Can I Request A Refund For "Infestation: Survivor Stories" After Service Shut Down

Sergey Titov, the infamous creator of The War Z, on why he's making another zombie survival game

(Image credit: Gratuitous Reign Entertainment)

At that place are few people in all of PC gaming more than controversial than Sergey Titov. Google his proper noun and you'll find YouTube videos and Reddit threads calling him everything from a fraud to a con man. It'due south a reputation earned by the disastrous launch of Infestation: Survivor Stories (previously named The War Z) in 2012, a controversial DayZ clone that, despite its largely negative reception, was even so played by over 25 million people. In the eight years since, though, Titov has tried to recreate that success with one survival game after another, cementing the belief that he's only pumping out the same one-half-finished game with only marginal improvements to differentiate each one.

Now Titov is coming "total circle," he tells me, and is making a spiritual successor to The War Z. Information technology'south called Outbreak New Dawn, and if you've played any of Titov's previous games, yous probably know what to wait. Merely, before you get angry that Titov is making all the same another survival game propped up by lofty promises, he wants to brand one thing clear: Outbreak New Dawn probably isn't for y'all.

Seventh time'south the charm

It's hard not to be skeptical or outright cynical about Outbreak New Dawn. Information technology launches into blastoff tomorrow and costs $30 for the starter edition (with more expensive versions offering more storage infinite and better starting loot). It looks exactly like every one of Titov's previous games—the same generic forests interspersed with abased houses and office buildings itch with mindless zombies ferociously guarding randomly generated boodle similar guns, food, and medical supplies.

At that place are some notable improvements that are worth mentioning, though. Outbreak features 100-tickrate servers (premium users can access servers with 150 tickrate) and improvements to the Nightshade engine (used in all of Titov'southward games) that supposedly makes it possible to render hundreds of zombies in one surface area without tanking functioning. That zombies populate areas in a much higher density is actually pretty cool, and I tin can see how it might pb to some intense situations more reminiscent of Left 4 Dead than DayZ. In the video below, for example, two characters make a last stand on superlative of some cars against dozens of charging zombies. "It's a much smoother and a much more proficient shooting experience for players," Titov tells me over Skype.

Unlike Titov's previous games, which were nigh exclusively focused on PvP, Outbreak takes some cues from games similar Escape From Tarkov. Rubber areas dotted around the map have NPC vendors who buy and sell items and offering missions that can exist completed lonely or in a squad. These missions are meant to provide more than structure, Titov explains, so players aren't just wandering aimlessly hoping to bump into other people.

The squad at Free Reign Amusement is fifty-fifty hoping to add grouping raids similar to Destiny 2 that volition take players to instanced zones that focus purely on PvE shooting. "And, yes, in that location are zombies," Titov says. "And, while zombies in Outbreak are actually much smarter and more fun to deal with and there is a much bigger PVE component to the game than there was in our previous games, nosotros still believe that they are just a side dish to your primary piece of the meal, which volition be PvP."

Six years ago a game like this would make sense, but, ignoring Titov's contentious history, the thought of playing another incomplete zombie survival game is exhausting. Yous tin can simply spawn, boodle, and dice so many times before it becomes a kind of Sisphyean torture. Sitting down with Titov, I had to know: Why in God'due south name would someone want to sell an unfinished zombie survival game in 2020?

A lot of those players have been messaging united states ... and pretty much saying, guys, we want an updated The War Z.

Sergey Titov

"The War Z has a huge, huge playerbase," Titov says. "It'south similar 25 million people that accept and withal play The State of war Z for eight years now. And a lot of those players have been messaging united states of america and sending emails and talking on the forums—everywhere on social media—and pretty much saying, guys, we want an updated The War Z. Then nosotros started thinking about what we tin do. What do we, as players, non as developers, desire to run across in a game? That'due south Outbreak."

It might be hard to believe that The War Z is that popular, simply Titov appears to be correct. Though Steamspy is not equally accurate due to changes in how Steam publicizes user data, it estimates upwards of 11 million people take played Infestation (or i of its spin-offs) on Steam, and Titov says roughly 60 percentage of the game's audition really comes from Southeast Asia, outside of Steam, where its free-to-play incarnation continues to exist popular. The Infestation Facebook page for Thailand, for example, has near 500,000 subscribers and is withal surprisingly active.

(Prototype credit: Complimentary Reign Entertainment)

That so many people have and continue to play one of the PC's near condemned games is fascinating. Despite the controversy and detest, The War Z and its successors, like Shattered Skies, obviously resonated with a small number of players. Both games' Steam forums are full of threads asking about private servers or emulator projects, and Outbreak'southward Facebook page has several k commenters eager to jump into the alpha. Information technology's those players that Titov says Outbreak is for, though he hopes others might exist willing to give it a try.

"It's e'er been a love-hate relationship," Titov says. "A certain percentage of our players are huge fans, and nosotros are making [Outbreak] first and foremost for them. Just in that location was always a grouping of people on the opposite terminate of the spectrum who hates what we are doing and they only don't get the experience they promise to become from [our games] and we empathise that."

Information technology's a diplomatic response, simply it likewise downplays the criticism of Titov's games and the suspicious ways he manages them. To hear him talk about it, yous might think he'due south got a small-scale but vocal group of haters, but every single one of Free Reign Amusement's games—and its numerous Battle Royale spin-offs and reboots—accept, at best, a "mixed" rating from Steam's user reviews. Most serious reviews complain well-nigh poor optimization, widespread cheating, or persisting bugs and a lack of updates. It'due south also clear that there's a lot of lingering animosity over the disaster of The War Z's launch. Reviews with effective feedback are hard to notice. Most are filled with malicious insults or exaggerated statements, like comparing The State of war Z to masturbating with sandpaper.

With Sergey Titov, it's difficult to carve up the hyperbole from the fact. His games are a fascinating case of how communities like Steam and Reddit can define the narrative surrounding sure games fifty-fifty though they take a happy audience that silently enjoys them. That isn't to say The State of war Z (or whatever of its successors) aren't bad games, but Sergey Titov probably isn't the sinister con-man that some would accept you believe. Game development is extremely hard, and making bad games or missing the marker on promised features isn't a crime, fifty-fifty if it happens repeatedly.

(Paradigm credit: Free Reign Entertainment)

A bird in the hand

There was always a grouping of people ... who hates what we are doing and they but don't become the experience they hope to get from [our games] and we empathise that.

Sergey Titov

Titov, though, isn't doing himself any favors. Though there are marginal improvements and differences between each of his games, they also experience so similar that it'southward easy to see why players experience like Titov is just reselling the same game every few years. Titov doesn't try to hibernate this—he tells me that Outbreak recycles "around 60 percent" of the art assets in Shattered Skies, though the team is swapping in more original assets every bit fourth dimension goes on.

Information technology'southward also weird how often Titov changes the names of his games each time he tries to reboot them. Last Man Standing, for example, is just a Shattered Skies boxing royale mode but makes no reference to the original game anywhere in the Steam folio. Also, New Frontier and Magnificent 5 are just spin-offs of the now defunct Wild West Online, an ill-fated Red Expressionless Redemption two clone using the Nightshade Engine, that Titov inherited subsequently the original developers folded.

"At that place is this notion that we abandoned [our games], I don't want to just say you're wrong, only I'm seeing what I'one thousand seeing," Titov says. "And what I'one thousand seeing is that we did a pretty good job actually supporting [our games] for a pretty long time.

"For all of our operations, nosotros've been like that," he adds. "We supported our games mode past the point where it was financially feasible, even. We've always been saying, okay, when we've seen that the game is failing, we've tried unlike things, there probably is no signal of return there, we turned off monetization part of the game, nosotros stopped selling the game or we stopped taking the currency from the game, and nosotros pretty much supported the game upwards to the point where there was no one left playing and so we decide to shut it downwards."

That each of these games is structured around a 'games as a service' model exacerbates the outcome, creating this brutal bike of antagonism that has haunted much of Titov'south career. It'southward the same cycle again and once again: People invest time or money into his latest game, but there'due south not enough players to sustain its connected development. As money dries up, Titov's team tin't afford to deliver the updates needed to amend it, so they throw a hail mary and relaunch it as a battle royale or complimentary-to-play spin-off that besides inevitably fails since the underlying bug are still present.

And because live-service games are but e'er equally skillful every bit their latest update and merely worth playing if there's the promise of more to come, players feel like they've been mistreated—fifty-fifty if they'd already played for hundreds of hours. And so a couple of years go past, the team makes some improvements to the Nightshade Engine and releases a new game and the cycle inevitably repeats. When I ask Titov why he doesn't just try making other games, his reply is so simple information technology's hard to argue against it: "We are making games that nosotros want to play," he says.

To expand on his betoken, Titov explains how many of his programmer friends have switched to mobile games because the audience and potential acquirement is much higher. "They say, 'Sergey, why are you still not making mobile games?' And my mantra has been always, guys, I know [the survival] genre. I know that market, and that gives me that small competitive edge over me going to another genre or doing other games. Information technology'south yet small, I'll have information technology. It'south my reward and my secret sauce."

Outbreak New Dawn is also promising full refunds regardless of play time within xxx days of purchase. The game isn't available on Steam (Titov says a Steam launch would likely coincide with the full release in 2021), but uses a website called Xsolla to handle transactions. Considering how suspicious players are of Titov, I decided to test this refund policy out and after a few days was given a full refund without having to do more than than fill out a quick grade.

Titov continually circles back to what he said before about Outbreak ultimately beingness fabricated for the small group of fans who genuinely enjoyed Shattered Skies and The War Z. To everyone else, "If y'all are in dubiousness, to be honest, it's early blastoff, do not come to the game," Titov says. "Don't purchase the game right at present, it's probably not the game for yous at this point anyway. We can't force y'all or alter your perception. The only thing we can do is to make as adept of a game as we humanly perchance can, and nosotros will provide you all the tools to look into the game and make up one's mind for yourself if it's the game for you or not. That's the best we tin can do."

With over 7 years of feel with in-depth feature reporting, Steven's mission is to chronicle the fascinating ways that games intersect our lives. Whether it's colossal in-game wars in an MMO, or long-haul truckers who plow to games to protect them from the loneliness of the open road, Steven tries to unearth PC gaming's greatest untold stories. His dear of PC gaming started extremely early. Without money to spend, he spent an entire day watching the progress bar on a 25mb download of the Heroes of Might and Magic 2 demo that he then played for at least a hundred hours. Information technology was a good demo.