I can't tell if people actually want co-op zombie FPSes anymore

pcgamer.com:

Normally I'd be psyched to learn that legendary filmmaker and noted gamer John Carpenter is making a co-op zombie FPS called Toxic Commando. The trailer, shown during today's Summer Game Fest stream, looks fun and Saber Interactive definitely knows its way around zombie shooters after 2019's World War Z.

Instead, the announcement of another promising zombie co-op FPS has me worried. The Left 4 Dead fan in me wants this kind of game to succeed so badly, but it doesn't seem like zombies (and the zombie-adjacent «infected,» evil sludge, or vampiric cohorts) are really doing it for people anymore.

Back in the early 2010s, when The Walking Dead was the most popular show on TV, zombies saturated the entertainment landscape. The undead were rising at an alarming rate on TV and in movies, but arguably their strongest impact was felt on videogames. People insisted that this whole zombie bubble was about to burst, but pretty much the opposite happened.

Earlier, in the '90s and early '00s, zombies were mostly seen as the basis for survival horror games like Resident Evil. It was 2008's Left 4 Dead that solidified zombies as excellent fodder for co-op shooters, drumming up a new subgenre of FPS and launching a cooperative renaissance that spawned Dead Island, State of Decay, Killing Floor, Zombie Army, Vermintide, World War Z, and Dying Light.

It wasn't until the past few years that I started to think that a zombie shooter malaise may have actually replaced that enthusiasm. We spent 10 years begging Valve to make Left 4 Dead 3, overreacting to every flimsy rumor of its existence. When Turtle Rock reemerged with Back 4 Blood, a spiritual successor that outshines the original in many ways, only a fraction of that enthusiasm was there