Watch the first gameplay footage from multiplayer zombie game Dead Dozen

The announcement of Dead Dozen—a multiplayer ghouls vs survivors game from the creators of The Wild Eight—created a bit of a buzz, but would-be fans were after some gameplay footage before passing judgment. Developer Fntastic has now obliged, releasing the first video of the game in action (above).

One of 12 players is randomly assigned to be a monstrous ghoul at the start of the round, with the other 11 picking between four survivor roles: scout, offense, support and defense. There's sub-categories within those roles, with one offense subclass getting a taser and a stamina boost, for example.

The survivors have to barricade themselves in a building, while the ghoul has to infiltrate it (by jumping down an elevator shaft in the video) and kill as many of the survivors as they can. Dead survivors come back to life on the opposing team and try to hunt down their former friends. I was hoping the dead would be reanimated with grotesque features or an extra arm but, disappointingly, it looks like they just wake up in exactly the same state, except they've lost their gun.

The first thing you'll notice is that it lacks polish. The shooting looks wonky, the guns have zero recoil and bullets seem to lack impact. The barricade building looks pretty thin too, with players just knocking one plank across a door and shoving a lightweight cabinet across the threshold. It is pre-alpha footage, mind, so it should only improve from here.

And there are some promising ideas. The final fight in the video shows the ghouls and his minions break into a room by tearing chunks in the wall and trying to funnel through. The fact that the environments will be destructible is a good thing, and makes it seem even more like a horror version of Rainbow Six Siege.

The first alpha version of the game is due to launch on January 8. You can buy access for $14.99 on the game's website.

Samuel is a freelance journalist and editor who first wrote for PC Gamer nearly a decade ago. Since then he's had stints as a VR specialist, mouse reviewer, and previewer of promising indie games, and is now regularly writing about Fortnite. What he loves most is longer form, interview-led reporting, whether that's Ken Levine on the one phone call that saved his studio, Tim Schafer on a milkman joke that inspired Psychonauts' best level, or historians on what Anno 1800 gets wrong about colonialism. He's based in London.