izigame.me

Where to begin really, I was impressed enough by the trailer and the interesting idea to buy the game without looking much into it, so really I didn't know what to expect other than the fact it would have survival elements and was based around a group of civilians in a war zone.
My first impression would have to have been the amazing artwork - the level of detail that has gone into every single part of the game's visuals is stunning, with many rooms having stories of their own to tell (for example, at one point you might walk into a shelled out room with some children's drawings on the wall). This factored heavily into my enjoyment of the game itself, as, along with excellent audios it drew me further into the game and made me connect far more with the characters.
This connection with the characters is what really made this game shine. From intially not knowing the various people you control very well, you get fed tidbits about their past, and some of their personalities are apparent from how they react to things you might make one of the characters, or indeed, themselves, do. The immersion was so great that when two characters died (actually my third and fourth to die, my first two had died pretty early on and thus I hadn't grown attached to them yet), which prompted a third to leave and never come back, I actually cheered as I wouldn't have to watch him suffer the slow deaths that his friend had. Of course, this enthusiasm was short lived as it suddenly dawned on me, he had left me with only one character, who was also dying of her wounds. The first playthrough ended therefore after five hours of me bumbling about blindly, failing miserably, and being utterly captivated as events unfolded; fighting desperately against the odds to save the lives of my characters.
Another plus was the fact that not every single NPC is a raving lunatic planning to murder and/or eat you as is so commonly done in other games set in survival based settings. There are some people with... issues, sure; there are a refreshing number of people who don't just shoot you or stab you in the back.
Altogether, I found the game to be one of the best of its kind that I have ever played; I even enjoyed the more mundane moments such as chosing where to place my new furniture (Yeah, trading all my medical supplies to buy materials to make a few armchairs didn't back fire on me at all, honest!). The scavenging is intuitive - the NPCs don't mind too much if you just pick up a few bits of rubble which is strewn about the place, but start picking up stuff they've put in their cuboards? They might object just a little to that one.
As for the combat... Well, I sucked at it so can't really go into much detail. Turns out trying to punch someone in the face when they have a shotgun and a buddy armed with an AK standing next to them is a bad idea. I did manage to escape from several combat situations, though in one case 'escaping' meant a slow, lingering death as the wound gradually worsened over the course of several days as I had no bandages to treat him with. So yeah, combat exists, but with the risks of infections and so on, it can be risky to attempt.
Altogether - I found the game excellent in virtually every way and far surpassing what I had even begun to expect. I look forward to spending the next few weeks playing it, as it has massively increased replayability by having randomness added not only to the daily events which can occur, but also to the various key events, even including the length of the wars (Sadly enough, I failed miserably despite having an apparently relatively short war to survive through, so I dread to think how badly I will fail at long ones).