Summary
FatalZoneis an Early-Access auto shooter very obviously inspiredby games like Vampire Survivors, Brotato, and more. However, whileFatalZonewears its inspirations on its sleeves, it does a whole lot even in the current stages ofits Early-Access stateto innovate on the auto shooterand roguelike genres.
The idea of going out on ‘Raids’ which are the auto shooter sections to then bring those materials back and slowly build up a base camp is so unique. However, picking which locations at the base camp to upgrade first matters a lot, and players need to know which upgrades tend to have the biggest immediate effect.
Upgrade Effect
Gate
The location from which players depart to go on Raids to different areas.
Upgrades grant access to new locations.
First up at the bottom of the rankings are Gate upgrades, surprisingly. As it turns out, each of the levels inFatalZonehas a multitude of ascending unlockable difficulties such as Noob, Experienced, Seasoned, Professional, Invincible, and Legend.
To unlock each subsequent difficulty, players will need to beat the level on the previous one, which can take a bit. Because of this, there’s really not much of an incentivized rush for players to unlock more levels quickly. Granted, a change of scenery is always nice, but the baseline difficulty also rises with ease new level, making it even less of a recommended early upgrade.
Gym
As playable Mercs level up through Raids, they can spend Skill Points to unlock unique Perks related to each Merc.
Makes more of the Perk Ranks available for Perk Upgrades.
Next up is the Gym, and this is where players use their Skill Points that they’ll acquireindividually on each characterthey level up through Raids. However, even if players have the required Skill Points, if their Gym isn’t upgraded they won’t be able to invest them in the higher Ranks.
So, it’s usually worth grabbing the first or maybe the second upgrade for the Gym early on, but then leaving it alone for quite a fun runs after. Perks do have a pretty noticeable effect inFatalZone, but not so much that players should put upgrading the Gym above anything ranked higher on this list.
Infirmary
Heals Mercs, Cures their Mutations, & makes Extraction available mid-Raid more often.
Treatment takes less time, and Extraction is available more often.
The Infirmary feels like whereFatalZonehas the most in commonwith something likeDarkest Dungeon, outside ofhow both games' Mercenary hiring works, of course. Basically, at this location, players can heal their Merc and cure their Mutations (though this cures positive Mutations as well). As players accumulate Experience in a Raid, they’ll also accumulate Viral Load. For every 1000 units of Viral Load, their Merc gets a negative status effect (such as -20 percent HP) and a Mutation (such as +15 percent Projectile Speed).
Healing negative status effects at the Infirmary is huge, and healing Mutations is a bit of a risk, but the real reason to upgrade this location early on inFatalZoneis to reduce the amount of time between Extractions during a raid. The higher the Infirmary level, the more often (and more quickly) an Extraction is offered every 2 minutes rather than every 5 minutes.
Upgrade Weapons & Armor before going on a Raid.
Opens up more available Upgrades to Weapons & Armor.
The Weapons Workshop inFatalZoneis an interesting location, as it basically baseline upgrades both the weapon and armor of each individual Merc before they head out on a Raid. the higher the Workshop level (and the more weapon/armor Upgrades that players buy), the more powerful a Merc will feel right at the start of a Raid.
However, this location alongside the Gym are the two that seem to be the most dependent on the HQ’s Upgrade level, so keep that in mind. It’s absolutely worth upgrading this location a couple of times very early on in FatalZone, as even a few bonuses to damage or defense can make all the difference.
Where players hire, reroll, & fire Mercs.
Increases the max amount of available Mercs.
Moving on to the final two recommendations for upgrades, the Recruitment Center and the HQ. The Recruitment Center worksvery similar to the Stage Coach inDarkest Dungeonin that players go here to hire more playable Mercs, to fire ones they don’t like, and to roll for different Mercs with different armor/weapon combinations. Because the primary weapon a Merc carries is RNG-dependent, rerolling at this location matters quite a bit.
Now, it may seem like this location is absolutely not worth upgrading early, but that depends on the player. If a player is more the type to want to try a new Merc as soon as they unlock it, upgrading this location saves them a lot of money in the long run. However, if it’s a player who makes do with whatever they get, this might be lower on their priority list.
HQ
All Unlock Challenges are kept here & influences other building upgrades.
Increase to maximum amount of Mercs hirable and make other building upgrades available.
And for the final and highest recommended location to upgrade, it’s the HQ. The HQ just impacts so many different things when upgraded. Without it, players will often find themselves unable to upgrade the location they actually care about because their HQ isn’t a high enough level. Funnily enough, the ‘hire more Mercs at the same time’ side of the HQ upgrade really doesn’t matter much, it’s just more of a fact that players are going to ‘have’ to upgrade their HQ to make any sort of meaningful progress inFatalZone.
FatalZonewas released on October 23rd, 2023 on PC, Steam, & a variety of other indie game hosting platforms.
