bfisher

You can also dress your clan up in the same gang colors which is nice.

You wouldn't hide your identity anyway. We'd just recognize you as the jerk with the mask! I don't know. Eye patches, sunglasses, bandanas, ski-masks, balaclavas, and shemaghs are fine because they look menacing and appropriate. I can even handle ski masks, motorcycle helmets, and the occasional Guy Falkes, Lord Humungous or Insane Clown Posse duct tape face. But it's not supposed to be a cross between Dead Rising and a West Village Halloween parade. I don't want to see a Chernerus full of guys in their bathrobe, horse heads, Optimus Prime, Halo Master Chief MJOLNIR armor, medieval suits of armor, Vikings, Samurai, Marvel or DC characters, fucking Pikachu, Miley Cyrus bears, cow costumes, Blind Melon bee girls, Dragonballs A through Z, SpongeBob Squarepants, anything Star Wars and/or Disney, Star Trek uniforms, a bobble head of A-Rod or Derrick Jeter, any gang from The Warriors or a mask of any US President ever.

Well, we did think it would come out around this time last year. When I first heard about DayZ, it was around a time when people were like "should I buy ArmA II or just wait for the standalone?" In all fairness, while Rocket hasn't actually set a release date, he has created a bit of a "we're just one more bug fix away from Alpha" vibe about the whole thing. But really the reason people are complaining is that they like the DayZ mod and are really excited to play the new SA version. Even if the SA is just the Mod with custom clothes, more enterable buildings, better zombies and some of the other stuff seen in the SA videos, that would still be pretty cool. Although, seeing the recent 1 1/2 hour video, it does seem like there is still a lot of work to be done. Mostly in a lot of little details. But those details add up and make for the overall game experience.

So what's the deal with the weird Lindsey Lohan on Crack zombies?

Haven't played in awhile because no time. Probably will pick it up again once the weather starts getting crappy.

I'd like to see progression in the character's appearance. Like if you don't shave, he grows a beard over time. Or he/she gets fatter or skinnier depending on how often and what he/she eats. I'd think some scripted actions like swapping weapons, bandaging wounds or fixing vehicles could become quicker the more you do them. You character could also develop greater strength, running speed and stamina over time. These are things that aren't reflected by the RL players skill. But certainly no weapon power-ups for completing 20 head shots. That would be stupid.

Really? Now we're DayZ SimCity?

No sleep til Balota - No logging off ever.You want to call it a night, find someplace to hide and hope no one murders you in your sleep.

I turn post processing up when I want to pretend my character has glaucoma.

Oh yeah. (Unless it's changed again), expect that when you get hit by certain zombies (the really fucked up looking ones), you will get a deadly lingering infection that can only be cured by extremely rare anti-biotics.

What a coincidence. Because my character is part of a joint NATO operation to initiate SCARLET OMEGA containment protocols by neutralizing any potential carriers of the virus with extreme prejudice. Initial symptoms of the virus include erratic and sociopathic behavior.

Also keep in mind that with all the new enterable buildings, you can probably have a hundred people hiding in Electro without ever seeing them. Personally, I liked getting up early on a server that is relatively unpopulated, but then starts filling up to near capacity as the day goes on. Sort of adds to the tension of having to get in and out of the major loot areas before the bandits start to "wake up".

I would disagree. As SalamanderAnder's heat map shows, there is a lot of traffic up north. Especially around Stary and NWAF. The problem is the map is so damn BIG. If you distributed all the players on a full server evenly around the map, there would still be something like almost a mile between players. And since we know that the players don't distribute evenly, the congregate around the coasts and hot spots, that's a lot of wilderness to wander around in without coming across another player. The other problem is the giant map is mostly empty and uninteresting. There's a lot of trees and nothing between points of interest. I don't think it's that bad IMHO. It creates this dynamic where you basically spawn into a meat grinder. But if you just want to survive and avoid all that, there's plenty of room to do that up north. The SA should fix a lot of that simply by making more buildings explorable and fleshing out the towns a bit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_Nukem_Forever Duke Nukem Forever - 15 years

I'm sneaking into Cherno on a mission to stock up on some much needed medical supplies. I'm pretty low on blood and I just used my last morphine autoinjector to recover from a devastating one-punch by a zombified Evander Holyfield with retard strength at a barren chopper crash outside Starry, It's early in the morn' so I think it's safe as most people are still curled up in their beds or tents or under an overpass somewhere. Long story short, I make my way around the back of the Cherno hospital since the apartments in front tend to attract passer-bys looking to grab a Saturday Night Special and the nearby grain elevator often makes a convenient sniper perch. I'm about to round the corner when all of a sudden I hear... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzip!! The sound of someone opening their pack! Then I hear it again! Cautiously peeking around the corner, I see a couple of heavily armed fellas with military grade assault weapons rummaging through the hospital. Well, I hate to be one of those jerks who just kill first and ask questions later (in spite of my many stories that seem to always end with "and that's why I had to kill that guy"). But in my weakened state, I simply could not afford to take the chance that these guys might not be in a mood to make friends. Especially with them safe in there and me stuck out on the street. A couple of quick bursts from my M4 renders their hospital visit a moot point. The moral of the story is that even a seemingly small and insignificant detail like opening a pack in the wrong place and time and make the difference between life and death. So pay attention!

Well, since I have a wife and a full time job, I only manage a few hours at a time, every few days or weeks. Maybe if I'm lucky, I might play 5 or so hours on a rainy Sunday afternoon. Once the SA comes out, I'll quit my job and divorce my wife so that won't be a problem anymore. :thumbsup: :D

I'm more inclined to kill zombies now since you can hotkey between your rifle / pistol and melee weapon. The SA zombies sound a lot better since they will be all over the map and respawn from someplace out of sight. That will really change the current dynamic of buildings as zombie zones and woods as safe zones. I might be more inclined to hold up in a building just to set up some choke points so I can't be overwhelmed by zombie hoards out in the open.

Worked our great for me.

You know the deal. You made a stupid mistake and got killed by zombies, bandits, a rock, fell off a roof, whatever. Fortunately you did it near a recognizable landmark and re-spawned close enough to make a bee-line back to your old body to pick up your stuff. But is it legit? I've done it. As recently as a few days ago. But somehow it doesn't feel right. My last character had earned that equipment. Mostly by taking it from people I had stalked and killed (who had superior numbers) or by sneaking into the most dangerous dark corners of Chernarus. Now it feels like it doesn't even fit. And no longer having the camo clothing doesn't help matters either. In all fairness, I was killed by a tree branch, so I don't feel that bad about it. But the DayZ purist in me thinks it is better to simply start over. Although my DMR and NVGs is sooo sweet! Thoughts?

Skype or TeamSpeak can be handwaved away as you both have radios. I suppose looting your own body can be handwaved away as you heard a rumor about a dead body and went off on an adventure with your best buds to check it out.

It doesn't "feel" like a money issue. It feels more like a design and implementation issue and throwing money at it might not make much difference. You can't make a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnent.

The virus works like the "Trixie" virus from The Crazies, turning ordinary people into murderous psychopaths. Guess who is infected? Every single player except for you!

I don't want to get into another rant/debate for/against KoS. But I guess I'm just a little confused about what experience people who complain about KoS actually expect? I've been playing off and on for about a year now. My general expectation is that if you are a noob logging in for the first couple of times, you will run around aimlessly, catching agro, possibly starving or dying of thirst until you are either overrun by zombies or summarily killed by a sniper, bandit or just some guy who is annoyed by your presence. As an experienced player, my expectation is that everyone I see will probably shoot at me on sight. Why wouldn't they? In a zombie apocalypse, anyone you meet is likely to be part of a bandit gang, local warlord clan, insane lunatic, punk ass jerk, or just some nervous survivors not willing to take a chance on another drifter. I would expect that on the rare occasions where I meet another survivor and we don't kill each other on sight, our relationship will be an uneasy trust based on necessity, the status quo which can quickly change depending on circumstances. So I guess I'm just wondering what people mean when they say "we should reduce KoS"?

Seriously. If 4 or 5 people just meet up on a server, they have a whole lot less to worry about from KoS loners.

People talk about "the early days", but I've managed to team up with total strangers many times in the past few months. It's tough though. It helps if you're on a server with side chat and it's own TeamSpeak. But I did meet one guy who I teamed up with over a couple days. Then we had a couple random guys come along with us as we geared up in Cherno. Then we all died in a spectacular gun battle with one or more snipers. But that's sort of how I envision the game.