Project Zomboid’s huge Build 42 update adds animals, expanded crafting
by Paul McNally Last Updated July 24, 2026 Read Review You can trust VideoGamer. Our team of gaming experts spend hours testing and reviewing the latest games, to ensure you're…
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Project Zomboid’s long-awaited Build 42 update will receive its full stable release on July 29, bringing sweeping changes to the zombie survival game after years of development and public testing.
Developer The Indie Stone describes Build 42 as one of the broadest updates in Project Zomboid’s history. It expands and refreshes the Knox Country map while introducing animal husbandry, deeper crafting and construction systems, improved lighting, additional environmental storytelling, and numerous quality-of-life changes.
A new trailer has also been released showcasing some of the environments, animals, and survival systems arriving with the update.
What is included in Project Zomboid Build 42?
One of the headline additions is a substantially expanded version of Knox Country, the game’s enormous fictional recreation of zombie-infested Kentucky. Existing areas have been refreshed, while new locations will give experienced players more buildings, wilderness, and potential death traps to explore.
Build 42 also makes considerable changes to crafting and base building. Players will have more options for creating, maintaining, and improving settlements, with the expanded systems intended to support longer-term survival and attempts at becoming self-sufficient.
Animals and animal husbandry add another major layer to the game. Survivors will be able to incorporate livestock, farming, food production, and wilderness survival into their plans, assuming those plans are not immediately ruined by a horde or one badly timed scratch.
The game’s lighting and atmosphere have also been overhauled to make houses, forests, roads, and towns more readable and immersive. Expanded lore and environmental storytelling will provide additional information about Knox Country and the events surrounding its collapse.
Elsewhere, players can expect improvements to the inventory, interface, interactions, and several of the underlying systems that power Project Zomboid’s detailed survival simulation.
The major Build 42 additions include:
- An expanded and refreshed Knox Country map
- Deeper crafting and construction systems
- Animals and animal husbandry
- Improved lighting and atmosphere
- Additional lore and environmental storytelling
- Inventory, UI, interaction, and quality-of-life improvements
Build 42 has been years in the making
Project Zomboid first entered Steam Early Access in 2013 and has since developed into one of the platform’s most detailed survival games.
Its combination of zombie survival, character progression, base building, farming, crafting, multiplayer, and mod support has helped it maintain a dedicated community throughout its lengthy development.
Build 42 has been in production for several years, with players testing unstable versions and providing feedback ahead of the stable launch.
“Build 42 has been a huge undertaking for the team, and we are all incredibly grateful to the community for sticking with us: testing, surviving, dying, and then doing it all again, while providing valuable feedback all along the way,” said Christian Allen, Design Director at The Indie Stone. “Project Zomboid has always been about creating a world where the player tells their own story, and this update gives them even more areas, systems, and tools to create the memories of How They Died.”
Although the update gives survivors considerably more tools for building a sustainable life, Project Zomboid’s core premise remains unchanged. Death is inevitable, and Build 42 simply provides players with many more elaborate ways to reach it.
Project Zomboid Build 42 launches in full on July 29 for PC, Mac, and Linux.
About the Author
Paul McNally has been a prominent games journalist since the 1990s, spending over a decade editing top-selling magazines and websites.
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