People say it would take away from the feel of the game and I just chuckle. This game is about scavenging and surviving I agree. This game doesn't need L4D or Dead Rising style melee most definitely. However, when it comes down to it the first tool of survival when you have no ammunition / guns is using / SCAVENGING what you can find to defend yourself. If this were real life and I had 0 weapons / 0 ammo my first priority would be to find some sort of object that I could defend myself so that I had the tools to survive a trip out to scavenge weapons and ammunition. I wouldn't just go crouching around in a damn city with a can of beans and road flares. I would find a pipe, a knife, a large stick, a hatchet, anything that could be used to stop me from being killed / turned. Fact of the matter is crude weapons are more prevalent in the world than modern weapons. The tools we use for our everyday lives now are also key to surviving situations like this (if it would ever happen). The drawback to these crude weapons are their lack of safety when using them / the fact that they only last for so long. All you would have to do is make it so you can't swing them while in full sprint so people aren't just running in circles around zombies swinging away. Add durability to the weapons, make them usable for other situations (hatchets being able to cut wood for fires or something), and limit the availability like any other weapon in the game.
