My car was abandoned in the middle of the road somewhere behind me. I couldn’t go back for it even though I desperately wished I could. I had to bail out of it – while it was moving, mind you – because it was the dead of night and I didn’t see the Bloater standing in my path until he exploded on the front bumper, filling the cabin with noxious gas. I was left to limp up and around a mountain, as a straight-line path back to my community’s base just wasn’t possible. My health was critical. My stamina was exhausted because I hadn’t slept in two days and simply couldn’t run more than a few paces anymore. I figured my odds of surviving – and thus not losing valuable geocacher/masseuse Fulgencio Arellano permanently – were barely north of zero. Between my body, my mind, and my situation, I really was in a state of decay.

see deal State of Decay 2 - Xbox One $59.99 on Gamestop

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Such novella-worthy stories are typical in State of Decay 2

Above: A gameplay footage teaser of what's to come during our month of IGN First coverage on State of Decay 2.

“ Splitting up generally doesn’t end well.

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it’s priced at $29.99 should buy it a lot of goodwill from gamers, too, even if a bit more wonkiness than desired creeps into the final product.State of Decay 2’s depth starts with the world. It’s a much bigger one this time around, set some time after the events of the original in a totally different place. I’m told that it loosely ties into the first game, narratively speaking, but you certainly won’t need to play SoD1 to understand the sequel. You need a bigger world, of course, when you have the ability to bring three friends into it to help you out in co-op multiplayer. It works in a fairly unique way we’ll tell you more about later this month, and I spent an entire afternoon trying it out. One quick tip for now: splitting up generally doesn’t end well. But if you’ve gotta go your separate ways, at least bring one friend along. Buddy System FTW!

Above: The full gameplay reveal of State of Decay 2. Join us on a four-player co-op adventure as we hunt Plague Hearts!

“ You can install mods in your facilities, such as an original Xbox that will boost morale.

Every State of Decay 2 Screenshot So Far 13 IMAGES

“ Having Blood Plague isn’t so bad, so long as you manage it and, ideally, cure it in time.

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Added character depth naturally means that your base building and upgrading mechanics have a lot more to them as well. You can install mods in your facilities, such as “Install Game Console” (fittingly depicted as an original Xbox) in order to boost morale. You’ll need water outposts, fuel outposts, and power outposts in order to keep your HQ running smoothly. You can temporarily have your farm churn out medicine instead of food in times of crisis. The Resources screen breaks down exactly what all of your various inputs and outputs are, resource-wise. This daunting level of detail may be music to the ears for some, but if you’re overwhelmed at the thought of this, know that everything I saw and played was from a world halfway into the meaty campaign. In other words, you’ll work up to what I saw. Said Strain, “You don't have to drill way the hell down into all this to succeed and have fun, but you can.”Having Blood Plague isn’t so bad, so long as you manage it and, ideally, cure it in time. A meter will start to fill every time you get slashed by an infected zombie, until eventually you just die and turn (thus potentially taking out one or more of your other survivors) if you fail to treat it. Naturally, you can only get Blood Plague samples from certain zombie types, and you’ll need five to fashion the aforementioned cure. Bloaters you already read about, but skitter-on-all-fours Feral, progress-halting Screamers, and hulking Juggernauts are back too.

Above: State of Decay 2's announcement trailer from E3 2016.

“ The team at Undead Labs have taken special care to make nighttime especially terrifying.

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Nighttime, I should add, pretty much always qualifies at “the exact wrong time.” The team at Undead Labs have taken special care to make the witching hour and beyond especially terrifying. Yes, the zombies have red eyes at night and yes, they seem a bit more irritable. The day-night cycle has even been made a bit longer than it was in State of Decay 1. But it’s the environment itself that’s been paid special attention. The developers explained how most games have an almost blue-ish nighttime, by design, so that you can see your surroundings. Undead Labs wanted State of Decay 2 to be a bit more realistic and terrifying of a rural setting, so the black of night is much more black. It’s not quite can’t-see-your-own-hand-in-front-of-your-face kind of black, but it’s dark enough that a car without headlights on, barreling down the street, might, say, completely miss a Bloater in the middle of the road and end up having to tuck and roll to avoid a cabin full of deadly gas caused by the Bloater living up to its name.

Above: State of Decay 2's first gameplay trailer from E3 2017.

Permadeath, resource management, relationship building, vehicle procurement, maximizing your community’s skills, building outposts, trying to figure out which survivors are friends or foes – all of it and more are what made State of Decay special. And State of Decay 2 deepens all of these systems and more, with the result being a game the Undead Labs team had to peel me away from after I spent two days with it. It’s fair to wonder how it’s going to run on a stock Xbox One – I only played it on a high-end PC, to which an Xbox One X should compare nicely – but from what I’ve seen so far, State of Decay 2 may be a steal at $30. And playing it reminded me that, annoyingly, there haven’t been any State of Decay copycats in the five years since the first game. Thankfully, the real thing returns soon enough.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Platforms. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan , catch him on Unlocked , and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.