The outbreak hit the Pacific Northwest. Hold the line. A virus got out of a lab in South Lake Union, and now the dead walk from Tacoma to Bellevue. Survive the rounds, take the city back block by block, or get in and get out with what you can carry. Solo or with friends, on real streets.
LITEPlay PNZ LITE in your browserNo download · Windows, Mac, iPhone, Android · Cross-play. Not compatible with PNZ BETA.Free. Windows 10/11 or macOS 11+, about 215–260 MB. Includes the Seattle map. Mac and PC play together.
The outbreak
It started in a biotech lab in South Lake Union. Within a week it was riding the light rail. Within a month whole neighborhoods were gone, and the infected were fast, relentless and past saving. First Hill General is still standing, and Dr. Imani Reyes is racing to build a vaccine before there's no one left to give it to.
That's where you come in. Burn the infection hives and the streets start to clear. Set up a safe zone and a block belongs to the living again. Take the next one and it gets harder. Raiders under a warlord called Rook hold Belltown, and past them, at the Center Tower, Patient Zero is waiting.
Think round-based zombie co-op, extraction shooter and open-world liberation in one game, played on a map built from real street, terrain and building data. If you know Seattle, you'll know where you are.
Pick your fight
Hold Pioneer Square against endless rounds of zombies. How far can you get before it all falls apart?
A 12-mission campaign that takes the city back from the outbreak one neighborhood at a time.
Everything you carry is at stake. Get to the helicopter or lose it all.
In the game
Walk into buildings, climb to the roofs, ride the trains, or steal a car. Every shot below is from the game. Click one for a closer look.
Where it happens
Seattle comes with the game. Puget Sound is a free add-on download, and more cities are on the way.
Pioneer Square to Capitol Hill, with walk-in landmarks, trains and the waterfront.
Included
Seattle to Tacoma, Bremerton to Bellevue: about 900 square miles (33 by 28 miles) of real streets, water and islands. Ride walk-on ferries across the Sound, or fast travel from the map.
8.3 GB, download in gameOpen Play in the game and press a map's button to download it. Stop whenever you like: it carries on where it left off.
What's new
Already installed? New versions show up on the home screen with an Update now button.
We know
This is an early build, and things will look rough in places. Last reviewed for v0.5.9.
Automated tests have occasionally seen a ferry or streetcar ride fail, then pass on retry. We haven't pinned down the cause.
18 of the 385 joins between map sections have a step over 1 m, so some bridges and raised roads will jolt you.
Co-op on this map and its regional trains and buses haven't been tested yet. Driving out of Seattle to the south and east works; heading north, test cars still get stuck at one spot on Capitol Hill.
Missions and Extraction loot containers stay mostly in Seattle for now.
Strict or corporate networks can block a friend from connecting. Use Tailscale and Join by IP instead.
James Street still sits well below the real ground where it passes under I-5.
Some junctions show stray yellow marks, and some bike lanes have jagged green edges.
Some piers look like earth mounds with no pilings, and some retaining walls and garage faces look flat.
On our Intel laptop at 1080p: about 95 to 100 FPS driving and 80 to 88 at the story start, but 60 to 80 in big downtown fights once it's warm. Try Low quality or a lower Render scale.
The installer isn't code signed yet, so SmartScreen may warn you. See Install below.
Before you drop in
The things worth knowing before your first match.
You'll pick up guns, points and upgrades in one small area before the open world opens up.
Die out there and your backpack is gone. Only what you bring out on the helicopter goes to your Locker.
In Liberation, each district you free gives you a resupply point and a fast travel stop.
In Liberation and Extraction, press heal at full health with an Antiviral Shot to drop every zombie within 25 ft. The Cure Burst field upgrade does the same.
Friends can't drop in once a match is running. They'll need to wait until it ends.
Quick Match finds a public party. Create online party gives you a 6-letter code. Add friends with your 8-letter Friend code under Social.
Go to Settings, then Graphics, and lower Quality or Render scale. Press F3 in game to see your FPS.
The map is an 8.3 GB download. You can stop anytime and it picks up where it left off.
Questions
Yes. PNZ: Pacific Northwest Zombies is free to download and play on Windows and Mac. Optional in-game items are one-time purchases tied to your VGS account; nothing is required to play.
Yes. The maps are rebuilt from real data: OpenStreetMap streets, buildings and transit, USGS 3DEP elevation, and real building footprints and heights. The downtown Seattle map that comes with the game is 2.5 by 2.5 miles (about 6.5 square miles), from Pioneer Square to Capitol Hill, with the Space Needle, Smith Tower, the Great Wheel, Link light rail, buses, streetcars and the waterfront.
About 900 square miles of land and water: 139 map tiles of 4,096 meters, spanning 33 miles north to south (North Seattle to Puyallup) and 28 miles east to west (Bremerton to Bellevue). It includes Tacoma, Bainbridge and Vashon islands and more than 30 towns, 6 real walk-on ferry routes, light rail and the Tacoma Narrows bridges. It is a free download inside the game (about 8.5 GB on disk).
Three modes. Survival: hold Pioneer Square against endless rounds of zombies with up to 8 players. Liberation: a 12-mission story campaign that takes the city back from the outbreak one neighborhood at a time, up to 8 players. Extraction: free roam for up to 24 players where you loot, fight zombies and Raiders, and reach the helicopter or lose everything. You can walk into buildings, climb to roofs, ride trains and ferries, and hotwire cars.
A virus escaped a biotech lab in South Lake Union and the Pacific Northwest fell to the outbreak. At First Hill General, Dr. Imani Reyes is building a vaccine. Liberation sends you out to burn infection hives and set up safe zones block by block, through Belltown, where the Raider warlord Rook holds out, to the Center Tower, where Patient Zero waits.
A 64-bit Windows 10 or 11 PC with Vulkan graphics, or a Mac on macOS 11 or later (Apple Silicon or Intel). The base game with Seattle installs to about 355 MB. Multiplayer needs internet or a LAN; solo play works offline.
Yes, with PNZ Lite, the free browser version of PNZ: Pacific Northwest Zombies. Play PNZ Lite in any browser. Survive the outbreak across the Puget Sound on a phone, tablet or PC. It is lighter than the full game and does not share multiplayer sessions with the Windows and Mac game.
PNZ uses your free VGS account. Create one at visoravgs.com/account, then log in on the game's home screen with the same username and password. Purchases, stats and achievements are saved to the account.
Visora Gaming Studio (VGS), an independent game studio in Washington State, USA, and a trade name of Visora LLC. Contact: team@visoravgs.com.
The installer is not code signed yet, so Windows SmartScreen may say it is from an unrecognized publisher. Choose More info, then Run anyway. On a Mac, open System Settings, Privacy & Security, and click Open Anyway the first time.
Get in
To remove it: Settings > Apps > Installed apps > PNZ > Uninstall. It asks whether to keep your saves (kept unless you say so).
Will it run?
| System | 64-bit Windows 10 or 11, or macOS 11+ (Apple Silicon or Intel) |
|---|---|
| Graphics | Vulkan (PC) or Metal (Mac) |
| Download | 213 MB base game, Seattle included |
| Disk space | About 355 MB installed, plus about 8.5 GB for Puget Sound |
| Online | Internet or LAN for multiplayer. Solo works offline |
