Sunday November 22, 2009 4:53 AM AEST
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Engine Room presents... Zafehouse!

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Engine Room presents... Zafehouse!
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By David Hollingworth
Aug 13, 2008 | 1 Comment
Tags: free | game | zombies

Here's the game that Logan Booker built, as featured in this month's Atomic magazine.

Issue 92 of Atomic is on sale today, and inside you'll find an Engine Room special feature on DIY game design.

Logan Booker, ever alert for great new challenges, has made for himself a little zombie hunting game - and in SEVEN DAYS no less! For the full feature on how he did it, you'll need to pick up the issue, but here's an excerpt:

"As the individual pieces came together, the actual gameplay of Zafehouse became apparent: Survive for 72 hours, or die trying. The player would progress one hour at a time, assigning survivors to raid for equipment, secure buildings or defend them. Along with keeping people alive, the player also had to manage various resources.

The first, and most important, resource is survivors. Survivors contribute significantly to the player's final score, as well as scavenging resources and keeping zombies out of buildings. Of course, if all the player's survivors die, it is game over.

Next up are weapons and ammo, which provide survivors with a means to protect themselves. Zafehouse has three melee weapons (fists, bats and machetes) and three ranged weapons (pistols, rifles and shotguns). Originally, ranged weapons would consume different types of ammunition. Unfortunately, this could not be implemented in time. Instead, the more powerful guns would use more ammo per shot, which had the same effect as including ammo types of varying scarcity, but without the hassle of balancing their frequency. Ranged weapons also lowered the chances of the player being bitten, making them a kind of armour."

And for those who want to share in Logan's genius, you can download the game, or the game and the source code.

Those zombies won't kill themselves, you know!

 
 
The latest issue is on sale now!

Want to learn all about Diablo III? Want to find out what the best Solid State Drive is on the market today, and how to look after it? Want to catch up on the latest hardware, games and in depth tech from Australia's best enthusiast mag?

Get your copy today :)
1 Comment
Thoughts on this article? Add a comment below.
Skulptur
Sep 12, 2008 10:24 AM
 High Scores:
TOOL - 7110
http://www.zafehouse.com/scoreboard.php
That's me :)
I only lost 1 survivor and I held all the buildings!
It took me about 4 hours of restarting...
Login or register to submit a comment.
 
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Atomic Magazine

Issue: 107 | December, 2009

Atomic is a magazine aimed squarely at computer enthusiasts, gamers, and serious PC upgraders.

Every month we bring you the latest reviews of new technology and PC components, in depth features on everything from overclocking to console hacking, and gaming previews and interviews.
 
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