A few months ago, Wii U’s launch exclusive horror game from Ubisoft, ZombiU, lost the U and made the jump to PS4, Xbox One, and PC as simply Zombi. The game was released digitally, and though it lost a whole lot of what had made the Wii U version special to begin with, apparently it did well enough that Ubisoft are going to be pushing it even harder now- the PS4, Xbox One, and PC versions of the game will be getting a physical release at retail come early next year.

Essentially, if you own a PS4, Xbox One, or a PC, and are somehow completely averse to owning digital games (maybe because you feel like you want to own your games, rather than being issued some nebulous license to use them), and were interested in this game, then this release is just for you. For other, more normal people, Zombi stopped being a big deal a long time ago.

Zombi launches at retail for PS4, Xbox One, and PC on January 21.

If you want to know about the game’s plot and what is happening in the dark London Underground, I suggest checking out our original review of the game here. This review will focus on whether developers have made any improvements in gameplay mechanics and visuals.

"As evident by the lack of graphical settings within the options menu, PC gamers will find themselves greatly starved. Field-of-view, resolution, and Vsync are just about the only aspects of the game that let you know which version you’re playing."

In what is supposedly taking place in modern-day London, the player takes the role of a random survivor in the city and lead is on a spree of errands across the corpse-engulfed city by an unknown assailant on a radio. I did find it strange how all of the escalators seemed to have disappeared in what “appears” to be the London Underground. It’s this lack of authenticity that places this re-release in such a sad state of affairs, and has me wondering as to how well the studio actually pays attention in recreating real-world locations.

Now while it’s fair to counter this perspective just by saying “Assassin’s Creed”, it then makes me question how much effort went into the development of ZOMBI, or better yet, what went wrong? Given the three year time-span of the original’s release, the missed opportunity to adjust the game’s visual qualities to that of a more modern game is a severe disappointment.

As evident by the lack of graphical settings within the options menu, PC gamers will find themselves greatly starved. Field-of-view, resolution, and Vsync are just about the only aspects of the game that let you know which version you’re playing. But since the original assets of the game remain largely identical to its last-generation original, you’d be half-pressed to notice any minimal changes that the game actually offers. To provide a little perspective on how the game holds up to current releases…in short, it doesn’t. While the fun-factor may differ from player-to-player, the technical achievements found it Madfinger Games’ Dead Trigger, easily outweigh those that have been incorporated into ZOMBI.

"Had the developers incorporated additional content along with the graphical overhaul that it’s clearly screaming out for, then it’s existence on the current platforms would’ve felt a lot more justified. This is where Rockstar truly excelled with the remastered version of Grand Theft Auto 5 on PS4, Xbox One and PC."

Taking into account Dead Trigger’s exclusivity to mobile platforms, the performance headroom that has been given to ZOMBI makes it all the more embarrassing to just how vexing it actually is. Among the linear dark hallways of the many train stations and the barricaded streets of Covent Garden that do little to nothing, except to serve as a “Gamey” mechanic that delivers upon that dreaded subliminal message of “You can’t go past this point in the level”, ZOMBI is by all its inherent namesake; dead.

Had the developers incorporated additional content along with the graphical overhaul that it’s clearly screaming out for, then it’s existence on the current platforms would’ve felt a lot more justified. This is where Rockstar truly excelled with the remastered version of Grand Theft Auto 5 on PS4, Xbox One and PC.

Like every other game that makes use of zombies, acquiring a gun is relatively easy when the world has come to an end. The game also contains some interesting jump scares, and if you ignore the fact that it supposedly takes place in London then it does serve as an intense, claustrophobic stumble through the dark and forsaken streets, that’s been littered with the reanimated. This is where the game actually holds strength, it’s grim, it’s gritty, and the tone of the game is present throughout each and street corner and alleyway.

"The only redeeming quality to this resurrection of the game is a 60Hz refresh rate, but even then it is still extremely difficult to recommend since there’s nothing that appears to be improved or even justified for a re-release."

The mood and atmosphere that the game attempts to deliver is infact a great one, the problem however, is that everything feels like a tease. Like a baby in a cot that’s struggling to reach the mobile on high but continues to laugh away regardless, much of the scarce enjoyment that exists within its gameplay seem to root from the technical limitations of its original platform. This begs the question that many PC gamers have been rioting against for a great number of years: What’s with the console ports?

When you have high-end hardware that in many cases can cost as much as a small car, that easily outmatches that which is present inside their console brethren, then the complaints for underutilized hardware and performance being flushed down the drain, clearly stand strong. ZOMBI is an underwhelming port that boasts no real difference from its original incarnation. There’s nothing visually within the game other than a bump in resolution, that makes this is worthy cause of purchase over Nintendo’s.

Textures may be higher but as to how much the player actually notices it or even cares is something I wouldn’t care to wager on. The only redeeming quality to this resurrection of the game is a 60Hz refresh rate, but even then it is still extremely difficult to recommend since there’s nothing that appears to be improved or even justified for a re-release.

This game was reviewed on the PC.

Zombi runs on the LyN Gen3 engine, which has been developed by Ubisoft for the Wii U. This was meant to effectively maximize performance above all else. The LyN engine was used in Red Steel 2, From Dust, Rabbids Go Home (with Zombi starting out originally as a Rabbid-killing title) and is rumoured to be the engine used in Beyond Good & Evil 2.

Now that Zombi is on the PS4 and Xbox One, is the LyN engine really required seeing as both platforms are more than capable of strong performance with better visuals? Developer Straight Right was obviously tasked with creating a straight port (no pun intended) with some neat bells and whistles attached. And from what we’ve seen, the gameplay has pretty much tossed all Wii U functionality out the window.

Head to head comparison – PS4 [left], Xbox One [middle], PC [right]:

Rather than viewing your backpack on the GamePad’s screen, which opened you up to attacks since the game doesn’t pause, you’ll see it on the main screen. Players are still vulnerable to zombies attacking in this state but much of the tension of looking away is gone. The two-player mode which allowed one player to use the GamePad to deposit zombies into a second player’s game on the main screen is also gone. What about this port then makes it stand out, especially when it’s arriving a good three years later?

Zombi runs at native 1920×1080 resolution on both the Xbox One and PS4. So far, so good and the sharper texture filtering is a bonus. The hardware on both current gen consoles also facilitates highly reduced loading times. Texture quality has been improved significantly but you’ll find the highest quality in the PC version (despite similarities across all three current gen versions). Straight Right seems to have modified the lighting system but unless you stop and observe your environments closely, it’s not immediately apparent. The field of view has also been expanded. Poor use of Chromatic Aberration results in reduced sharpness on-screen, while the post process anti-aliasing smoothens out the edges enough. An anti-aliasing solution is present but it’s implementation is a bit spotty. Regardless, the custom solution does a decent job.

Otherwise, in terms of art style, alpha parameters and volumetric effects, Zombi resembles its Wii U predecessor almost exactly. If you were a fan of the dirty lens filter effect, then you might be slightly bummed to hear that it’s gone. Honestly, it’s a purely subjective aesthetic but it would have been nice to see some kind of option to enable or disable it manually. This would have provided current gen players a look at just how the Wii U version felt (though the clunky combat will more than assist you in that endeavour).

It’s the frame rate performance that ultimately disappoints in Zombi. You’d expect a Wii U port to PS4 and Xbox One to run at 1080p resolution and 60 FPS, right? Straight Right only received half the memo as Zombi runs at 30 frames per second on both consoles. It would be one thing if the frame rate were locked at 30 FPS but it sees its share of drops. It admittedly drops to the high 20s every now and then but on powerful hardware like this, that’s hardly any consolation. Again, this game launched in 2012. A locked frame rate should be a given and 60 FPS should have been the priority on Xbox One and PS4.

PC users will be better off as usual. It’s possible to hit 60 frames per second using a mid-level GPU. Our test configuration consisted of an Intel Core i7-5960X with 16 GB of RAM. Settings were turned up all the way across six different GPUs – the Nvidia Titan X, GeForce GTX 980, GeForce GTX 960, GeForce GTX 770, Radeon R9 290X and Radeon R9 290 – and there were absolutely no issues in achieving a steady 60 FPS.

PC Graphics Settings are limited.

But – and you knew it was coming – there isn’t any other real advantage to playing the PC version. The texture quality is slightly better than consoles but nothing else has been improved, whether it is lighting or other effects, from the console versions. One could at least expect significantly better texture work but alas, that’s not the case.

There isn’t much more to be said about Zombi and that sums up the game’s entire existence till this point. A sequel was planned at some point but cancelled by Ubisoft since the first game wasn’t profitable. This port is as rudimentary as can get and the obvious objective is to try and earn some revenue from current gen consumers while expending little by way of resources.

If you really want to play Zombi, then the PC version is your best bet. It’s possible to achieve 60 FPS without the highest of the high-end hardware and thus acts as a significant game changer. That the consoles never received a 60 FPS frame rate option still baffles us. If you’re really desperate to know what the gameplay appeal of Zombi is, then the Wii U version is worth looking into to satisfy your curiosity. There’s little else to recommend either the 2012 or 2015 version by in terms of graphics though.

Note: Performance analysis was carried by Bill Smith.

Game Overview:

Zombi is the remastered version of ZombiU which was released as a Wii U exclusive back in 2012. It’s essentially the same game with updated resolution and better frame rate performance along with subtle changes in lighting and texture quality.

Zombi is now available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. The game was developed by Ubisoft Montpellier and published by Ubisoft.

Check out the video walkthrough of Zombi below and let us know if you have any questions in the comments section below.

For video game guides, tips and wikis, check out our gaming portal here.

Zombi is now out on PC, PS4, and Xbox One, and if you want to run it on your PC, these are the specs that you will need to have. Of course, since this is a port of a Wii U game, and the Wii U itself isn’t exactly some kind of wonder when it comes to the tech that it is packing, you should be able to run the game even with relatively modest specs.

With that said, you will need a 64 bit Windows OS if you want to run the game- so if you’re still on a 32 bit edition of Windows, you are out of luck.

Here are the specs:

MINIMUM:

• OS: Windows 7 SP1 (64bit version only)
• Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E7300 @ 2.6 GHz or AMD Athlon II X2 240 @ 2.8 GHz
• Memory: 4 GB RAM
• Graphics: nVidia GeForce GTS 450 or AMD Radeon HD5770 (1024MB VRAM)
• DirectX: Version 9.0c
• Hard Drive: 25 GB available space
• Sound Card: DirectX Compatible Sound Card with latest drivers

RECOMMENDED:

• OS: Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8.1 (64bit versions only)
• Processor: Intel Core i3 2105 @ 3.1 GHz or AMD Phenom II X4 955 @ 3.2 GHz
• Memory: 6 GB RAM
• Graphics: nVidia GeForce GTX 660 or AMD Radeon HD7850 or better (2048MB VRAM)
• DirectX: Version 9.0c
• Hard Drive: 25 GB available space
• Sound Card: DirectX Compatible Sound Card with latest drivers

Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage and information.

Zombi, the port of the popular Wii U survival horror game ZombiU, is out now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC as a digital title. The game, which makes quite a few changes from the Wii U game (such as the lack of the Gamepad mechanics, for obvious reasons, as well as the lack of the multiplayer mode), puts players in the middle of an infected London, where an outbreak has distorted the population into mindless monsters preying on the flesh of the few remaining survivors.

All the ingredients of the acclaimed fear-fueled Wii U first-person shooter are back, delivering all of the most intense chaos and tension to multiple new platforms. In this version, however, a number of updates have been introduced for the new consoles including new melee weapons, faster load times, improved flashlight gameplay and overall visual effects, to make up for what has been lost in the transition from the Wii U game.

You can check out the launch trailer for the game below.

ZombiU on the Wii U was a special game, even if it was not a particularly good one- it is one of the rare games that actually utilized the Wii U’s much maligned Gamepad controller effectively, using it to amp up the tension and atmosphere in the horror game. So when the PS4, Xbox One, and PC port was announced yesterday, one of the questions that very naturally arose was- how would that tension, which relied so intrinsically on the Wii U Gamepad, be replicated?

Very well, claims Ubisoft. 

“We knew from the beginning that maintaining the tension and feel of the original was one of the main challenges, as the way ZombiU was presented on Wii U cannot be reproduced,” says Hélène Henry, Zombi’s producer. While the minimap (which formerly required players to glance down at the Wii U gamepad) has been moved onto the main screen, “We maintain a minimal HUD as much as possible,” Henry says. “It disappears when not required, giving the game a very lonely feeling. If you have surround sound, the awesome sound mix from the original still stands and greatly helps immersion. As much as possible, we’ve tried to keep those key elements.”

“Also, there has been a slight increase in the field of view,” Henry adds, “and players can increase and decrease it a little if they want to, but not so much that it takes away that claustrophobic feeling. Some work was also undertaken on the control mapping and response to improve the look and feel of the first-person movement.”

“We kept the central idea that you’re always vulnerable,” Henry says. “Rummaging in the backpack still doesn’t pause the game. We’ve added a dedicated button to access the backpack, which lets players see their full inventory and assign shortcut keys.” While accessing the inventory, you won’t be able to see anything happening on the main screen. With the game not pausing, that should hopefully adequately replicate the Wii U experience.

Other changes also abound- while the cricket bat was the only melee weapon in the Wii U version, the PS4, Xbox One, and PC ports will have two additional ones. Plus, the local multiplayer mode of ZombiU will not be returning in these versions. This is because they “believe this is where the ZombiU experience really lay.”

Zombi launches on PS4, Xbox One, and PC on August 18. It can be had on Wii U right now.

It was bad enough when Nintendo was being told that games offered on both the PS4 and Xbox One wouldn’t be coming to the Wii U. Now the company is losing titles that were once exclusive to the Wii U. The Australian Ratings Board website, long been a place for reliable video game leaks just had a listing pop up for a ZombiU port for Sony and Microsoft’s flagship consoles now simply titled Zombi.

Originally one of the only adult-level launch titles for the Wii U, there have long been rumors that the game was going to get a sequel. It appears that instead of a followup, the title is not going to get a souped up version for more popular consoles. As always, this kind of report needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

We just finished up E3 and there was nary a mention that this game was coming to either console. Ubisoft was the original developer for the game and rumors of a port that started last month have said the company would work on any other version. Perhaps this release is simply not big enough news that it warranted mention at the gaming conference. It’s also possible it’s not far enough along to be talked about yet. It’s inclusion on the Australian Ratings Board would seem to indicate it’s pretty far along though. For it’s part, the only comments Ubisoft has made in the recent past about the game is that ZombiU wasn’t “close to profitable” and there wasn’t any interest in a sequel. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.