Sadly lacking

[kebman 213]

What DayZ is sadly lacking is true zombie atmosphere. I mean, what we've got already is all well and good, but...

You all know this from before. Players make them spawn, and when they do, they just walk about aimlessly until you aggro them. And when they do, they sprint like Usain Bolt. It's just not very cool, althoug good enough to make the mod legendary for doing something that was never done before - make you start the game with nothing, and having you sneak and fight for your life to survive. In the beginning this is what attracted so many players, because it gave the game real atmosphere - atmosphere soon lost when you figure out how to dodge the zeds... (And most players gear up and lets the griefing begin.)

What if... What if they simply behaved a little more like in the lore? That is, slowly awakening, purposefully, but slowly hunting you in large packs? Waiting in dark corners to lash out at you if you're not careful? Breaking trough wooden planks, climbing up from graves or catacombs or from the sewer? Maybe there were simply too many of them to get past a certain area, and you'd have to be smart to find a way past - or maybe trick them in some way... After all zeds aren't known to be too smart.

How cool wouldn't it be if they were in every town to begin with, without players spawning them?

How cool wouldn't it be if they were sleeping (or relaxing, if you will) but that your smell would slowly wake them, and only your stupid mistake would aggro them? ...as opposed to how it is now, where they aggro a kilometer away. If they moved slower, and in bigger packs, they could still aggro at a kilometre away, but you'd have time to cover your tracks and try to get a way. Or maybe traps could be set in place, where some of them would flank you from the side?

How cool wouldn't it be if you could actually clean them out of smaller towns, or an area of a bigger town? Or maybe exploit the fact that most of them went after a large band of survivors? Or maybe even try to lure them (or transport them) to an enemy camp of survivors?

That could be end game stuff only possible after collecting enough ammo, or after barricading your turf properly. Then you could swoop in with a heli, or aggro them with a car, either to corral them or to lure them away with noise. Ah, the epic stories that players would see unfold!

And before you scream "alpha", or cry about the few possibilities the Arma engine gives, let me tell you, I don't really care about any of that. I just think it's too bad such a game haven't been made yet... ;)

Edited November 2, 2012 by kebman

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Most of those problems will be solved with the standalone, I'm sure.

As for the whole 'atmosphere' thing, I think you might like a suggestion I made: Dead Bodies and Dormant Zeds