smoq2

It might (and probably has been) suggested before but since I couldn't find it (not an expert forum user :)) I'll give it a shot. Since we have many gestures now, including sitting down, why can't we have a "fake death" animation? The idea came to me when I was prone near another dead body looting it, when another player run over to me from behind a building. I literally thought I was done for, since I didn't have a weapon in my hands. Funny thing is, the guy just run to the other body, and started looting it. It occurred to me that very moment that my would-be killer thought I was already dead! :D. I pulled out my 1911 and placed a bullet in his head. Now I know I was extremely lucky but it got me thinking. How many times have we witnessed "playing dead" as a survival tactic in movies or RL? Hell, it's a natural procedure designed by evolution itself. Hard to see it not being an option in a game focused on SURVIVAL. Now imagine using that tactic when you start hearing sniper shots fired at you an you're in an open field. You just drop down hoping the sniper will buy it. I know that once the option would be implemented most snipers would just "double tap", but still 1/10 might just let you off. There should be some restrictions of course, as the feature should practically be an all-in gamble. E.g. Trying to move or look around should break the animation. Also, I have no idea how would that perform once ragdolls make it into the game, but on a side note, I wonder how "unconscious" will work with ragdolls as well. Death with ragdoll and falling unconscious with an animation will clearly be distinctive -> double tap.

I'm fully expecting to see a DayZ SA version of Arma 3 Epoch or Exile. I.e. Traders, currency system, tower building system, simple missions and tons of vehicles and weapons ported from other Arma games. Do I want to see that? I don't really know...

This one actually deserves defending, so here goes... :) The "surviving" aspect is non-existent at the moment, but with good reason - the team is testing functionality of certain systems, so they make related objects easily obtainable on purpose. E.g. They allow you easy access to food and see if e.g. vomiting applies desired effects/hunger and dehydration progresses at desired pace/etc. (Of course nutrition testing was concluded long time ago, I just used it as an example.) You'll see a shift towards survival aspects when they start data mining for social behavior, migration, frequency of occurrences, etc. and start fine tuning the numbers of what you find or are able to do in game. Digression: They already do that, but to a very small extent, like making heatmaps of where people die. When that comes is a totally different question though...

I'm with elander on this one... At this point (with the overall project delay), believing that we'll get a declared, feature complete beta, is unfortunately borderline delusional. All the "nope" features in the above post commenting the roadmap are kind of "grand" and I don't see them appearing out of nowhere between updates. Basic implementations, elaborated later, is what I'm expecting. Then again, the developers claim that many systems are already in place, just waiting to be switched on when blockers are removed, but I've seen little evidence (I could be ill-informed). Disclaimer: I have no emotions regarding the matter, just want people to get real.

I think he was talking about an internal release date, which I'm also almost certain exists - There is a budget allocated to each phase, so there has to be an internal estimate on how many man-hours or man-days it will take and real time deadline (or even several: "target", "safe" and "critical" if shit really goes south). For obvious reasons, it won't be made public, so there is no public/official release date, which makes you also right. Ergo, both of you are right, you're just talking about two different things. ;) To the OP - We don't know; BI won't tell...

The whole mission concept, with the ideas included herein, reminds me of what we have in Epoch/Overpoch/Exile right now, which is basically a very basic method of inciting players to gather up in one place, which leaves a bitter taste. Nobody cares what the mission actually is, as basically in every scenario it's (1) Kill AI, (dependent) Kill any players around (2) Loot crate. The thing is, in my experience with the aforementioned mods I noticed a pattern - If you really want to succeed in the mission, which I understand by gaining the reward, you have to join a server with 20 active players at max. Otherwise it's just a snipefest until the crate despawns and nobody actually wins. On occasion a clan or group of 10 people came around and actually did hold the ground (with losses and run-straight-to-the-body gimmicks) - didn't see that on popular servers that could hold a notable population till present day (others run dry now). All of the above is paradoxically the same reason why I'm certain we will have the very same missions when BIS throws out mod support - the system is easy to port between BIS games and people already got use to it. Now I know OP wants to have missions "on steroids", not the clunky and basic system I related to, but I fairly don't expect that to see the light. It's just too ambitious. But I do hope to be wrong...

While all of your ideas are good, they revolve around combat. My take on bases was from a survival perspective, since that's my preferred style of play. And from that perspective I see very little of value in having a base. That, and well... Quoting someone from this forum: "If the developers rely on mods to make their product attractive, they have already failed." Being a strong advocate of this thought I almost never include mods into my line of thinking when discussing future features.

I'm not sure how will I personally use the feature... In Arma mods where basebuilding is a feature I always build some form of a base, but in the end I always end up playing solo. The groups I played with disbanded sooner or later and maintaining bases and vehicles becomes simply tedious. Nowadays, I see that in the long term 1-2 stashes of some form of container and one smallest possible vehicle is enough for a lone wolf. Everything else simply draws unneeded and uncontrollable attention. Since I don't see any potential groups among my friends that will bank another 1k hours into DayZ as I will after release, I also don't see the need to build anything, apart from something small and lockable to park my smallest vehicle for the night. Ergo, basebuilding is a feature I consider to be profitable only for groups. Of course, I am against any artificial measures that would prevent a lone player from building a sizable fort, should he/she wish to. [EDIT] I forgot to mention one thing that puts me off - exploitable design flaws. Exile and Overpoch left a bitter taste due to the fact that hackers or glitchers can penetrate bases with relative ease. I don't know if that will be the case when DayZ hits 1.0, but it's safe to assume it will - hacks will always exist, exploits will also always exist. Another reason why "safety = concealment" and "safety =/= walls" in my book.

Sigh... There is not much to say in the matter, other than just the reception of the game is what it is. Call the reviewers haters, spoiled brats with too much cash or uneducated in terms of game/software development, they are the market and the market is very similar to a force of nature e.g. a flowing river. No matter what arguments you put forward, the river just keeps flowing. You can either adjust yourself to float and go along or drown. Metaphors aside... People are giving the game harsh reviews because it doesn't/didn't meet their expectations. Period. It may not be just, it may not be polite, it just is. DayZ is an ambitious project that has to survive on a very shifting and demanding market segment (gamers). One of the main distinguishable aspects of this segment is an almost addictive need for the "new" - deliverance has to be frequent and fast. Corner-case users will say that "Let them take their time. I want the game to be as good as it can be.", but the truth is, if they don't fit their best reception window period, it will hurt their predicted sales and development budget for subsequent phases. Repercussions are that the long-tail of feature implementation gets cut starting with the features planned after 1.0, and if the situation becomes dramatic, e.g. sales predictions after 1.0 become close to 0, not all the features planned even for 1.0 are implemented and the game gets instantly "released" with some promotional badge. IMO, I don't know what's the situation in BIS marketing department, I don't have the data relevant for their strategy. I just get an inkling that the faces there are not too happy with the statistics they produce. Also, I'm beginning to see that the recipe for success in the gaming industry is to impress more frequently with less than to promise more and hope for patience. Oh, and changing the scope after market exposure is not a good move as well.

Did it once... My two friends were talking to fresh spawn in Berezino. They were giving him food, etc. I was about 0.5km away and trying to meet up with them. They really wanted to help the guy... When I arrived I ran up to the the fresh spawn, shot him in the face with a buckshot and said "OMG Dude! You look fucked up! Are you ok?". My buddy just said stoically "Well... Shit..." -> laughter... I don't know if that's shit talking, but it was hilarious at the time... Never did it again because going full jerk is not my style. Had to just, well... See how it is just once. :)

Hard to say... The pattern noticed throughout last 2 years would be for an update to sit 15-30 days on experimental, then get pushed to stable, depending on the severity of blockers. However 0.60 is unprecedented in terms of scale so throwing any time frame would be complete guesswork. Also, there may be other factors than technicalities (e.g. marketing) in place to rush/postpone a stable push.

I managed to get in and play 2-3 hours altogether. When I first joined I was overwhelmed with joy! 45 FPS in Cherno! After all, the amount of work and passion they've put into it to make a new renderer and whatnot... But after the excitement settled (around 1 hour into the game) I started to analyze how much value was actually added to the product from the end-user perspective and I couldn't shake off a feeling, that it's very little. I mean, from my perspective it's just average 20 FPS more, otherwise its the same amount of content/value that 0.59 was giving. The problem with the patch is that we can only experience the tip of the iceberg and that's not enough for me to get into the game for more than just to have a quick peek on what has changed. Rational judgement: I do give credit to the team for pulling this off - Thumbs up! I can see you're trying to make the best product you possibly can! Emotional judgement: Initial excitement ended with "meh". Too little value delivered to the consumer in terms of UX. I'll give it another shot when stable rolls out, but I don't expect fireworks.

I don't see the problem with what it is now... I however do see it if they were to implement some unnatural solutions to circumvent the current outcome. Like temporary invincibility for example... The universe of DayZ is nothing like it would be in the real world under the same circumstances - immortality or "rebirth" is not a factor in real life after all, thus value of DayZ life is simply very very very low. It's a blend of VR with a coating of reality. If you stuffed 50 people with Deadpool like powers on one e.g. island you would have DayZ. To put it bluntly, don't expect DayZ to be like real life, it will never come close, and so is its society. Depends on your goal, but if you want to survive the longest, always keep in mind that this is a game and approach it a such. If you don't want to be killed on the coast after spawning then just head for the nearest village that is not on the exact coastline the very second you have control of your char.

I'm not sure whether we can even do a realistic guess work regarding the value of having a base at this time - it all boils down to how balanced it will be. I mean, taking 1 hour or 1 week to break into a base by hammering the door with a sledgehammer alone changes the value of any base basically from meaningless to "all win". Whether we will be able to see the damage done to that door once we log in and can repair it breaking the breaking-in process is another major factor, how long will it actually take to build something decent, etc. Ideally (IMO) I would image a system, where destroying (breaching) some creation would take roughly the same amount of time it took to build. If it took you a week to build something, it would have to take a week of someone else's time performing some action in order to destroy it.

As Grimey Rick said, 99% you were just sniped. It didn't have to be from a range - many guns glitch out (e.g. the mosin) and don't play the fire sound for other players. Many of my friends don't hear me shooting, although standing right next to me. Also, a bullet hitting your body makes the same (probably placeholder) sound as being hit with an axe. Since there was no gunshot sound to mix, you could hear the hitting sound loud and clear. Hate to say it, but "typical alpher".

I came to this conclusion through several years of experience in my professional line of work. Furthermore, I said "large" not "largest". A large portion of the "sales pie chart" can be stated for 5-15%, so the notion is subjective. Ultimately however, even 5% of your customers (when you count your sales globally) matter greatly and should not be treated as a leftover statistic and told in a cynical manner to sit quietly in the corner because they don't know how things work. If treated accordingly, this group can turn around any PR backlash you might be facing with design choices, obvious development hinders, etc. Basically anything that influences negatively your project in any other area. And don't live in denial, PR passively influences everything else you do, be it production speed, income, reception, etc. To relate to the second part of your statement, it's not true that very few games offer an alpha/early access as "QA" (quotation marks intended because of sarcasm and personal prejudice). Look at GoatZ... Their advertising phrase "buggy zombie survival games became a genre of their own", or something along those lines, clearly implicates that the trend has become somewhat widespread, and that the fact that DayZ is blatantly stated as the "role model" also hints of the existing infamy. So please don't spread false truths about BI being generous to let us have a "sneak peek" at their game during the development phase, if that was your aim. They did it to gain funding and if anything, should be radiantly thankful to everyone who gave them the benefit of doubt and bought the game or rented a server. I disagree, but it comes from my different perception of things you name as "whining" and "complaining". Of course I don't disagree with helping through the bug tracker or other tools the developers setup. I just don't support telling those who believe something is fundamentally wrong with the project to focus on the details. I really hope you understand my point - it's basically saying "don't discriminate" in gathering opinions.

He's not actually wasting time. He represents a portion of BI audience and clients. Yes, a portion that can be called immature and not caring to get even a glimpse of insight of why things in game development are as they are, but still, a portion that I bet forms a large chunk of the sales pie chart, and are not irrelevant to BI, otherwise the company would show serious inability in creating their customer archetypes. Steam chart shows a decline of interest, hell even the server list shows a decline of interest by just looking at it. And let me mention the best one: the game hasn't been released yet. At least not in the technical term. If this keeps up, by 1.0, we will have a bump to 40% (~10k avr. players) interest in the product of the of initial release (>20k avr. players), and that's an optimistic guess. If that is enough for the company to keep up with the running costs of the project, then great - business model worthy of worship... But will it be so great for (even the hardcore/devoted) the player? So in my honest, and professional opinion, evil11 is providing valuable feedback. He/She is completely, or in majority, dissatisfied with the product he/she got, regardless of what anyone else is saying. Now I could quote a certain shoe selling company that follows a mantra "We mostly provide customer service. It just so happens that we also sell shoes." I bet that company could get some valuable info from evil11 instead of having its forum stuff ridicule his/her complain. As for the feedback tracker... Some of us think there is no point in telling someone "Hey, your wheel is broken!", if we believe they are going in the wrong way altogether. Sorry for the off topic. On topic: I see no reason for praising BI. I witnessed better developer interaction with their clients in other software companies. I can point out the sticking out dedication of some of the DayZ team members to their project as something worth mentioning, but that's it.

After reading this thread I come to a conclusion that the whole debate is due to varying interpretation of the term "End Game". 1. I noticed that to some it basically means character development, which by all means will always be a finite progression and have a specific "end" to it, e.g. there will always be a gun/clothing/vehicle/building material considered best in a given class. Then again DayZ gives us the ability to play as you and you can hone your real skills at playing the game indefinitely. 2. To others "End Game" means some kind of plot/gameplay mechanism that is lacking in the current stage (no forced goals). This is unlikely to happen. It would be best to just state more clearly what do we refer to when saying "End Game". I think that most "lack of End Game" cases are about those complaining being dissatisfied with the amount of activities one can do and that the world is in fact too limiting. Whatever you choose to do, you will very quickly end up doing it over and over and over again. E.g. [future build assumptions] Once you built your base in the most desolated place possible, start your own garden, gather rain water with X amount of barrels it basically would become unattractive to even log in to the game (to most players it will) - the game environment lacks the amount of external factors the real world posses. In the end, without question the game is mostly a sandbox game and its entirely up to the player what he/she makes out of it.

Knives also don't seem to be able to cut out seeds from vegetables. At least I tried it on a green bell pepper with a kitchen knife and a meat cleaver and there was no option, just the regular "swap item" (teal highlight). Or am I doing something wrong? On a side note, yesterday was the first time ever I had to grow my own food. I'm actually beginning to think this game might become a survival sim after all. ;)

Oh no, I'm not requesting or asking for anything, I'm not that "entitled". :) I'd also hate to see them putting too much effort to marketing - the side point was just to stress it cannot be neglected, but that was rather an off topic issue. Although, I would advice taking a few PR bullet-courses for some of the DayZ team members, as their announcements sometimes tend to be confusing. ;) No offence here guys, you're doing a great job in the field anyway! My original point was to bring up the issue that there is a limited time frame when a product can be delivered - something you won't hear from any company, yet every company is (or at least should be) aware of it. By writing my first post in this thread, I was just trying and hoping to shift their attention to it (if its not focused on the issue already, which I can't know) or at least get a creative discussion flowing, which I think happened I also don't believe I've written anything harmful for the development process. I'm discussing potential future outcomes basing on current facts. Anyway, it's all "food for thought" after all. :)

I envy you the confidence in DayZ. Believe me, my deepest hopes are to be wrong. I agree that DayZ is a special case, hence my strong interest in the project not only as a player, but as a marketer. I see their initial success as something that bends the rules of the trade. I'm hoping to write a loooooong and thorough article about BI and DayZ once it gets released. I don't mean to attack you, but you're forgetting that DayZ thrives on its multiplayer aspect and that makes it impossible to separate and neglect the need for a good marketing plan. It has to have a certain critical mass of popularity to thrive. You wouldn't play this game if nobody would like to play with you, but I guess by that time there wouldn't be even any servers to play on. You'd be surprised how many revolutionary projects (not just in the game industry) of huge potential I witnessed slowly roll down the hill and get abandoned just because the author couldn't supply it with enough attention.

It is true and has been for any recreational product since the beginning of time. The fact that a product has a life cycle and an always diminishing interest is a universal fact. Unless you're trying to tell me that collage grade marketing education is horse crap. Now that we got that out of the way let's look at the case at hand... Check steam charts for relevant data. The interest is diminishing, with regular updates trying to bring it back to some level. However, the returning and new players do not completely fill the gap of the ones that leave each time for good. Of course, the game is alive and well now "user-wise", but will it be in the same shape with an adequate player base by the time it hits release? There is a time frame in which a product has to be finished and delivered since its initial "leakage" to the general public, otherwise it will not attain its full market potential. I'm not saying that this time frame has been missed, I'm just saying that it might be in the future. My own patience will do me no good if there will be no adequate amount of players to play with after a month of the final release, or worse, even before the release.

I am certain about the renderer, it's the fact that they are not reporting progress what worries me. The outcome is not as expected perhaps? About melee... I'm not convinced. I have an itching feeling in the back my head that they judged the current implementation as adequate and shelved further direct work on the matter.

I find the lack of information regarding the renderer a bit disturbing. I got the impression from previous announcements that they are nearing its release, yet there have been no mention of any progress recently. I'm happy to see the first fruit of labour regarding the zombie problem. I'm very curious as to how the developers envision their "perfection", and when do they see this "perfection" rolling out to stable - Weeks? Months? Years? I have to remind that time and sustainable level of interested players is diminishing (always and in every product's life cycle). Also, there has been no mention of melee being further worked on. For the love of God, I do hope we'll see improvement in that area, as what we have now can't be even compared to modern gaming standards. Diseases... Now that's something that will finally make DayZ more like DayZ. Plus, the enormous amount of factors taken into consideration when designing this system by the developers is astonishing. Kudos!

With the introduction of private shards the devs moved on to other issues of higher priority, i.e. stability, extended systems, server architecture, renderer (!!), etc. They don't see it as a concern at this time, so I guess "deal with it" is the only answer you can get, but I'll leave you with a bit of hope that it might be only for the time being. I'm guessing they're not touching the issue of loging in, since it will have to get a rework anyway - the whole spawning-in-someone's-base problem. Fiddling with it now is just pointless. As for my personal point of view, I just moved to play on private shards the minute they appeared. Never regretted the decision and never returned to public space.