DayZ

DayZ remains the best post-apocalyptic survival game available. I started it playing in 2015 as a mod through Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead. It was the first game I bought when I got my own computer and access to Windows games — so a brief forewarning for some bias here. A full decade later, the standalone release is at point now where I would consider it complete. With the 1.28 update, Bohemia conjured the idea of using vehicle code from Arma: Reforger in DayZ. By doing so, they've (almost) completely fixed how vehicles behave. For context, vehicles in DayZ were notoriously unreliable; players often encountered laughable physics and lag compensation, which would result in their demise and/or the destruction of their car. With a 225 km² playable area, motorised transport is obviously desired. These issues have long plagued the game, and made vehicles simply not worth the effort of finding and maintaining. This was an thorn, because DayZ's predecessor, made on Arma 2, was a military-simulator with intricate detail and consistent vehicle behaviour. As you'd expect, [u] 1.28 is a game-changer. [/u] Base building is in the vanilla game, but needs work to make the time-sink worth it. Modded community servers arguably showcase a more realised version of permanency in the post-apocalypse, however, I ultimately prefer playing on Official or Vanilla community servers. I don't use stashes or build bases, I treat every life as its own playthrough and try to remember [u] its not your gear, it's just your turn with it[/u] which can can help stifle the blow of losing a well-geared character to that moving bush with a sniper rifle. Even after 1000~ hours, and more on its predecessor, across all the "soldier simulation" games I've played, DayZ is the only one that really scares you with its PvP interactions — left thinking you're going into cardiac arrest b/c of the heart-pounding gunfights you'll find yourself in after not seeing another player for hours.

1. In order to enjoy the game, you have to dedicate some time in order to learn some of the mechanics and some of the map. 2. Very hard on a solo player both in terms of time and progress. 3. Hard to be stealthy even as a solo. 4. If your only purpose is to survive as long as you can without caring about other players, you can do fine without ever dying or not dying often. That means you won't get the best gear but you will be alive. 5. If you want to actually enjoy the game and fight, you need to find a way to hide your gear and as a solo this is harder said than done. 6. Do not recommend using shovels for stashes, it's dangerous to stay in one place, you can't bury much and you can hear it which attracts attention. Use shovels for growing vegetables only. 7. Use fishing poles, boil food with a pot and a gas stove. 8. Don't build bases as a solo unless they are a decoy. 9. Don't use tents and shelters as a solo unless they are a decoy or to temporary stash that you are gonna move soon. 10. Learn situational awareness. Listen often, look often. 11. Don't fight without the element of surprise, unless you are searching for a fight and you happened to get discovered before you discovered them. 12. As a fresh spawn find a gun with a few bullets, get a bit of food and listen for shots to ambush someone. Don't needlessly run across towns with other players. Unless you have a party, in-game parties aren't a well organized group and most people don't know what they are doing. You might have some fun but you will die trying to stay together. The game is good. To an extent it might be better to have more frequent wipes just so that you don't grow attached to your gear since you can't really keep it for too long as a solo. There is almost no other way to effectively solve spending tons of time getting to the level of big groups. If that doesn't sound good a solo gameplay update focused on the experience of solo players is recommended.

Ever felt alone, miserable, wandering along the streets is a desperate need for any social interaction just to find out that other people are jerks? well.. now you can do that while running away from a group of zombies while trying to drink water from a street fountain like a gazelle. or bambee as we call them... 10/10 would forget to load my gun again

Pretty much the heroin of open world survival games. And with the active modding community you can have it anyway you'd like it...

I bought the game while its on sale. First experience in official server really sucks. First guy i saw was running at the speed of light, and punched me to death. I respawned and immediately got blowned up. This goes on and on for maybe 5 lives until i met another guy on the coast who suggested community server. I am now playing in Asia Vanilla community server. Community is great, and server has consistently have 30 pops and above so interaction is frequent. Admin and discord channel are pretty active to. In case you experience the same thing and want to try something new, do check them out on discord: https://discord.gg/rk6QMzbtG8

After 100 hours in game which isn't long from what id say in all honesty this game reminds me of the saying "A game for everybody is a game for nobody's". What I mean by this or why it reminds me of this is because this game is brutal, you will lose everything you worked for, every piece of gear you spent hours getting and all the progress you made physically. You can sometimes lose it all over something as simple as not washing your hands after gutting a chicken then eating with said hands, if you don't have pills your stuffed... But with that high risk said, the reward is given to those who learn from the experience and improve next time around, its a game that rewards determination and persistence to those who don't mind getting back up again to go another round of survival, you'll come to find when playing that despite this being a Zombie game its the people you've got to watch out for. But sometimes you come across someone and its the start of a long partnership full of failures and success's, all in all this game is great if you can handle it, the complexity and punishment if you F-up is what makes for its greatness as you'll always come back better.

walking sim basically, loot for 3 hours wander around to just die to a cheater or camper. everyone just kills on sight, heavy looted players just wait for freshies to come around to kill em

*This review is mostly based on DZSA modded servers since Vanilla DayZ is pure dehydration, starvation, disease, and death* No other game scratches the *hardcore-survival-looter-shooter-prox-chat itch* like this game. The contrast of ultra realistic firearms ballistics, but with the jankiest world collision hitboxes & zombies, will either make you love or hate the game... for the DayZ veterans maybe a bit of both. It feels like a glitchy retro game but also modern sim at the same time. Takes a while to get up and started with a base, pvp encounters are few and far between until you venture into cities/towns, but when you do encounter someone its pure adrenaline. One moment you're just running through the forest or looting a building, and the next thing you know you're in a gunfight holding 12 hours of loot and everything to lose, all while zombies are rushing towards you from a 100m away. No other game has made me more paranoid about losing my loot than DayZ although it gets better when you've established a base with storage. The sound of distant 1km away gunfire will give you a rush. The players are either the solo ghillie sniper, or the team who just rushes and flanks you on contact. If you're new, a lot of the times you won't know how you died (to that sniper) since it just cuts to black screen with no sound (can't hear the gunshot that killed you). Be prepared to use real world tactics & mechanics in this game to come out on top, eg. fire and maneuver, flanking, ambushing, concealment & cover, travelling in a spread out column formation with your group. Never sit still in the open in town. Even firearms mechanics like ballistics, zeroing, height over bore, etc. That or just rush in close range to spray and pray with an auto rifle. But seriously you'll save 100's of hours of pain, If you don't get the mechanics down in this game you're at a huge disadvantage. p.s. Play modded servers on DZSA launcher and bring a friend.

if you enjoy wasting hours only for hackers and petty server admins to ruin your game, this is for you

Its probably been close to ten years since I last played DayZ. But I remember back then all the friends, and experiences I got to be a part of, and share with. I've been watching various Twitch streamers play this game for years, and to see how much this game has gone from what it was to what it is now, is absolutely mind boggling. I am very nervous to pick this game up again after so long, but I have been searching for a game where when I play, I have no idea the encounters, or what is going to happen. To develop a game, and put so much hard work into it to make it a new experience every single time, how could anyone get tired of a game like this!? I am excited to experience this game all over again, and learn more about all its creators, and people working so hard to make this game what it is today. And to all the future players I will come across, because the players is what ultimately shapes the experience and excitement. Much love to everyone, and happy hunting!

This games is a bit of hidden gem, but it is not without it's flaws. The game is a truly unique experience but the cheating on official servers is far more rampant than you'd expect. I'd almost not recommend the game as a whole because of that alone.

“10/10 — Accepted dinner in Kamyshovo. Realized too late I was the main course.” Spawned in with a flashlight and a dream. Heard laughter near the church. Followed it. Found five people in matching raincoats singing Ring Around the Rosie around a fire. One offered me steak. Said it was “locally sourced.” I thanked him. He wept. Another named MilkSteve asked if I wanted to “join the family.” I said yes. They cheered. They dressed me in burlap and gave me a new name: Nibbles. I spent the next two hours clapping to sea shanties and eating “mystery meat.” Then someone passed me a human skull and whispered, “It's tradition.” That’s when I knew. I ran. Tripped over a goat. Woke up on the beach again. Heart full. Pants gone.

I've always wanted to play this game as a kid. Arma and DayZ were two of the main games that inspired me to get a PC growing up, especially because of FrankieonPC, Arma DayZ mods, and Summit1g streaming the games. This game rarely goes on sale, so when it did, a friend asked me to get it in the hopes of playing with me, and I pulled the trigger. Unfortunately, we were both met with launch issues and ultimately didn't have a good time. I found this quite sad because we both love the game. Rust, Arma, and Days Z are very similar games, and my friend is a former Rust fiend so I thought his enjoyment of the game would transfer. Again, it's unfortunate that it didn't, and I'm quite sad it didn't. I really wanted to like this game as I've been following it for over 10 years now, but oh well, maybe next time

got shot in the back of the head whilst i was placed in handcuffs with a burlap sack over my head 10/10 game

i love it. its on of my favo game. the grapics and everything is just perfect

Yes, it is actually a good game although it is very hard and challenging being a new player. Also, the map is huge, one day I was playing with one of my friends and they would be on the other side of the map which would take a couple of hours in real life to go to.

Its hard to learn and get started, but once you understand the dynamics the game becomes amazingly fun!!

very realistic, nice, and the feeling is the best when you hop on with da boys

After playing 39 hours I would not recommend this game. This game is not for you if you expect the following: 1. Survival game to actually have robust foraging, hunting/gathering (i.e. find bushes that have berries or actually having more than three items per major house. 2. Standard unlock-able map as you explore the zone. No map to which you can actively locate oneself in relation to the rest of the major interest points or teammates. 3. Fair play with a perfectly optimize anti cheat for both modded and official servers. 4. Easy co op with your friends (the whole purpose of playing games). Of the 39 hours I have played 32 hours have consisted of me logging into official servers to meet up with my friends only to follow one of three patterns. 1. Spawn in fresh and open all houses with closed doors to find worn or damaged clothing items with no food, walk/jog to where my friends are only to get either instantly killed with no game audio by a hacker or die to my lack of food after hitting up 16+ houses. 2. Spawn fresh find some food, a weapon to defend myself, and then run getting close to where my friends are to yet again... you guessed it.... die to someone with hacks or die to dehydration. 3. Get food and water get all the way to my teammates then to yet again, have a hacker come up say our names and proceed to enter God mode after we killed them and them instantly TP on us and kill us with a BSK 12 from 80 meters. This game on paper is very appealing but in actuality misses in every mark due to hackers, and a horrid loot pool that is also monopolized by hackers. Even modded servers are not immune as in order to even play those you need to install additional mods that clash with the official servers. Overall rate this dry mouth noise from the game. Do not purchase if you are wanting to play with friends.

Fun until you get shot. Then it's fun again, until you get shot. Repeat until nothing is fun. Pretty much any good game could gain the same entertainment value of sudden inevitable death by setting a macro to randomly Alt+F4 for you and delete your save file. This one is not really optimized for Rogue-lite progress either; it's pretty much just Rogue-like FPS. That's common enough in PvP FPS, but you start with (basically) nothing every time, which leads into the enjoyable-enough survival crafting angle, but then randomly trashes all time invested, and it's generally enough time going into each life that it hurts. However, when you do manage to survive, or just play a community server without PvP or whatever, then it also becomes evident that the survival crafting angle doesn't actually go THAT deep anyway. Live or die, you're gonna be doing a lot of the same shit for as long as you have the appetite. There are reasons to do it anyway, but those reasons are also too finite to justify all the mundane gripes of how actually unrealistic it is. E.g.: starving to death -- faster than you'd dehydrate -- in something like 2 hours of real time or maybe 2 days of game time -- and much faster if you're freezing, because...? Can't build a base or even drop a tent you're carrying because the ground isn't flat enough anywhere in sight? Chop down a tree of any size with a hatchet in 10 seconds, but you'll break all your hatchets, axes, sledgehammers, and maybe even your guns before you'll dent the wooden wall some jerk made out of the same kind of tree just to block off the water supply in the spawn towns, because fuck you. And a big Fuck You Too to the playerbase. In 1212 hours, I've never had a 2-minute conversation with any of you psychos. The few of you willing to talk instead of shooting first are clearly too afraid that I'm going to kill you, and that's justified (mostly by others' baseline behavior). This game could've had all kinds of better social dynamics if you douchebags weren't wasting your lives preying on fresh spawns for some of the most pathetically invalid ego tripping PvP shooters have to offer, and that's saying something. May you all continue playing for tens and hundreds of thousands of hours until you're too physically infirm and cognitively rigid to do your harm anywhere else. DayZ can keep you.

Tried to play with a friend. Spent an entire hour just trying to land in the same damn server. Not join a match, not play the game, just find the same server. This isn’t early access anymore, but it still feels like a half finished mod. The server browser is borderline useless. Same game, same filters, and we get two completely different lists. No way to refresh properly, no real fix unless you do some voodoo by joining random servers. And yet somehow, it’s still priced like a premium title. For a game this old, it’s shocking how broken the basics still are. You’d think after a decade they’d fix the most essential part of a multiplayer game: playing with friends. If you're thinking of buying DayZ in 2025, don’t. Spend your money on something that actually works.

This game is a stupid piece of shit. The game and all of its aspects itself are fine. People complaining about no resources just aren't looking hard enough or in the right places. The reason this game sucks is because of how old and buggy it is. Im about to lose my 20 hour character to blood loss because I froze as a zombie was hitting me. I just had to sit there and watch it hit me over and over again while I cant do anything. offical servers run like crap and will kick you every 10 minutes because you aren't playing literally in the server farm. The games engine is so damn old it cant hold more then 60 players. Im keeping the game, but i would not recommend to anybody who plans on keeping any of they're stuff. Fix your servers Bohemia. You made a great game being ruined by bugs.

base building needs updating its horrible atm. devs are gay and want to add a new map or a new rifle silly imo the base building is what needs work now that the vehicles are okay at least and they waste money flying out influencers for bs

Still unbelievably janky and full of psychopaths who think what you do in video games matters. Not quite as bad as the MOBA community on the whole, but probably a close second.

couldn't play the game.. i try contacting contact customer support so we can understand, why the game keep crashing when i open mods or anything else. and its too complicated to get in touch with them, even on discord or anything else they use to contact them with a problem

global Banned from dayz as soon as I bought the game and joined my very first server and never played this game. I will be putting Bohemia interactive games on ignore list in the future. [Refunded]

So old - very little interaction with environment - graphics are not a positive - everything is really difficult - then you die - but I love ut! something about this game gets under your skin - despite the lack of bells and whistles (which is painful!), this gets the adrenaline pumping like no other Zombie genre - you like arcade style gret graphics, big explosions, destructable environments and gore everywhere? Then this game isn't for you. But if you love a challenge and don't mind losing out to realistic survival challenges, then maybe give this a go. Every spawn is a new adventure.

The game is very good for a shooter (I tend to do lots of dragons, etc type games) I am enjoying learning the game play and the nuances of the game.

This game is great if you don't play on official servers. I have met a lot of friends through this game it isn't just a game but a good way to socialize especially if you are more on the introverted side. I love this game and all of it's janky behavior. This game has a learning curve and it will take a while to navigate the map and has great survival mechanics. There is nothing that makes me hard quite like killing a random stranger and leaving him naked and ashamed.

This is the worst game ever. Constant BattleEye issues. Steam refuses to refund for a game that doesn't work for me. Read up on the BattleEye issues before you guy, it's been a known error for years and no fix in sight. DO NOT BUY. No Steam refunds. Total money loss.

I have over 2k hours in this game just on this account on Steam, I've played this since 2013 on friends' PCs before I owned a PC. I played over 6k hours of DayZ on Playstation when that came out. I have purchased copies of this game for friends 5+ times over across different platforms. I think I'd probably recommend this to anyone who enjoys these 3 principle things in survival games: 1. A hardcore survival or a completely customizable difficulty to your survival preference (with community modded servers). This game will push you to engage and learn on a curve that is very steep and sometimes makes you more thoughtful on your choices than you normally are on any other survival game. 2. You have no UI (on a vanilla/lightly modded server) telling you to "get food" "get drink". Your story or character's "life" is up to you. You choose on what you want to accomplish and get no direction besides your character needs. 3. You will die. A. LOT. and will be killed in the most ridiculous, stressful, and hilarious ways. But it makes you work to understand the game knowledge and how to survive longer. I love this game beyond measure, it's given me thousands of hours of entertainment and challenges. My favorite thing about this game, is that every character "life" is never the same. You can team up with people and become the biggest group on the server, you can team with other fresh spawns share food and water and get betrayed later on. You can become the bandit that you were killed by, You can steal peoples' shoes and amass a collection. You can do whatever you feel up to that minute and it'll feel different every time. I cannot speak higher of this games praises, legacy, and the love this community has. And hope everyone finds this review helpful and enjoys it half as much as I have. <3

Review – About Me and DayZ DayZ is a really great game that I enjoy a lot. What I like most is how you can survive in a harsh world full of dangers and constantly learn new things. It’s not just about killing zombies or other players, but mostly about strategy, planning, and sometimes luck. Surviving in DayZ is not easy. Every day is a challenge because you have to watch your food, water, health, and also other players who are not always friendly. This makes every moment in the game full of tension and excitement. What I really enjoy about DayZ is the freedom. You can be a friend, you can be an enemy, you can build a base, or just roam the map looking for new things. Every match is different, and you never know what will happen. And I have to say, it’s 100% better to play with friends. When you play together, you can protect each other, plan attacks or defenses, and most importantly, it’s way more fun. With friends, surviving in DayZ is much easier and more thrilling. The game has also taught me to be patient and think carefully about every move. It’s not just about quick kills but surviving for the long run. Overall, DayZ is an amazing mix of action, strategy, and survival that never gets boring, and I always enjoy coming back to it.

very fun game i was running around with someone from romania never again left in a fight 10/10

I love the survival and the way you combine things to make the things you need its pretty awsome just don't like getting killed by another player right at the start and I know there are PVE servers in the community part but good job

Superb game with less and less bugs, don't expect an easy time though, haha

Makes me want to eat metal sometimes, and gives me major anxiety It alright, I guess, 10/10

Great game, love it! Would not recommend to anyone though as there is a HUGE problem with HACKERS on official servers. Literally just died to a hacker who then had the audacity to add and message me on steam admitting to having just cheated me. If they spent have the time and resources they do on new content and updates on fixing the anti cheat and hacking problem id rate it 10 / 10...As is 4.5 / 10

Get game look at servers choose a community server get error saying server unreachable choose official spawn in see big city go to city see someone say hi gets shot with a sporter-22 stay stuck at you are dead screen choose to leave see respawn respawn see city again see signs in Russian see something that says police go to the station find a gun with one bullet see someone enter try to shoot him but miss run get shot die 34 more times find someone that nice teach you how to make fishing rod fish search up how to make a fire make fire and start getting a sense to survive kill people find person in car shoot him take his loot and car not know how to drive look at controls drive crash into house keep driving learn how to drive then make base and then die and quit 1 hour later you try again succeed

I've been playing the game for quite a bit of time (arma 2 days), its only that my acc got hacked, I got over 7k hours in this game, and I must say, its the best game I've ever played, like chef's kiss, theres no other game better imho, you can do whatever you want, and I like it, you can act as whoever you want, the realism is unimaginable, its the best game I've ever played, the concept of this open world game is honestly revolutionarry, others are just a ripoff of this masterpeice.

Love Zombie games, waited for this to come out since the Arma mods. Its a whole different game than most, so it take a big learning curve but can give thousands of hours of fun.

What can I say, it's a laggy, buggy, janky piece of crap. It's great, highly recommended. Seriously fun game, easy to get lost in, high replayability. You can do pretty much whatever you want to do, wanna kill zombies? You can do that, wanna do farming? You can do that too. Wanna do pvp? Sure no problem. 10/10 would phase through a fence in my car, and then spend 30 minutes trying to get it out by piling dirt on top of it again.

Dayz In A Nutshell download game open game look at server selection Picks an official server Spawns in Looks for gear Dies to zombie respawns Dies to naked guy Respawns Finds decent gear Finds a friend Plays for 20 hours with that friend just to get shot in the back Unistalls Reinstalls f*ck community servers Downloads DZSA Game = Good

If you like getting sick for no reason, or you just wanna guzzle gas til you die (roughly 4 Gal). This is the game for you. Do not hesitate to buy this classic!!!

Gone along way from a mod for a mil sim. Cant stress enough how this game is not for everyone. You will be walking, dying, getting sick, getting killed by wolves, killed by those you trust, getting launched. But yet you manage to have fun after the first 300 hours when you know how to stay alive. Wish their were helicopters.

2000 hour + playing Arma 2 DayZ mod, when standalone came out I was horrified with its state. I kept up with product development, and every once in a while maybe I'd install and try again, to be semi-impressed but mostly still horrified. GLIIITCHY zombies, terribly clunky mechanics.. and that's even comparing to Arma 2 xD I was never able to fully get into it, but over time I noticed the game gaining popularity on well-optimized community servers. It was clear people were enjoying it. When Livonia became available to everyone (even though I had already paid for it), I figured it was a good time to give the game another shot. It felt significantly better. The mechanics were much smoother, I’d say it's more refined than Arma 3 in some ways. I actually found myself enjoying it quite a bit - That said, there were still a few bugs here and there, and the zombies, while improved, still felt a bit underwhelming I decided to reinstall the game in June 2025, and to my surprise, it’s running better than ever. I’ve already spent nearly 50 hours on community servers, and it’s been an incredibly enjoyable experience. The mechanics feel tight and responsive, the graphics are well-optimized, and the gunplay is excellent - honestly comparable to Arma Reforger in terms of realism and intensity. Zombies have seen noticeable improvements too. While there's still room for refinement, most remaining issues seem tied to latency. With a good ping, the zombie encounters are far more satisfying and immersive. DayZ is the alpha dog in the survival apocalypse genre. Its commitment to realism and tension is unmatched, and few things get your adrenaline pumping like a high-stakes PvP encounter in this game. Definitely recommend giving it a run

it is hard when you first start but after a hour or two of playing the game becomes an incredbaly fun so dont quit right away give it a far try

fun game , very hard at first , extremely realistic , if u play with friends its very fun but also very nice solo experience , you will put hours into the game just to get basic gear and you will die A LOT either from hurnger , dieseses ,zombies or other players so you need to keep an eye for many things. Even though sometimes its a little discouraging when you get a lot of good gear and die. Its worth a shot imo. If you want a game like rust slow pace more realistic and EXTREMLY better community and more fun in general this is the game for you

pretty difficult but the community is funny and the game is good.

errrrrrrm, fam its it, get some cat food, somthing to hit them growlas with and get in.

Amazing game! started off starving with little food finally made it out of spawn town and found a chicken that i then punched to death and then carried it by its broken neck the the next 5 small villages i had no matches so i couldn't cook it then died of starvation 5 stars!!!!!