it's easily one of the roughest gems that exists on the steam store right now next to a plethora of other games, me and a friend still regret not buying it when it was $29 during that free weekend
spent 26 hours on it total during that weekend, it's an entirely different experience in and of itself and deserves its place as a survival game
we skimped and bought arma 2 just to play that dayz and it's so lacking in QOL cahnges and community it was astonishing
if it ever dips below $40, it's more than likely worth the purchase - people will tell you it's rightfully scuffed in a lot of ways but the absolute foundation of fun is in place and can't be shook
probably the biggest thing people never talk about is world design - there's no generation of bushes or fauna, wandering a forest truly feels like you're moving rather than passing the same chunks of flipped and pre-fabricated land, you can use specific bushes near objects as landmarkers, watch the trees sway in the high winds (which is intensely fascinating at high FPS) and in general stop and smell the roses between your work. People shit all over it but there really isn't any match to slowly walking down a road between massive apartment blocks, taking in the sights around you before climbing one for the night and watching the sunset. It's eerily similar to wandering an abandoned road irl and listening to nature around you
sound design and world is great but the removal of its weaponry scuffed release so hard I don't think it'll recuperate until mid-february
It's worth some form of money though