game actually looks like a decent isometric survival title. It contains many of the same trappings one might expect from Klei Entertainment’s Don’t Starve series or Housemarque and Climax Studios’ Dead Nation. You take on the role of a male or female survivalist during a zombie apocalypse.

You’ll be tasked with keeping your survivor fed, warm, and hydrated.

You’ll be able to collect items, weapons, food, and crafting material as you venture about the sandbox environment. Melee combat plays out a lot like Diablo, where you’ll hack and slash away at enemies during close combat encounters. The animations are kind of stiff and janky when it comes to the melee combat, though.

You can get around the zombies wandering about the map by using stealth. Sneaking around limits the amount of noise you generate, thus allowing you to perform stealth kills on the zombies and avoiding luring massive hordes to your location.

As showcased in the video from ContraNetwork, you’re able to build your own forts to keep the zombies out, much like Fortnite.

There’s a day-and-night system, along with the ability to upgrade your character across three different categories, including Combat, Survival, and Construction.

Each skill category will help you in specific areas of survival, such as being able to kill zombies faster, or scavenge for higher quality supplies, or crafting better quality items.

The hook for the game is that much like 7 Days To Die, you’ll have a limited amount of time to gather supplies and build up your fort before zombies begin to flood your location, specifically at night.

So there’s a race to gather as many supplies as possible and fortify yourself in a location before you get overwhelmed by the zombies. You can also recruit NPCs to help aid you during battle as they join your team.

As noted in 8-Bit Eric‘s review, the game manages to do just enough to separate itself from other titles on the Switch while offering something challenging and varied for its price point.

The Unity-made game doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it does remind me of a similar kind of game to Project Zomboid or Ingames’ Flesh Feast, just with a more colorful aesthetic and made for the Nintendo Switch.

While most people might be tired of the zombie genre, if you were interested in a zombie-survival game for the Nintendo Switch, you can check out Jungle Z over on the Nintendo eShop where it’s available for $12.99.

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