When it was just a mod and it was bean warz on the coast, I was upset a lot. But then I remembered that it was all just zeros and ones, just a game, and it was a challenge. Other people could make it annoying, but I could try again. I've gone from 'raging eights' to maybe an exhasperated three if someone is being a bully but generally, taking a moment to remember that it's all just signals in a bit of wiring makes me feel better about it. Paid one price, no being upset about having to pay to play again, losting a quarter or token (what is this 1980?) or having paid a monthly fee to take abuse. But whatever the reaction, we all keep coming back, so the game has done something right.

I feel revitalized. I have that same feeling i did back in May 2012 when I first started with DayZ as a mod. The zombie slaying lady within is quite pleased with the challenge and adventure ahead. "But Lauren," you might say, "It's alpha, it's buggy, it's this and that and whaaa wha wha." So was DayZ the mod some sixteen, seventeen months ago when I first read about it, consumed some Youtube vids and started playing. I loved the experience back then. The mystery, the struggle, the learning curve, the deaths to zombies (I have since learned to ignore the annoyance over the reality that I will be killed. The mod taught be that back when I was spawn sniped for a can of beans and a makarov mag. Yes, way back when those were starter items!) There's something thrilling about being there at the beginning, about finding the bugs, about learning the new techniques, and while I am not quite so pleased about the shuffling fleshbag of infection that survived multiple crowbar hits and knocked me out when I had finally escaped the coast with a good setup...I laughed anyway and respawned. Next, I had a delightful night-time encounter with someone who tried to punch me and bully me until I stopped running and pulled out the hatchet. Then he went quiet and ran. Ha! Of course my poor t-shirt became bandages. It gets cold at night in the game... Whatever the flaws are, I don't care right now. It is a wonderful new challenge in a familiar world, but new houses to enter, new loot placement, new rules, new commands, new menus, new looks, and same old player base of weird folks. THIS is what it felt like to me back in 2012 and this has rekindled the fire of DayZ for me. I was done with Epoch, base building, Overwatch hide and seek, and mods not working because of all of the changes needed, and I was ready to move on from the mod. Standalone has brought back the magic and the chaos. I look forward to being there through it all, even if the crowbar is still weak. ;)

Time to wade into the chaos! i think that on some servers females that existed from older versions, such as my Chernarus 184 day survivor I had, will remain until you perish. Then if you are somehow placed into the great mystery beyond life, you are subject to the new patch and the server settings. I suffered the Mike Tyson Knockout, or what I prefer to call a Bruce Lee zombie Death Punch, died because I didn't wake up to be able to try and shoot again. 184 days on the regular public server system (okay I played that twice a week for the last few mo nths and mostly when the server was night, or as far from the hot spots as I could go), I did not get the option for gender when I went to spawn in again. I was just in the male version of a survivor when I spawned. As a lady who likes video games from time to time, I prefer the female skin because, well, it is a reflection of me. I use the microphone from time to time in direct chat, and the image and the voice match up and it makes sense. As you may have read in other threads, my play style is not to ghillie it up and snipe or any such thing as that. I enjoy helping people, and apparently crashing aircraft and surviving. So I suspect that it may not be an option because of the whole skins thing, but if there was a female character from before, the character will continue on. It's just disabled as a spawn option. On some different note. I remember being on Lingor and spawning as a female in a grey hoodie and camo pants. So it has to be possible to at least change the colour scheme easily enough. Not that it was very stable but still. It can be done, and with the ghillie suit the character model becomes a walking tree so there should be a way to make it work without much effort, at least for that. My ranting is complete. go forth and lay the undead into a proper, eternal rest.

These posts are fun. We need silliness and mythology. Thus, I emailed *** Mina, my expert on Chernarus history, and this is what she had to say. Kamenka, is not exciting. But I remembers, I do, papa he tell me story, five hundred year and more past, battle fought when bridge was just wood, small thing over river. Winning army, they know not what to do with prisoners. The leader, he no want to feed them. They cut throats, one by one, and push into river. Prisoners scream for mercy, but none given. Fifty men die, all in pile that choke river, turn it red. Leader, he move on, bring army home, but on way, men fall ill. Plague spread, and soon, only leader left, alone in wild, lost and mad. He lose way forward, can only follow bodies back to Kamenka. There, villagers see him stand on bridge, raising voice to God and beg forgiveness, offer his life to atone for cruelty. He take long knife, stab into chest and fall into water, giving life in hope of salvation. Now, plague come again to Chernarus, plague again near Kamenka. Maybe to atone for sin, many hear the voice of old leader, hear the call to offer life, to atone for sins of man and make right the world. Maybe. Is all I know. Ask *** no more, I not remember. Was long ago papa tell story. I rest now. Use computing machine to message after. Signal is no good here where I hide. Green Mountain make strange noise again. An ancient curse in times of plague and sacrifices to make up for the plague, then. ;)

Scripted events with NPCs in limited locations can create interesting events that might bring people together to complete a challenge. Should it be normal? no. Should it happen? Sure. If you make 90 per cent of the map a regular zone, but have some spots which are rumoured to have warlords and gangs or who knows what, then the player can chose to either play the normal way, or dare to take on that limited area. You can have both if you build it the right way. Life should never be an exercise of "all or nothing". :)

Who will tend the gardens and care for the cattle if you slaughter everyone? Who then will ensure there is food and drink beyond the supply of cans that are no longer made? If humans were as barbaric as people claim they would be, we would not have achieved the civilization we have now. Despite what video games might make us think, humans are social creatures, who look for acceptance in social groups and work together to survive. We are led to believe that there would be a great number of factions fighting one another, gangs everywhere, but this is based on the concept of entertainment. A movie, a TV program, a comic book, none of these things are exciting if they say that zombies came along, and we banded together, chased them off and rebuilt society and got along. There isn't a prolonged source of revenue in that story these days. So things have to be gritty and brutal and have everyone posturing to be the biggest bad-ass on the playground. Not that we should cry too much about being killed in a video game, but some people are frustrating with their need to snipe everything, and some of us like to point out that frustration. .

We won't worry about servers or maps or names, I'll just tell a little story and maybe you can help me understand why people play as they play. It was an interesting afternoon on a low population server. I was listening to people talk on side chat, and there weren't enough players to complain about it and it was nice to hear about people working together. Find engine parts, repair a car, drive to a new spot. It seemed like there might be good people out there. Meanwhile, some distance away, I was learning to fly an Osprey because I found one and let's face it, curiosity means trial. It's a game, and death is nothing serious. There's some keyboard dexterity involved in flying in ARMA games so I was eager to see if I could do it. It was tricky. I persevered Once I managed to figure out how to get some altitude, it was a pleasant flight, and I zipped along, listening to three people make a few pop culture jokes on the side chat. After some trouble with lower altitude work, I decided to land at an airfield. It seemed to be the destination of the chatting people who were fixing the car earlier. Perhaps they might need a lift in the Osprey. Perhaps I could trade it for the car they had. They seemed nice. As a pro tip, if you click the autopilot landing option on your MV22 Osprey, it doesn't hover any more, instead moving to land on a runway with engines not pointing straight up, which can impact the nature of hovering. Meaning the bird moves forward with a bit of momentum and that already steady descent I managed with the auto-hover on became a death dive into the ground. Or so I thought. Despite the flaming wreckage that had skidded off the side of the runway, I was alive. Shaking, battered, not bleeding though, and my legs were not broken. I emerged and quickly put some distance between my less than healthy self and the flaming wreck that cast a beacon of smoke well into the sky. A few zombies drew near, a few rounds of 9mm stopped their erratic advance upon me. I looked back to the smoke and listened to the repeated fireworks of exploding Osprey parts. I knew that the other survivors might head this way and this was certainly a sign that someone else might be around. Yet they were newly teamed up, strangers becoming friends, working together, and if I came across them I would certainly have a nice chat and I would offer my own help to them if possible. I crouched and weaved about, heading for the fire house. I would have a good lookout point for them, and maybe I could find some suitable supplies. All seemed quiet as I ascended the stairs. Only the echoes of my steps called to me. To the top I went, finding a morphine injector, a third for me, so perhaps I could use it as a peace token with those approaching. A soda, a magazine of STANAG rounds, some flares that could be ignored in the bright light of day. All seemed well. I headed back down and decided to wait outside so they would see me and I would see and hear them. I could flag them over and see if either survivor needed one of the blood bags I had in my backpack. Yet as I reached the ground level and turned to enter the garage area, two survivors appeared, one quickly backtracking while the other stopped to look at me, and I at him. They seemed to have made it here faster than I thought. But no matter, I would back up a bit and say hello, wondering if the lady they heard speaking from behind the manly soldier character would bring a chuckle as much as confusion. I never did like joining a server where the gender choice was turned off, but it had allowed me to wear the camo outfit for this life on a private hive where I hoped the hackers wouldn't follow. Perhaps it was that hint of voice, or the camo clothing, or the M14 that flashed across his vision as I tried to turn to the side and back up that caused his reaction. I barely had time to say anything more before he fired, the pistol calling out three times as bullets hit me in the chest. I shot once into the wall and backed up, hoping the risk of pistol versus rifle would get him to move out the small green door, and he did, but peeked in and tried to take aim once more. I hit the caps lock, began explaining that I wasn't a threat, that there was no need to shoot. There were more shots outside, perhaps those shambling bags of bloated infection decided on a plan for lunch with these fellows. I remained calm, asked why they fired, ask them to speak. There was silence. Again and again I asked, and still there was nothing. I was upset now. I was cornered. Were they trying to get on the roof and cover it in case I tried to flee up the tower? Would they cover the ground exits and wait for me to appear? They said nothing still, with only another pistol shot in response to a zombie's shriek to let me know they were still around. I bandaged up. I wasn't hurt all that bad and had only lost a small amount of blood. Combat had cooled down but the moment remained tense. I was still there, in the fire hall, waiting for a reply to my question about why they shot, and if they would even answer me. There was no response. Frustrated, I did something that I don't really do in DayZ when players are around and there's been some shots fired or even a confused standoff. I hit escape, I aborted, and I logged off the server. When I think about the people I do help, how I sometimes give out guns, how I leave a repaired car or even give someone a ride in a Huey and then leave them to have it in the hopes they'll help others, well, it makes me wonder why I do it. If people just see me, geared up after a good deal of effort and just decide I am a threat and open fire, then why do I even try? Should I treat all of them the same way? Sometimes I wonder if I'm suited for video games at all. I lack this online killer instinct, I guess. None of my friends play games online. I see this as a game, as code, as an escape but not something to be upset over. Is it wrong? Should I have throw smoke, tried to fight back, persisted? And are Makarovs really that weak? The mind boggles.

It's not that I want to be a noob now, it's being a noob back when the mod was just growing, getting in well before there had been a million players, or even a quarter million, and sure there were bugs, but everyone was still learning and people were teaming up. Then the noob hunters came, shooting the new spawns for that can of beans, and the mystical bean wars began, and then startng gear was changed to make the fresh spawn less appealing to kill, and so much more has happened since those early days. There was a time when everyone was a noob, and that was when things were the most fun. If we could al go back there, we'd al have a lot of fun.

Do new maps mean character resets? I suppose it would. It's fine if the change is known, but I have had servers where I finally manage to get some decent mid tier gear and fix a vehicle, only to have the map change the next day. Three times this has happened so far. Not a complaint, just a nice to know before getting into a situation. That's all. I like different maps, keeps things fresh. But I also like finally fixing that vehicle and getting ready to help people. Or be blown up by them. Boring storing involving an attempt to start a Taviana bus service but with explosive ending and a long run as the epilogue.

The we go, making friends, getting people to know you by voice, that's excellent. We're all just graphics without a voice, without personality, so I would say you are going about it the right way!

I didn't combat log, combat was well done and over. Had they engaged me in conversation and distracted me with it while they regrouped, fine. But after minutes of trying to get some response and not having anything happen, I decided on a different outcome than being killed or having to kill anyone. All done within the limits of the combat timer and the way the game is set up. And hand holding is fun, it's nice, but maybe I don't want to hold hands with you. Not unless you wash the blood away first. Eww. ;) Oh and there is no rule to the game that says kill or be killed. That applies to shooters, but this is a zombie survival game, who says there has to be killing? Most of the time I don't even need to shoot the zombies! You play your way, I play mine. If you kill me then fine, but nothing says I have to kill you. Not unless I missed the debut of the BottleRocket official DayZ rule book. Which is possible.

well the dude part is fine, it's become a generic friendly bit of slang. But sis might be better. You know, bro? No offence taken, I was being silly, since, well, I don't get upset about the little things. May your vocabulary make slight recoveries, but still represent who you are and all you have been through.

Hackers have changed people into rabbits and para-dropped cows everywhere, so having a hacker be a rabbit makes sense. There are YouTube vids enough about it from the days when hacking was everywhere at all times. While it would have been interesting to see what was in store, logging out was just as safe of an option given that you might have found yourself descending to the pavement of an airfield from a few thousand metres in the air.

Well, apart from the crashed Osprey I am not sure they even knew I was there, but then, that might be why they fired at me to start with. But yes, a very good point, I have seen side channel conversations where people teased someone who had been lured in. Yet I've taken the chances when asked for help and I am about 50/50 on the outcome of friend versus trap, and surprisingly good at escaping vehicle wrecks even when someone's fired at me. I still miss that bus. But no matter. I've managed to scrounge my way from the shore enough times to make the threat of death pointless. They could have asked me to surrender, tried to bluff, said something. Still so strange. We're at an airfield, plenty of good gear for everyone, no need for shoot outs.

Well I don't know about the bro and dude part, but the rest makes me smile. Thank you for your awesome assessment of the story.

Thank you, and no need to be jealous, being a writer is a skill anyone can acquire with practice and time. But loving the written word is whe it all begins, I suppose. :)

More melee weapons. Pick axe, sword, steel pipe, all sorts of items with a bit of reach and zombie killing abilities.

I suspect that there might be a percentage of video game players out there that become overly attached to the games they play. It might be a smaller percentage, sure, but it intrigues me as to why they wouldn't respond, or do something when they see and hear that someone is not hostile. Keep playing the way you do, and good luck to you as well.may your kindness never get your virtual self killed.

Thank you! Comments like that keep people like me trying to play games like this. Interesting that you use ecosystem. Maybe it is just binary and code somewhere, but in an unusual way, it is a living thing, this type of online multiplayer game, especially when it's not quest based, but survival based. I'll try to fill the role for as long as I can.

I won't change my play style. I just have to play as myself I suppose. Rocket wanted this to be the anti-game, the reality simulator, so I just play as I would if it were something real, but without the child-like reaction of death. I'm the shield maiden who tried to save the world. The first time I was backstabbed was almost ten months ago, which says something. I ran out of ammunition, mentioned as much to the survivor I had teamed up with, so he shot me in the head. Fun, huh? I hope I don't become the KoS type, ever.

I repaired and gave away a Huey today. Helped some people new to the particular server get a good start. In time I hope they help someone else, and so on. No humanity score increase, but maybe some education that people can be good out on the Internet. Firepower to the people!

Without a vehicle, stealthy is the key. Lauren Danger the wilderness ranger, staying out of the way and living off the wild creatures, drinking from ponds, all those things. Yes, I still shave my legs. Just in case your were worried. I'm not that far gone into the wild mode. Eww. Never fire first, always give a new spawn a gun if possible, and simply move along after helping, vanishing into the forest like the Littlest Hobo.

I've loaded some Chernoarus servers, and the food and drink items were the same as before Found a lot of Coca-Cola and the standard baked beans. But I also found the TP and razors. The TP makes sense, the razors, well we should all be acting out Sweeney Todd and slashing each other with so many of them lying around. There was a barber and his wife......

I read the patch notes briefly when i had five minutes earlier, and they might be examples of trash loot. Things you might expect to find that won't really help you. More immersion perhaps, since these are things found in most homes. Trash loot all over! W're filthy humans, especially in times of emergency. Okay, lunch is ending for me, back to saving the real world in my own little way.

I'm with Chris, show the friend some videos. After all, for a long while zombies were just the nusiance factor in a game where trusting a real life person could get your character killed. Thus it is much more than a silly zombie game. Does this friend like any other video games? maybe there's a way to draw some parallels. It has dmanic features that most games don't, like: Find a broken down vehicle and repair it. Avoid hostile AI that want to eat your face. Try not to starve to death. Stay hydrated. Scrounge for a weapon and ammo. Step off of a rock the wrong way and break your legs. Wait, now it makes it seem difficult. Which it can be. But that's the immersiveness we enjoy as players.