SystemiK

Shit, you had to go and mention that didn't you? I still have not come to terms on how I'm going to deal with that. I've already begun to wonder if this mod has killed my ability to tolerate traditional games any longer (all my old favorite games just feel kind of hollow and meaningless now) but I'm afraid that PS2 is gonna steal me away from DayZ and never let go. See you in battle my friend...

COPIED FROM DAYZWIKI: That last statement is false, tents do not currently disappear after you die, however you do lose your ability to pack up the tent and move it. Rocket has stated that he has plans for tents to be removed by the server a couple of days after you have died (giving you time to "make arrangements").

I've actually found myself thinking about this quite a lot after having played the game nonstop for a month straight. Rocket calls this an Anti-Game. Those two words mean very little until you actually experience them for yourself, and it's quite clear within those first few meager attempts to survive that this IS something remarkably different from all of those things which we normally "expect" from a new game. Then, somewhere along the way in the ensuing weeks of madness, mayhem and murdering (or perhaps for the more sensitive of you....rainbows, roses and ribbons....) you begin to realize that in its current state that what you have already experienced is largely what you will continue to experience. Sure, in a sandbox of this sort, there will always be a new encounter which spikes your senses and keeps you coming back for more but in the end, it's always THE end, same as before. I honestly don't know which will be the "golden mechanics" that add more replayability but I think we could all agree that any mechanics which support replayability will be a hugely determining factor in the overall sucess of the project. As far as my own experience, about the same time where I started feeling a bit of burnout with the mod, I was lucky enough to find a tent (and about 3 hours later I was EXTREMELY lucky enough to find a place where I could actually place that tent :D ). That was a game changer for me. I might die and respawn several times before ever even seeing the tent again, but it contained a few sparse memories of my past. I had a connection with these items and they were a driving force for me to stay alive. It presented me an opportunity to leave some small trace behind of my previous existence, (something which I supppose all of humanity has contemplated at some point or another). There. I have just compared a tent in DayZ with the human condition. I think that kind of connection (or some variation of it) is what will eventually give DayZ a large share of it's replayability. If not tents, then some other mechanic which offers a connection. Anything which might have an emotional or other connection from the previous life/s. In short, any mechanic which provides something which can trancend the death of the player whether that exists through an accumulation of items or through some sort of player enhancement....although in the spirit of the game, it should be something which also has the chance of being taken or lost entirely. ---- TL;DR got a bit burned out on the game, found a tent, realized that death still sucks but even in death, some small thing still remains to return to. And so, I will return.