Zenless Zone Zero is a futuristic post-apocalyptic free-to-play hack-and-slash action-adventure role-playing game developed and published by miHoYo. It was released on PlayStation 5, PC, and mobile devices a few weeks back and is currently releasing a brand new character as its first post-launch update. As of writing this review, there have been many negative reviews mostly regarding its gameplay loop and poor optimizations regarding its AI and difficulty. Are these reviews justified or is there a hidden Jem somewhere locked behind its many gotcha mini games let’s play a few and find out.
The story of Zenless Zone Zero takes place in a post-apocalyptic futuristic, but also retro Japanese city called New Eridu. This city is currently the last surviving city as the world is under siege by creatures called Ethereal creatures that travel through portals called Hollows. Several factions with different goals have banded together using technology and resources collected from the Ethereals to establish New Eridu as the final safe point for humanity. The player takes control of a Proxy who is a character that digitally assists Agents who explore the Hollows throughout the game.
The gameplay of Zenless Zone Zero has unfortunately not been the game’s strongest element. This sentiment has been expressed by many players and reviewers for justified reasons. One primary example is its main core gameplay loop where players guide their agents using televisions, a method that while on paper can be interesting and fun as a hacking mini game this loop is unfortunately not as fun as the main gameplay loop for every level. Each level uses this loop with very little innovation. While there might be added elements as the game goes on, players have to traverse essentially a mini-game with very few segments of combat and collectibles such as different currencies to collect. Their very few moments of combat have also left a bit of a sour taste because of their lack of difficulty. The combat primarily centers around mostly mashing the attack button while sometimes using a heavy attack when the meter gets full along with using the character swap to counterattack enemies. While each character does have their own unique and flashy ultimate move the combat still lacks enough depth to where it can be satisfying after playing multiple games. Every level has different objectives, but they do ultimately end with a final stage boss that sometimes ends up just being the same enemy type just with more health and a different color.
Many characters can be unlocked by both playing the story and playing loot box gotcha games that can also unlock extra character shards that can unlock extra abilities for characters that have already been unlocked. Within the gotcha games, there are also cores that are used to buff characters’ stats depending on what support ability they have.
When it comes to the open world of Zenless Zone Zero there isn’t much to it because it’s pretty much a small hub world. Still, unlike most hub worlds there aren’t other players to interact with just a bunch of stores with items that can upgrade characters like cores and other upgrades as well as restaurants that can apply short-term buffs to characters for only a few games. There is also the video renting store your character owns that can be used to make passive income while the player plays missions. There is finally the newsstand which gives the player a daily option of using a scratch-off ticket that can reward a specific amount of currency depending on if that ticket is the winning one.
The visuals of Zenless Zone Zero can range from very stylish to something that players have probably seen in other games. One thing that might stand out is the character designs which come across as a very techno hot topic. The one that stood out the most was Billy whose style makes him look like a cross between a character from Cyberpunk and Destiny with a personality that would fit into both worlds. Despite some interesting character designs that may or may not inspire cosplays others have raised quite a bit of concern because of their physical appearance like the character Lucy who sports a biker chick outfit with thigh-high shorts. Now the outfit isn’t the problem since there have been many female characters who sport this type of clothing in multiple forms of media. The issue that people have been concerned with is that the character appears to be a minor (A Child) which has raised some concerns with players. Despite the design choice, there are other characters with unique designs that players will enjoy.
Overall the game needs to make a large amount of changes for this game to rise back into good graces with its community such as reworking the difficulty and altering the Television system to make it less mediocre and repetitive. While it might be understandable that the developers may have wanted the game to be easy for players, there are only so many times a player can take the easy route until they become bored and crave a new challenge.
Score: 5 out of 10
Reviewed On: PlayStation 5