7 Days to Die is what you get when you mix Minecraft, The Walking Dead, and a home improvement simulator where your wallpaper choices can literally kill you. It’s equal parts survival horror and DIY project — only your enemies don’t care about feng shui, just brains.

Atmosphere: Zombies with a Calendar

The game’s defining hook is right in the title: every seventh day, the undead stop shambling and start sprinting in a horde that would make a football crowd jealous. The tension ramps as the red moon rises — and you realise the roof you built with duct tape and hope isn’t going to hold.

The in-between days are quieter (if looting creepy hospitals and fighting zombie dogs counts as “quiet”). On Deck, the world runs smoothly enough, though don’t expect AAA polish — think more “post-apocalypse chic.”

Crafting & Base Building

The crafting system is both deep and overwhelming. There are about 200 recipes for things you’ll never use, and exactly three that stand between you and being zombie lunch. The joy comes in experimentation: cobbling together a bike from scrap, rigging traps, or figuring out that yes, zombies can climb ladders (and they will).

Base building is where chaos meets comedy. Structural integrity is simulated, which means that “floating fortress in the sky” you thought was clever will collapse the moment you add one torch too many.

Combat & Survival

Weapons range from primitive clubs to machine guns, and while combat feels clunky at times, there’s a strange satisfaction in braining a zombie with a spiked baseball bat you crafted yourself.

Survival isn’t just about fighting: you’ll manage food, water, infection, broken limbs, and the creeping dread of running out of duct tape. On permadeath rules, this game is a cruel teacher — one misstep, and seven days of careful prep vanish in a flurry of clawed hands.

Difficulty & Replayability

The beauty of 7 Days to Die is its sandbox nature. You can adjust zombie speed, loot rarity, and horde frequency to tailor the chaos. With friends, it’s comedy gold; solo, it’s tense, punishing, and oddly addictive.

Replayability is nearly infinite — every world is a fresh disaster waiting to happen.

Verdict: 4 Collapsed Bases out of 5

It’s rough around the edges, sure, but 7 Days to Die nails survival tension like few others. The horde nights are unforgettable, the crafting is absurdly deep, and the chaos feels just right.

If you’ve ever wanted a game where “home security” means a trench filled with spikes and a flamethrower turret on the roof, this is it.

Survivor’s Notes

• Best Moment: Discovering the joy of a spiked club on horde night.
• Worst Moment: Watching my entire base collapse because I didn’t respect physics.
• Steam Deck Verdict: Runs well enough for chaos on the go. Perfect for short sessions — just don’t play at night if you value sleep.
• Immersion Factor: Creeping through abandoned houses with distant zombie groans in headphones is peak tension. Until you fall through the floorboards, of course.

More from Survivor Incognito

• Survivor’s Review Hub — all reviews in one place.
• Seven Days to Survive – 7 Days to Die Hub — permadeath diaries, guides, and chaos.
• Day One Diaries — where the pain begins.
• Survivor Incognito Home — where chaos is portable.