Zenless Zone Zero (ZZZ) is a visually exceptional ARPG set in a sprawling urban environment. Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
Zenless Zone Zero Review Overview
What is Zenless Zone Zero?
Set in a post-apocalyptic metropolitan city called New Eridu, the last urban civilization that survived the apocalypse. As New Eridu continued to survive and thrive, inhabitants were able to combat the materializing Hollows
that brought disaster, ruin, and the Ethereal
monsters to life within its pocket dimensions.
Zenless Zone Zero features very stylish fast-paced action combat with a gorgeously fluid and cinematic art style. Players will be able to execute all sorts of attacks and combos to defeat the dangerous Ethereals. It will also implement roguelike features into its exploration.
Zenless Zone Zero features:
⚫︎ Roguelike progression
⚫︎ Urban jungle-themed environments
⚫︎ Character gacha
⚫︎ Bonding events
⚫︎ Arcade minigames
⚫︎ Real-time combat
⚫︎ RPG-like character progression
For more gameplay details, read everything we know about Zenless Zone Zero's gameplay and story.
 Epic |
 Playstation |
 Google Play |
 App Store |
Zenless Zone Zero Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Well-Defined Models Incredible Animations Pretty-As-Heck Interface Extremely Quick Dailies |
Terrible QTE System Mixed Bag of Character Designs Unimpressive Roguelike Progression Extremely Grindy |
Zenless Zone Zero Overall Score - 80/100
Zenless Zone Zero is a very impressive ARPG. While the gameplay can certainly use a few improvements here and there, particularly with the impact of its roguelike upgrades and its intrusive QTE system, it’s still an incredible piece of work. The audiovisuals are nothing short of outstanding, and the expressiveness of each character stands out among its peers and competitors. Be warned, however, that it also uses the developers’ standard 50/50 system in its gacha.
Zenless Zone Zero Story - 7/10
Pacing is quite important in telling a story, sure, but context is also just as essential. Zenless Zone Zero nails this idea properly by avoiding topics that require deep rabbit hole dives into its lore early on in the story. However, the main story narrative contrasts a lot with the game’s more lively style, and the dialogues are often too stuffy to be engaging. The character bonding stories are also nice, sure. But since Trust Events repeat, they quickly overstay their welcome.
Zenless Zone Zero Gameplay - 7/10
While Zenless Zone Zero’s combat runs very smoothly, with some particularly explosive moments that leave you wanting more. It’s been refined to the point where combos at turning points such as when enemies are stunned require incredibly precise rotations. However, the majority of it is filled with dull stretches of hitting combos that barely provide visual or practical gratification while waiting for your gauges to top up or the enemy to get stunned. Its most offensive flaw is the extremely intrusive QTE system, which regularly stops the combat’s fast pace dead in its tracks just to force you to follow its instructions. Aside from that, its roguelike progression is barely noticeable due to the lack of specializations you can opt into.
Zenless Zone Zero Visuals - 10/10
To say that Zenless Zone Zero’s visuals are impressive is a massive understatement. There’s little doubt that the developers made great efforts to make the game as visually pleasing as possible. Not only is the model quality excellent, but even the animation and camera work are nothing short of outstanding. The only real issue here is that many of the characters have pretty unimpressive designs.
Zenless Zone Zero Audio - 9/10
Zenless Zone Zero has a very nice set of sound effects that appropriately delivers the well-rounded combat experience. The voice acting is also really good as a bonus, which helps in making fights more animated. Unfortunately, the sound effects do sound a bit muffled, and much of the regular grind doesn’t come with voice acting to give it life.
Zenless Zone Zero Value for Money - 7/10
Featuring the all-too-familiar 50/50 system, Zenless Zone Zero’s gacha can be a wild ride of joys and heartbreaks within a very short period of time. Combine this with the game’s meager economy, and you’ll be forced to skip multiple banners to guarantee characters that you really want. On the other hand, the game’s roguelike system makes for a very replayable game that isn’t limited to the boring daily activities that most mobile titles have.
Zenless Zone Zero Review: A Visually Solid Gem
It’s no secret that miHoYo, the developers of Zenless Zone Zero, has had their eyes on the roguelike and rogue-lite genres for several years now. Honkai Impact 3rd had Elysian Realm, Genshin Impact had Imaginarium Theater, and Honkai: Star Rail had Simulated Universe and Divergent Universe. So, it was only really a matter of time before miHoYo would release a title that focused a large part of its gameplay on it.
At least in terms of weekly activities.
But despite sharing the ARPG genre with two of its more prominent older sisters, Zenless Zone Zero manages to differentiate itself from them, and even from games with a strong parallel to it such as Punishing Gray Raven and its Cursed Waves mode. That’s because, for those titles, their roguelike modes are just that—a mode. But in Zenless Zone Zero, you'll encounter its roguelike elements even outside of where you'd normally expect them to be, such as in Rally commissions.
The most striking thing about Zenless Zone Zero is its aesthetics. It’s a veritable audiovisual feast with a color-rich user interface, impressive (and expressive) character models, and fluid combat. It really goes hard with its style, making it blatantly obvious what the developers’ priorities were.
However, that may also be where its weaknesses lie. While the game’s superficial qualities are top-notch, it suffers from aspects beyond what the eyes and ears can quickly distinguish.
As an ARPG with roguelike elements, its core gameplay, particularly in the weekly Hollow Zero explorations, revolves around the usual real-time slap-enemies-around-until-they-despawn combat loop where, once you’re successful, the game rewards your efforts with a random set of upgrades. These upgrades allow you to reach further heights using the same set of characters, but are completely reset when you fail the scenario.
Roguelikes have various aspects to them that make them appealing. One of those is that their systems support and encourage diversification of playstyles. For example, in Honkai: Star Rail, you can do a run that relies solely on Damage Over Time (DOT), or one that makes full use of Follow-Up Attacks instead. These upgrades allow you to form each run in accordance with your team.
In Zenless Zone Zero’s case, the upgrades (Resonia) that you obtain after every run might have different effects, but they lack the qualities necessary to create diversification. That is, the effects don’t make enough of an impact to truly change or adapt to your playstyle. At the very least, they don’t annoy you enough to warrant a reset when you keep losing out on the upgrades you actually want.
The reason lies in the fact that most of the Resonia you obtain only increases certain stats either passively or under certain conditions. While that’s a bit of a given for the passive bonuses, the conditional ones will rarely, if ever, require you to do something that you hadn’t already been doing in the first place. In addition, most Resonias don’t deal with conditions that only certain characters have access to.
For example, one of Honkai: Star Rail’s team archetypes specialize in dealing large amounts of damage through the use of DOT effects. In the Simulated Universe, you can take dozens of upgrades that make use of and strengthen their effects. But in Zenless Zone Zero, the upgrades are spread so far apart that you can only take a few of such specialized upgrades that it doesn’t feel at all impactful.
Now you might be thinking, “I can just not play with the dedicated roguelike mode, then.” That’s not recommended, unfortunately. Just like miHoYo’s other titles, it’s part of their weekly chores and provides a not insignificant amount of gacha currency (unless you’re a whale).
Essentially, if you’re a free-to-play user or one that simply dabbles in monthly subscription packs and battle passes, you’re going to have a bad time with its gacha if you don’t play it often. And by often I mean up to five times a week.
But aside from that, the biggest issue in Zenless Zone Zero is that its own combat mechanics are detrimental to the experience. Specifically, its Quick Time Event (QTE) mechanic is so intrusive that it stops the fight for a few seconds demanding for you to switch into another character, and its gauge-based skills mean that most of your time fighting enemies will be spent stringing combos that quickly becomes repetitive due to its lack of attack buttons.
On the other hand, those issues might be entirely deliberate. In a way, one can even interpret Zenless Zone Zero's overall design as being apt for a mobile title, as its lack of buttons and reliance on repetition feels pretty good while you're on a touchscreen.
Unfortunately, as Zenless Zone Zero is an action RPG at heart, you will be exposed to its flawed combat system extensively. While the roguelike progression through Resonias is pretty underwhelming, it pales in comparison to the kind of disappointment you’ll get in fights.
Thankfully, the game is so visually beautiful that it’s extremely difficult to dislike it. The characters also have a very wide variety of personalities and quirks that they can be forgiven for having such standard or borderline boring designs. Plus, the arcade games are very fun.
Pros of Zenless Zone Zero
| Things Zenless Zone Zero Got Right |
|---|
|
Well-Defined Models Incredible Animations Pretty-As-Heck Interface Extremely Quick Dailies |
Well-Defined Models
Zenless Zone Zero’s character models are undoubtedly a cut above the rest. Honestly, it may be the best among its peers. While many other mobile games seem like they’re trying to recreate a flat plane with their 3D models, ZZZ’s are blatantly three-dimensional. This gives them a truly solid presence on your screen, where depth is as important as breadth. In combat, the developers use this aspect to great effect with the great camera angles they employ using cut-ins.
Incredible Animations
Each character’s expressiveness is a treat to watch in the game’s story scenarios. The way their faces twist and turn with every changing emotion gives the game a lot of life, especially in these sections where some could get bored with all of the exposition.
The work done on its animation manifests in more than just its cutscenes, though. It’s also there for all to see as you engage in Hollow Zero Investigations (basically dungeon diving). That’s because, while its combat certainly isn’t very flashy, each character’s movements are well-defined and telegraphed. This allows you to keep track of your agent easily, despite however many things are happening on the screen simultaneously.
Each skill cut-ins are quite impressive as well, which also fully utilizes the game’s impressive camera use.
Pretty-As-Heck Interface
Zenless Zone Zero’s interface reflects its nature as a game; a lively, energetic title full of the nice kind of vibes that you would expect from a populated downtown market. Similarly, its UI is a colorful and rich collage of buttons and icons that resemble old electronics.
This liveliness is particularly noticeable in the character deployment screen. It’s almost as if the game refuses to stand still for a moment as it displays each character with an idle animation of looking around, breathing, and blinking.
I’ve heard of a lot of complaints regarding its navigation system based on TVs. But, I find it quite charming and easy to understand. Sure, the developers could have made us walk through the dangerous hollows with our characters instead, but that’s no different from many other games at this point.
Extremely Quick Dailies
Clocking in at barely a minute to clear unless you count the opening prompts and animations, Zenless Zone Zero's dailies are perhaps the quickest one to clear among all of its peers. All you have to do is log in, stock your shelves with videos for the day, get a scratch card next door, and then buy a cup of coffee. After that, you're free to do anything else you want to do.
This is a significant matter since the game is essentially telling you that there are no real chores to do every day. You can spend the rest of your playtime suffering on Hollow Zero, which is the game's main weekly dungeon, consuming your stamina however you want, partake in the arcade's many minigames, or whatever else catches your eye.
Cons of Zenless Zone Zero
| Things That Zenless Zone Zero Can Improve |
|---|
|
Terrible QTE System Mixed Bag of Character Designs Unimpressive Roguelike Progression Extremely Grindy |
Terrible QTE System
As an action game, Zenless Zone Zero had an obligation to present an incredible combat experience to its players. To that end, it implemented great features such as its fighting game-inspired combos and, most notably, parrying. However, it definitely tripped over when implementing its QTE system, which is markedly terrible enough to ruin the entire thing.
Simply put, its QTE system, referred to as Chain Attacks in the game, function by putting you essentially on pause for a couple of seconds when you hit a stunned enemy with something that has a "heavy attack" effect. Then, it displays a depleting bar, showing you an allotted time where you can switch to a different character to perform the Chain Attack with. Time only resumes once the bar completely runs out or when you continue the Chain Attack.
This system is incredibly problematic since that pause does nothing but to put a damper on the combat’s pace. But perhaps the most annoying part about this system is that you can’t do anything to force yourself out of this state. The game is essentially yelling at you to perform the Chain Attack, or be stuck there for the next couple of seconds watching your character’s dramatic pose.
If only this didn’t happen often, there would be no problem. But it does, since every enemy in the game can be stunned. In fact, there’s an entire class of characters that specialize in stunning opponents.
Mixed Bag of Character Designs
While uniformity does make a world based on societies and civilizations look more realistic, that’s not quite an excuse to have characters that barely look different from an NPC. While there are a number of characters with a unique appeal, such as Nicole, Lycaon, Ellen, and Koleda, the vast majority of the characters don’t have the same striking quality to them as one would expect.
Unimpressive Roguelike Experience
Roguelikes tend to pride themselves on creating wildly different scenarios and experiences depending on your luck, there’s barely any of that in Zenless Zone Zero. The main issue is the lack of variety in the way bonuses are provided as you clear stages that really make an impact.
Sure, there are upgrades that have conditionals attached to them, but these are rarely requirements that make you do things that you wouldn’t already be doing in the first place. If anything, the game should commit to more exclusive upgrades and prepare Resonias that only affect a certain subset of characters.
Extremely Grindy
It really shouldn’t come as a surprise that Zenless Zone Zero, just like most of its peers, will eat your time, chew on it for three hours, and spit it out with barely anything to show. This is mainly due to using the same equipment system as its older sisters in Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail.
Credit where it’s due, though; Zenless Zone Zero’s equipment are far less enslaved to terrible RNG as Honkai: Star Rail’s are. After all, only three out of six of your item slots are subject to the first RNG check in farming; the main stat roll. Compared to Honkai: Star Rail’s four out of six, that’s practically a steal. On the other hand, Zenless Zone Zero’s equipment stages does cost 20 more stamina than Honkai: Star Rail…
Anyway, that’s not the end of it. All of them are also beneficiaries of the worst luck-based mechanic in the game’s daily grind: getting the correct substats and upgrades. You can’t even directly use them to upgrade each other, just like how Honkai: Star Rail allows you to do it. Nah, man, you’ll have to grind for exp materials, too.
Is Zenless Zone Zero Worth It?
It’s too pretty to ignore
While Zenless Zone Zero’s combat is certainly something to think twice about, especially if you're used to the more complex ARPGs, its audiovisuals are impressive enough to leave a lasting impression. And since gameplay generally evolves after a few updates, there’s little doubt that Zenless Zone Zero will only improve going forward.
However, do keep in mind that this game will take up a whopping 50GB on your drive if you’re on PC. That’s more than double the size of Wuthering Waves and almost 10GB larger than Honkai: Star Rail.
Still, I definitely recommend at least checking the game out!
| Platforms | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Epic |
Playstation |
Google Play |
App Store |
||
Zenless Zone Zero FAQ
Is Zenless Zone Zero a gacha game?
Yes, players must engage in its gacha system to pull for Agents and Bangboos.
Does Zenless Zone Zero have an open world?
The game features a limited open world where you can explore the streets and alleys of your locale, but combat is limited in instanced dungeons where physical barriers exist.
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Zenless Zone Zero Product Information
 | |
| Title | ZENLESS ZONE ZERO |
|---|---|
| Release Date | July 4, 2024 |
| Developer | miHoYo |
| Publisher | miHoYo |
| Supported Platforms | PC(EGS), PlayStation 5, iOS, Android |
| Genre | Action, RPG |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| Rating | Teen |
| Official Website | Zenless Zone Zero Official Website |
