Solopopo

Keep up the good work! I've never been more excited for the future of this game.

This could easily be solved by making it so that players are limited in how fast they can turn while sprinting. Something like this already exists for weapons. I don't think it's too much to expect something similar to come to sprinting. Another way to address this could be to make the player suffer stamina loss when suddenly changing momentum. They have been working on new animations for a year and a half. They definitely have something up their sleeve regarding this issue. Some expect that they will be slowing down running speed when other methods of transportation are more abundant.

I've noticed something today while messing around with the video settings. The new .62 foliage on the ground doesn't completely disappear anymore when you put object detail on low. It can now be reliably be used as cover. It still has a render limit, but the new trees are also providing better protection at range now. Has anyone else noticed this? I'm very happy about it.

Very nice ^^

Um, what? Everyone has been well aware of this issue, which is now much less of an issue, for a long time, especially Bohemia; and by no means was it a simple "fix." They massively overhauled the landscape to accomplish it. I did actually post about a similar issue on the feedback tracker a while ago.

I think the new audio is much improved from where it was in the first 3 years of Day Z's development. Overall, the new audio sounds great, but there is still one persistent problem that really needs to be put to rest. One thing I could not stand about the old alpha builds is that they would play the same looping audio track that would repeat every 6 minutes or so, and about every six minutes a random, arbitrary, chain link fence sound would play, regardless of whether you were in an open field or in the tallest building. It made the game seem cheap. It completely removed me from the experience. I think the new sound is much more immersive, but there is still a very identifiable looping foot step like sound that plays every so many minutes that is very distracting. In the past there was one single sound that ruined the entire loop, and now there is still one single sound that ruins the entire loop. Please remove these unnecessary and immersion killing sounds and never put them back. Sounds that stand out too much are bad in an audio loop that repeats too quickly. Ideally, I'd like to see the loops dumped entirely and have truly dynamic sound. One can hope.

Now THIS is a status report. Keep em coming.

The current audio loop plays a random foot step sound every so many minutes depending on your environment. It sucks. They really need to move away from audio loops. They've been using them since day one. They've gotten much better, but looped audio always starts to annoy eventually. It makes the game seem cheap too.

The new screenshots look great. But, did we really need to "learn" that releasing an alpha before having the technology in place is a bad idea? I don't think anyone can say that they legitimately "learned" that from this experience. I think we can all objectively agree that is just common sense. I think the only thing to be learned from this alpha is not to release alpha. It's just bad business practice. It is a fact at this point that this game being in alpha has not helped the development process move faster. It has in fact slowed it, as the team has divided their attention between stable branch and actual development. To use an example from recent events, cars were taken out of stable branch and put on experimental to encourage people to play experimental and give you guys experimental data. Regardless of the fact that it didn't work, this goes to show that the only real gameplay from players that is useful to you is experimental gameplay, and most players are not even playing on experimental. All of stable branch is useless to you, but you are committed to keeping it at least somewhat playable, which is a burden on the overall development process.The fact that the game has needed to be playable from the beginning of development to the end is a problem. Unfinished games don't necessarily need to be playable unless you sell them. Having something that is in an unplayable state is fine if you haven't charged money for it, and having the liberty to leave something unfinished to work on more long term goals isn't a problem in that case. Even now you have 4 members of the dev team working on stable who could be working on bringing the beta closer. TL;DR The only thing to be learned from releasing a game as an alpha is not to do it again. I mean this seriously and with respect. This game's reputation has been dragged through the mud because of it. It's no way to do business and people don't appreciate it. If someone from BI were to publicly acknowledge and take responsibility for this, I think that would be the first step on the road to improving DayZ's reputation and it's future. EDIT: I know that Arma 3 more or less worked out as an alpha, but people were not exactly thrilled about the game's early lack of content then either. It may be argued that Arma 3 released as alpha with the appropriate technology in place and that's why it went better, but where is it appropriate to draw the line? When is a game finished enough to be released as "alpha?" I think personally that any self respecting company should take pride in what they put out, and what they put out should be a completely finished representation of what it is they do. Anything in between just blemishes the product and the company, at least for the duration of the alpha. So why participate in this thing called alpha at all? We are not meant to see the skeletons of the games we play. We are meant to be immersed by their seeming realism. Everything about early access alpha releases is contradictory to what gaming is. The entire gaming industry literally collapsed in the 80's because of unfinished games, only to be built back up by companies who took pride in themselves and their products, and who refused to release less than great games. We are risking repeating history with these alphas. There is just no justification for it at all, and there is no other way to be than blunt and staight-forward about the harm it does to the company that participates in these alphas, and the gamers who play them. By the time DayZ comes out, there are a lot of aspects of DayZ that players will already be jaded by, because it will be too familiar, all too familiar to that clunky alpha that was almost unplayable. The entire map of Chenarus will be a treasure trove of bad memories. You've built up a wealth of disappointment and dissatisfaction that will not just disappear when the game is "finished." That's the risk you run by releasing alpha. You've already delivered the package. It was an incomplete package, but players received it, and they've had time with it. There is only so much adding extra frills to the game can do. The most basic experience is there and players have had hundreds of hours with it. A new coat of paint might not have the results you hope for. Again, that is the risk of releasing alpha. It would seem that there is a direct correlation between a game's time spent in alpha, and it's overall reception. The longer a game is in alpha, the less happy people become with it. This would lead any rational person to conclude that the best time in alpha is no time in alpha. With all that said, I'm rooting for you, along with a lot of other players. As you are more than well aware, there is a lot of passion surrounding this game and we all want DayZ to be a success. However, I think I speak for at least a good portion of us when I say that I have grown tired of seeing the devs try to avoid taking on responsibility. The way that you word your developer updates is careful and calculated so as never to accept blame or acknowledge mistakes made in a legitimate and honest way. Even in the video posted here, the issue is not being addressed honestly. The decision to release too early was made with the knowledge that the technology wasn't there. It was no surprise to anyone, least of all anyone on the development team. The decision to release too early was made on purpose, and If I'm really going to stab at the heart of the matter, the decision to release early was an effort to grab money that some other company could potentially grab with their own unfinished alpha copy-cat. We are not stupid. We all know what happened. Words can't change the past. Being honest with each other is an important first step on the path to a better future for DayZ.

Player controller aside, I am a little fearful that DayZ's server performance will always be for the most part bad. The way their server architecture is set up, the server is the master, not the client. Most games, including Arma, are the other way around. If you are playing a game like arma you may be lagging and not know it, at least not right away, but in DayZ you immediately feel the result of lag because your client is catching up with the server, not the other way around. Apparently they made DayZ this way to discourage hacking, but as far as I know hacking is still happening, which really brings the whole thing into question. I do know that in general bullet hit registration is much improved over what it's been, but throwing objects still looks like flip book animation, and I'm legitimately worried that will never change. I was surprised to learn recently that DayZ actually uses a legitimate physics engine, but the server performance is so bad it makes it seem like the physics engine is incomplete, which is not actually the case. DayZ uses a physics engine that works just fine in other games. Maybe someone a little more informed can chime in on this?

You are forgetting about modding, which is what the team has spent a lot of their time working on this past year, and what makes Bohemia Interactive games what they are. If the game is not what players hoped, it will still be a modders paradise. DayZ may be the foundation for something much bigger on the horizon, in the same way that Arma II was the foundation for DayZ. I think that DayZ will be just fine. I don't think the fact that the devs are acknowledging the potential for failure is a bad thing. They are being realistic. Sometimes you need something chasing you to get you going.

Okay, wow, the amount of presumption coming from you is just stupid. You don't know anything about how I play. I don't kill myself to get anywhere. I'm not saying I never have (and who the hell can?) but generally I don't. I appreciate what DayZ is supposed to be, but it isn't what it's supposed to be yet, so I'm not going to waste my time pretending it is. A lot of people have come to the same conclusion, which is why the game is dead right now. I think radios are awesome but no one uses them. No one will ever use them. Every squad uses team speak and that's just the truth. You can live in your pretend, idealized, DayZ world if you want to, but I have a life outside this game, and so do the people I play with, and so do the majority of the people who will play this game. You need a reality check. Also, what exactly is bad about trying to introduce new players to the game? What exactly is bad about playing with noob players? They are very enthusiastic about the game and that enthusiasm is refreshing. I'm not ashamed of playing with them. I don't quite see what you are getting at. Without people like me the game would be pretty shitty for new players, and new players make up the majority of the people who are actively playing SA right now. No problem. Yeah, it can be a bit of a strain trying to meet up to play when you have responsibilities, but once you do the adventure you'll have is better for it.

Personally I loved the idea of the public hive when SA came out. But it's problems have proven insurmountable I think. I have recently started playing on private servers exclusively and my DayZ experience has improved a lot. You have my vote to dump public servers. They really do kill the DayZ experience.

So true. It really is invigorating. Scotch is the way to go if you don't want a sleepy drunk. Drinking beer while playing DayZ was one of my favorite things to do a few years back. There is always a point where you are too tired to go on and don't really care anymore if you decide to go with beer though.

Yeah, I love it! On the exile server I play on the auto run negates the movement impairment you are supposed to get for running up hills. Not sure if it's intentional or not but it's awesome.

Why do you want this? In what way would this make the game better? What's the point in making it harder for friends to play together? I'm not going to "just play the game" when I'm trying to introduce someone to it. I've had people quit before I ever even saw them once. People have lives outside of DayZ. A 30 minute suicide timer would be ludicrous. DayZ is arbitrarily punishing enough. The very last thing it needs is more arbitrary punishment imo. OP: When I meet up with people we each start out by identifying our location on the map. We then pick a location half way between us both and head there. A veteran such as yourself shouldn't have much trouble with that. Gorka winds up being a pretty common meeting place. It's pretty easy to navigate your way there from basically every spawn, and being there puts you in a pretty good position to make your way deeper inland without getting lost. It's a pain but it works. Playing with friends will improve your map awareness. You actually need to remember the names of every place you visit, and what they look like, if you mean to communicate where you are with people. If you're having trouble finding your locations, just find the coast and run along it towards each other, one with the coast on the left and the other with the coast on the right. You need to know who is the north guy and who is the south guy. The south guy runs with the coast on the right, and visa versa. There used to be a way to kill yourself with the rag you spawn with but i'm not sure if it still works. It probably still does.

The lengths people go to to get auto run working for them in SA are laughable. I made a thread about this years ago and people started posting pictures of their whacky auto run set ups just like this. The devs are just being stubborn. They don't want half the server at any given time AFK auto-running. But everyone wants auto-run. The game should clearly have auto-run. They just don't care. As soon as modding is available it will be the first thing players add to the game. What they are thinking not just adding it now is beyond me. They are just pissing people off even more than they already have. If I didn't have a macro keyboard for auto running I wouldn't even bother playing SA.

Presently in Day Z, if you attempt to turn your vehicle the character will actually turn the wheel, and it is the wheel turning that actually turns the wheels of the car. The wheel actually functions as a tool that operates the wheels, just like in real life. I've always thought this was a fascinating aspect of Day Z and Arma games in general. Developers are presently in the process of changing this so that players directly control the car, not the character behind the wheel. Please guys, DON'T do this! Desyncing doesn't have anything to do with this issue, and I don't think the marginal improvement in response time is worth dumping an awesome and unique game mechanic. Arma games have always prided themselves on being deep. To quote the Arma 3 steam trailer, "you are not just a floating gun head." You are a real character interacting with your environment in real ways. For example, if you bring your gun sites to your face, you are actually looking down the sites of the gun, not just some fake picture of a gun that appears in front of your face. To remove this aspect of Day Z is to diminish it's value in my opinion.

I might be misinterpreting something similar that I read but I don't think it's that passage in particular. Thanks for the info.

You guys took vehicles away from players on stable branch for a significant period of time in order to encourage them to play experimental build so you can get your testing done and it didn't even work? That is quite a blunder if I'm being honest. The community of Day Z more or less died in that time. I'm happy you guys are trying to get work done, but wow. The clause in the alpha disclaimer that addresses bad design decisions really applies here.

This is actually a good question. I've also noticed that the feedback tracker has options for submitting suggestions. I'm a little unsure where would be best to submit suggestions myself.

I recently made a post commending BI for their work with the new zombies, while acknowledging that in general I am not satisfied with Day Z. As I've had a little more time with .61, I've really come around to it. I recently had my first wolf encounter and it was amazing. I killed their pack leader and they split up and ran away. About 20 minutes later I found the same wolves in the next town and had to deal with them. I've seen some complaining on these forums about wolves and the new difficulty their presence adds to the game. I am frankly surprised that people aren't overjoyed by these new threats. Players seem to have gotten accustomed to the ease with which they can just run for miles without a care in the world. I for one think that's maddening and I've always hated it. I love that there are finally reasons to be cautious. There are actually things to survive from now in this survival game. Dealing with zombies, wolves, and even weather has been a blast for me. The clothes you chose to wear actually matter now. Finding water resistant and warm clothing can actually be the difference between life and death. I've had to craft multiple fires to dry my clothes and warm up to avoid dying of hypothermia. Locking myself indoors with lock picks and setting up fires has become a pretty regular thing for me. In fact, I think my cooking is what drew the wolves to begin with, which is awesome. Another thing I've really come around to is persistence, now that everything isn't always spawning in the same spot with mostly nothing everywhere else. I know this still happens sometimes, but the last time I tried playing Day Z it was so bad the game was literally unplayable. I've also really come to appreciate walking as opposed to running, similar to how Arma 3 is played. Somehow slowing down has made me more patient while exploring, because keeping my breath down has become an objective, like the objective of getting to my destination. Soon enough when vehicles are implemented again BI will be adding new, more punishing, stamina features making it so that we can't run forever. I'm really looking forward to that. Stamina management can be a game in itself, and it can really break up the monotony of endlessly running straight for miles. The way Day Z has been up until now, and the way some have become accustomed to, the fun needed to be sought out at far away loot locations that took endless running to get to. The way Day Z is going, the game will be fun wherever you are. That is a better game. That is the Day Z we want, meaning we should be more receptive of new challenges in my opinion. Day Z is certainly deserving of some criticism, but I think it's important to criticize the right things. Getting used to a survival game with nothing to survive from and then being put off when the developers actually deliver on survival features doesn't really make sense. What does make sense is that Day Z has taken so long to develop that it has already cultivated a community who have come to prefer Day Z the way it was. While I think this is a mistake, it's hard to blame them. However, it is reasonable to assume that many changes to come are going to be hazardous to your survivor's health, so it makes sense to embrace these new changes and adapt now. What Day Z has been up until now is quite poor; don't cling to it. There is so much better to come. Anyway, I just wanted to express how much I am enjoying myself right now at a time when it seems a lot of people are taking a break. For the first time in a long time I am excited and confident for the future of Day Z. The 64-bit client, along with the new Enfusion engine, has made the game more smooth than I thought would ever be possible. I am delighted by how smooth even the mouse is on the main menu screen, a true hallmark of optimized games lost even to Skyrim. Things also look incredible. I sometimes marvel at the detail of forests, unlike anything I've seen before in a game, with so many individually placed trees of different species. The new sound is fantastic as well. I remember when sound was so broken it was more likely that any sound you heard actually happened hours ago, and I'm not exaggerating that time frame. Sound is now very reliable as a form of defense and also as a way of seeking out any hidden threats. That may seem rudimentary, but it's something Day Z didn't have for a long time (it had it in the very beginning, but then lost it). And they finally got rid of that damn ambient noise audio loop they had for years; the one that would play random chain link fence sounds every ten minutes regardless of whether you were swimming in the ocean or in an empty field. The ambient noise is actually appropriate for the situation now. When it comes out, the new player controller, with it's new animations and features dependent on those animations, will significantly improve the overall presentation of the game. It is the last major piece of the puzzle to make Day Z what it needs to be, and it's the next thing on it's way. Then new physics will be the icing on the cake, and it's just smooth content releases and optimizations from there. I expect content will be released quickly then, with BI finally having put in place the main infrastructure they plan to build on, which is a goal they set years ago. The majority of the development team is working on beta as I write this, as I'm sure a lot of you know. .62 may be the last update before beta. We are coming into the home stretch! edit: It is now cofirmed that .62 will be the last update before beta

Whatever place most people think is good spot will eventually become a bad spot, more or less. At least that's how things are supposed to work at the moment with the central loot economy. It's dynamic though. What's good tomorrow may be bad today, depending on people's tendencies. I think that's just how Tissy is intended to be. It is the furthest place you can get to from all spawn locations.

Derp. Sorry about that.

My steam name is "maddpeace" if you wish to message me directly. Yes, it can be dangerous. I highly advise you to do a bit of research before changing things around in your system's BIOS, which is where you would make these changes from.