We have another zombie-survival game on the way, but it sure has the star power and development chops to turn some heads! Undawn is the newest open-world action title featuring everyone’s favourite undead foes, with an emphasis on survival, base building, and multiplayer. If you want to think of it as a deeper H1Z1, a more collaborative State of Decay, or a less troll-ridden Rust—you’d be on the right track!

To really put the cherry on top, Undawn features Will Smith as an NPC named Trey Jones who will help the player along the way, all while giving off some serious I Am Legend vibes. Not only does this mark Will Smith’s video game debut, but Undawn is coming from the team behind mobile juggernauts PUBG Mobile and Apex Legends Mobile—Lightspeed Studios. Level Infinite is on to publish and has its own impressive catalogue to boot.

Undawn is a deep, post-apocalyptic survival experience with fast-paced action gameplay and hyperrealistic mechanics. From top to bottom, this title feels like quite the amalgamation of ideas from several areas of thought, which come together nicely to form a package that feels like it could have some longevity—even if it is mobile-centric.

Looking and feeling a bit like H1Z1 in terms of graphics, art style, and the third-person point of view chosen by the developers, Undawn matches up with some of the studio’s roots in PUBG, as well as a coincidental genre match with the zombie-survival shooter gameplay. While it may look and feel like other games, Undawn does offer a deeper experience than most I’ve seen on mobile, especially when compared to some of the large-scale experiences it closely resembles on PC and console.

Undawn is a deep, post-apocalyptic survival experience with fast-paced action gameplay and hyper-realistic mechanics.

With an expansive open world—which covers around a 6-mile by 6-mile square in real-world measurements—Undawn offers a ton of area to explore while featuring unique characteristics for different biomes and sudden, drastic weather conditions that will influence the player’s choices. The best part of it all is the idea of playing through it all collaboratively with friends from across the globe in a setting that “feels like an MMORPG.” Get those WoW raid parties ready!

When developer Lightspeed Studios says their game is “hyperrealistic” they mean it—get ready for some tubs and flossing! Personal hygiene is an important factor of Undawn, as cleaning clothes, bathing, and more great habits can make it harder for the infected zomboids to detect you via smell, which turns out is a good thing, for sure. While working through some of these mechanics seems like they will tread the line of tedium very closely, it makes for an interesting planning phase before runs.

Possibly the most important part of the pre-planning phases, however, is where you will rest your head the night before making such dangerous treks into the wild. With extensive features allowing for tons of options, Undawn’s base building seems to let the player go in nearly any direction they would like. From the wacky, bachelor-pad-esque mansion that feels like something straight out of Just Cause or Saint’s Row, to a legitimate fortress built to fend off enemy hordes and store all your goodies—Undawn lets you decide the direction you’d like to take things in.

The biggest mantra the developers are trying to give the player with their experience in Undawn is simple: Survive your way, play your way. Throughout your time in this survival adventure, you’ll be allowed to explore, build, cooperate, or raid other players to your heart’s content—even if it does end up getting a bit troll-ridden. Squad up with friends and do whatever it is you like, which sounds like a good time even if nothing gets done, as gaming with friends can sometimes devolve into.

The biggest mantra the developers are trying to give the player with their experience in Undawn is simple: Survive your way, play your way.

Co-op dungeons and raids offer more places for you to group up with your buddies or even just to fight other players and see who has done the better job collecting—mano a mano. At the end of the day, more experiences that you can jump into with friends is never a bad thing, even if the mobile components feel like they would be a bit wonky for someone who traditionally has only been a console or PC player. Nonetheless, Undawn can also be played on PC, but the makers of some of the biggest mobile titles in the world definitely know what they’re doing.

Getting into another deep system of Undawn is the crafting, which features the ability to make firearms and special weapons like drones, mines, or auto-turrets to protect your base or clear away the infected from a zone you’d like to spend some more time in. Hunting will also be an important component of Undawn, where wild animals in the woods or fishing on a local lake can lead to original recipes in an also-deep cooking mechanic.

Additionally, the weapon choices in Undawn are out of this world, with so many different types of guns with different attachments and options available to really customize the kind of combat experience the player would most enjoy. Feeling almost like Escape From Tarkov in the way that you can bust out different combinations from the same base gun, Undawn brings the heat.

There is a ton to do in Undawn, between the exploration, crafting, hunting and cooking, base building, material gathering, multiplayer raids and dungeons, and Will Smith happy hour—Undawn has plenty for a hungry player to sink their teeth into. Let’s just hope they’re the only ones sinking their teeth into anything, and not the aforementioned infected zombie-likes waiting to come to dinner.

There is a ton to do in Undawn, between the exploration, crafting, hunting and cooking, base building, material gathering, multiplayer raids and dungeons, and Will Smith happy hour…

Undawn will release on June 15th, 2023 on iOS, Android, and will have a PC companion version available through Steam. Players can pre-register for this open-world, action-survival RPG right now at the official website to receive several rewards at launch. You can also share the registration page to receive a weapon skin when the game releases next month.