Aground Zero

by Aethyna Jan 30, 2024 | 1 Votes | 32 Played | 0 Reviews

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Rogueside , Fancy Fish Games In this game, some unknown force attacked Earth, and in its bombardment of Earth’s surface, a bunch of cryo-sleeping people, including you, were plunged into the deep underground. Awakened from your cryo-sleep, you set about fabricating everything you and your growing colony of survivors to need to survive! Play Now Similar Games

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Summary Plotline Gameplay Community Graphics/ Sound Conclusion

Summary

Aground Zero is the highly anticipated 3D, first-person “sequel” of the popular 2D original sandbox game. In this game, some unknown force attacked Earth, and in its bombardment of Earth’s surface, a bunch of cryo-sleeping people, including you, were plunged into the deep underground. Awakened from your cryo-sleep, you set about fabricating everything you and your growing colony of survivors need to survive by mining the blocks of minerals around you. Upgrade your tools to go further, and ultimately, you might just be able to reach the surface.

Plotline

You were awakened from your cryo-sleep by your personal AI, or PAI for short, and found yourself inside what looks like an underground cavern of sorts. It seems like the bunker that housed your cryopod, along with many others, has collapsed during a heavy bombardment of the Earth’s surface for some unknown threat, trapping you all deep underground.

It’s unsure if you and your little colony are all that’s left of humanity, but you’re determined to find your way to the surface to find out what happened and if you could return to the surface to start anew.

Gameplay

Before you start playing, you’ll be asked to create your character. There are plenty of options available, and though they aren’t as in-depth as Cyberpunk 2077, you can still create an avatar that’s uniquely you. Of course, you’ll need to give the character a name. Once done, you can dive into the game proper!

In terms of its gameplay, it’s pretty similar to the original in the sense that you’ll need to be mining for various minerals and then turning them into more valuable items and more advanced materials. You will start with a set of three very helpful tools – the laser drill (for drilling and disassembling debris you find; comes with a pretty powerful flashlight), the assembler (to craft basic components), and lastly, the fabricator (to build factories and other structures). All of these tools need to be charged with the power from the generator via batteries and can be upgraded via upgrade chips that can be crafted via the Electronics Lab.

Exploration in this game is very similar to Minecraft, except that the goal here is actually to “dig up” since the goal is to reach the surface. There are tougher blocks of soil or rock that will require upgraded tools to access, and these new higher-grade blocks may contain minerals that can’t be found in previous lower-grade ones.

You’ll start by doing everything manually using the tools you have at hand, of course – you can craft quite a bit of items yourself without the need for any workbenches, and well, you can deliver the materials the various factories needed to automatically produce anything you’ve set them to produce. However, Aground Zero is quite similar to Satisfactory or Dwarfheim (the underground portion) because automation is part and parcel of the gameplay. This is where the conveyor belts come in!

In this game, it’s crucial to design your base in such a way that you can fully automate the production of most, if not all, of your craftables. There are many blueprints that you will have access to, with more being unlocked as you progress. Each factory in the game usually comes with clear indicators of the output and input areas, and you can place and rotate your conveyor belts to make sure that the logistics of materials and goods produced make sense. The factories need to be constantly powered to work so you’ll need to make sure that the cables all connect to the coal-powered generator/s.

There are workbenches in this game as well that will need to be manned. In Aground Zero, you’ll eventually be allowed to awaken other cryogenically sleeping survivors from their slumber. In a way, instead of the loneliness of Satisfactory, you also get a bit of colony management here. Your survivors will need to have a place to stay and have their needs fulfilled. These NPCs usually have specialties, too, and it’ll definitely be better if you can assign them to the workstation that matches their talent.

The colony management aspect here is pretty rudimentary, but it works great to complement the other aspects of the game’s gameplay and add a bit more liveliness to the game. Of course, that’s not including your friends whom you can play with since the game supports up to four players locally. Things can definitely get a bit crowded then, especially if you’re just starting out!

Survival in Aground Zero isn’t just all about making sure your character and your colony have enough to eat and be satiated – you have a health bar, too. You can take damage by falling from great enough height. You can also get injured from fighting against some hostile creatures that lurk underground, some of which aren’t even really from this world! There are weapons you can craft, and they can similarly be upgraded. Thankfully, any health loss can be restored through food. Eventually, you’ll even get to ride a submarine and fire torpedoes at enemies.

Community

It’s always more fun to survive with friends. Aground Zero supports up to four players locally, but as pointed out by the game, only one player can use the keyboard and mouse combo. The other players will need to use the controllers. That said, you could have everyone use the controllers if you have four of them around.

Graphics/ Sound

As mentioned before, Aground Zero is made in glorious 3D, but the choice of art style used here can be a bit odd. The visuals are unique, but they aren’t exact eye candies per se. All I’m saying is the graphics might not be everyone’s cup of tea. The game is also in first person, so it feels more like Minecraft now. In terms of sound, the game features a selection of techno and synth music that seamlessly melts from one soundtrack to another.

Conclusion

Aground Zero is, without a doubt, a major improvement to its predecessor. It has everything that made the original Aground so popular while offering a brand 3D new look, storyline, characters, and some mechanics. If you enjoy playing Aground or if you’re a fan of colony sims, sandbox games, and efficiency-driven automation sims, Aground Zero is definitely one game you’ll want to check out!

New Game Added: Aground Zero

by Aethyna Jan 30, 2024

In this game, some unknown force attacked Earth, and in its bombardment of Earth’s surface, a bunch of cryo-sleeping people, including you, were plunged into the deep underground. Awakened from your cryo-sleep, you set about fabricating everything you and your growing colony of survivors to need to survive!