Reddit - Jan 2013 - Q&A with Rocket

[SmashT 10907]

Some more questions answered on Reddit by Rocket, will add more as they come.

Q: How long is the closed technical test going to last?

A: As long as it takes to smooth out the architectural issues.

Q: Can we expect any new guns/gear upon foundation release?

A: Yes, lots.

Q: Have you made any improvements in terms of sound?

A: Sound isn't something we've played with a lot yet. It's something we can easily improve - we want the freedom now to innovate, which means not getting locked down because we created certain content. The pace of our innovation is insane at the moment and is entirely changing the landscape of the future content changes.

Q: Will the standalone bring an FPS improvement?

A: Yes, but I follow the usual pessimistic thought that whatever FPS increases we see will likely be taken up with new things added to DayZ. A staggering amount of code that was unused by DayZ has been removed, and is ongoing. This includes UI code and object related code, everything. This provides some benefits. There has been a huge amount of art asset optimization, again helping. Overall, I would say DayZ standalone will offer a smoother experience but not necessarily an FPS increase. I.e if you run it on High now, you won't be running it on Very High but you should get a much smoother experience.

Q: Any plans for Minecon-style DayZ events in the future?

A: Probably, no plans as yet. I would say by June we have a good picture on the success of DayZ as a whole and sometime around then we'll have a good think about the future.

Q: What are your plans for end game content?

A: Firstly, once we have DayZ stabilized into something reasonable - we will look at some advanced vehicle stuff. I.e. sort of vehicle construction, adding different parts to vehicles etc...

Then towards the end of the year, probably, looking at base construction as an entirely new game mode.

Q: What about vehicle customization?

A: Not initially, vehicles will remain very, very basic. But later we will add great depth to the parts mechanic something like a "vehicle construction" system. This will be our first foray into "endgame" type content, after we have stabilized the build.

Q: Has Marek Spanel (CEO at Bohemia Interactive Studio for those who don't know) played the mod/sa and given any feedback on it?

A: Marek has been extremely involved since very early in DayZ (since shortly after it's release really). He continues to be a key contributing member of the team both at a management/steering level and also with design.

Q: What about the price?

A: Cheap for a start, rising in price during development. I'm just going to come right out and say it, so that people start to stop with this whole "competition is good" thing. Competition can be good, under the right circumstances. Personally, the WarZ scandal and the price people have been paying has made me think, personally, that we've been undervaluing the project in terms of price. If one company releases a product, that doesn't perform well and is at a high price, and succeeds - what example does that set for other companies? People need to behave like rational consumers and not just instantly buy everything they see - otherwise all they will end up with is crap. The moment gamers start organizing and rewarding developers that meet what the consumers want - is the moment the publishers will be forced to value their developers more (and pay them more). Regardless, it's never going to be at a full retail price.

Q: How often will updates come out?

A: Daily/weekly. Pushed through steam as delta updates (<3 you steam!)

Q: Will there be some kind of report system in case of hackers?

A: TBC, likely something we will have to work on improving for the entire life of the product.

Q: To what extent will customization go, e.g clothing, character

A: Clothing, full range of selections: Head, eyes, torso, pants, feet, gloves, vest, backpack.

Q: What about player numbers, 60 seems low currently but obviously that will depend on the map design and new areas etc, what do you think is an ideal number?

A: This has been a key focus for redevelopment of Chernarus. I think about 150 is a good number, from our testing in terms of design.

Q: I've been quite impressed by Seattle map in TOH. Would it be possible to rework the map to make it playable in DayZ

A: It's very impressive map, but the issue is more it was designed for something specific (helicopters). DayZ needs interiors, they're really important. I think DayZ needs a new map, BI made, that features a western city... let's just say I have plans. :)

Q: Will there be other animals in the woods such as wolfs, bears, a horde of zombies? Will there be caves, etc?

A: One of the artists is working on a deer, and I believe a rat has been done. The main issue is animations, they have to be generated (often by hand, although once a horse was mocap'd here in the studio for another game!).

Q: Has a chainsaw been added yet?

A: Nope, not yet. We've only really started on item art asset development recently, as we just confirmed all our desired item architectural changes are possible.

Q: Are you aware of the issues with rendering vegetation, obscuring items, tents and players at close range while they remain visible at long range?

A: It is important, we're aware of it - but we haven't got it planned to be addressed yet. We're still on these major, sweeping, architectural changes.

Q: How do you deal with the stress of the game? When you get overloaded with Questions and the difficulties with the development etc. What's your method of keeping things together?

A: Bizzarely enough, aside from running or one of my hobbies like mountaineering or wakeboarding (which I can rarely do here) - the greatest stress relief comes from modding someone elses game.

I love KSP and love modding for it, and I am really in love with Space Station 13 at the moment, and loving making new maps and editing/modding it. There is something inherently beautiful about modding that I just love. I probably was having a slow-moving nervous breakdown towards the end of last year, really. But this year has been great, the progress has been outstanding and all the huge gambles we took architecturally last year have started paying off.

Q: How do you plan on making lone-wolfing more interesting as well as player interaction?

A: I really want to increase the amount of activity in the game, such as hunting and just general surviving/traveling. I hope this makes the lone-wolf play more interesting, which in turn will add more value to any human interaction.

Q: How does the whole humanity thing work?

A: My first thought was "not well". Then I realized I made it, and I just felt bad for myself :( I think we can do better with the standalone with some good experimentation and innovation.

Q: Is the idea of making security systems for underground structures still in?

A: I'm playing a lot of Space Station 13 at the moment and it is giving me some tremendous inspiration for ideas for base construction. But expect this more towards the end of this year. We have much ground to cover first.

Q: Will the ragdoll system be initially available in the SA or will you implement it later?

A: No ragdoll currently, it is a significant amount of work and one we haven't done yet. We looked at it, even tried some, but it was just going to cause far too much delay.

Q: When ArmA 3 comes out, are you going to mod DayZ into it or let the community do it?

A: My real hope, is that the next "DayZ" comes out and get's it's big break in ArmA3. I made a space mod for ArmA2 that I never released, maybe I might make that for ArmA3! I guess someone will mod DayZ for ArmA3 and it will probably be great for it, that's the awesome thing about this community.

Q: Can we expect some unannounced surprises in the standalone release?

A: Absolutely. For the next 12 months at least, probably beyond that.

Q: Are you still looking for SA testers?

A: I am not handling the SA technology test tester list, Matt handles that. I'd probably implode with all the queries I'd get with it (my twitter/facebook/email is full now already).

Q: Will private hives on the SA allow for admin controlled starting gear?

A: Private Hives still haven't been thought out much. For a start, we're going to issue the architecture to some of the big hosters initially until we can secure it and lock it down more for general release. So initially, you'll either need to connect centrally to the main DayZ hive when running a server or you'll need to connect to one run by a commercial hoster. But we still haven't decided this fully yet.

Q: Are you still considering underground bases? It was mentioned early on but not so much since.

A: Once we have things really stable and solid, like a really good experience (I estimate loosely on my return from Everest in June), I think we will start with base construction. I've been playing A LOT of space station 13 and it has given me some great ideas.

Q: Will there still be a 'dot' system and will it potentially still allow ESP hacks (which are hard to detect)?

A: I want to remove the crosshair but I suspect we will have it configurable by servers. Same with 3rd person, but no firm decision is made yet we need to test everything out with you guys first. Hacking is something we will have to work on for the life of the product. I.e. forever. We just have to try this new architecture and continually innovate, adapt to the change of pace. That's just the reality of the world.

Q: Are we going to be able to hide from zombies in trees and bushes? *Here comes a swarm of zombies, I'll just sit in this bush until they give up.*

A: Yes. Although for a few months expect these new mechanics to spontaneously break and hilarity ensue

Q: Do you have anything in the works for more obtainable skins like the hero and bandit skins?

A: You can cloth yourself in custom items for each body part. So effectively, you create your own skin. We're still looking at options for humanity and we aren't tied down to a system yet.

Q: What's after DayZ? Can we expect a DayZ 2?

A: I've got two "ultimate game ideas" that I have wanted to make for many years, and I'm hoping this is my ticket to fund and develop them completely myself and make them the way I want, with no marketing department input. So I'd probably be more interested personally in pursuing these once DayZ is 1.0. But sequels are really just a numbers game. If the idea is still fresh, I hope the harsh approach of DayZ spawns a sequel, so long as that sequel tried something new and fresh (but with the same flavor) on, say, the PS4 and/or the Steambox. I mean, why not? But I'm not sure how involved I would be with that.

Q: Did you play The WarZ at all? Anything from that game that you liked/disliked?

A: Yes, both me and Matt did. It's rather hard to compare because it just wasn't the kind of game that I would want to play. I am not a good barometer for what is a good game or not (the games I played most last year were OpenTTD and KSP..., and this year it is SS13). My taste in games is very "out there". So to say it wasn't my kind of game is putting it in company with the new XCOM and many other well received games. Their out of game UI was very polished and overall gave a much better impression about the product from the word go compared to DayZ. The DayZ standalone, probably will not ever match that either mainly because I'd rather have that artist working on assets for the game rather than a menu or some out of game screen. But that level of polish was really good. Connecting was simple and straightforward, and quick. The melee was "better", although with some caveats. I mean, the bar is pretty low, the melee I mod'ed into ArmA2 is probably as basic as it gets. Continued...

Q: Any possible date or time frame for the closed technical test?

A: We're down to the last few things to fix before the first test servers pop online and we run the first full servers. Slowly we'll hand out the first keys and get a few servers running. Then we will reassess. It could go really well and we open up quickly, or it could go badly. Don't expect the tech test to be fun, or very pretty. It's a tech test, any game design that makes it into that will be a bonus.

Q: Do you think SA will come before April?

A: Yes I think so, but anything could happen and usually does. We'll know more when the results of the tech test are out. Any dates before then would be pure speculation, and my last speculation didn't work out so good.

Q: Any plans to implement a sewage/drainage system in the major cities?

A: I really want too. We'd need to do some magic though (or instancing... but only I am really happy with instancing as a solution at the moment! the programmers want to do it properly).

Q: Will the mechanics of inventory management be changed to something like ARMA 3's, where you have tabs for your person/backpack as well as drag+drop capability?

A: Drag and drop... confirmed. Like ArmA3's... no. The aim's a different. DayZ needs a viseral feedback of what you have. Your inventory is everything in DayZ. I see it as the mechanics that DayZ needs. Hell, you can take away the zombies and still have a game if the inventory is decent. So when you open your inventory screen, you will get instant feedback on everything, using 3d models and some good drag and drop functions. Let me put it this way, if you liked the original XCOM system, you'll like this one.

Q: Are players going to have to re-learn how to play DayZ with SA? Meaning, has the core gameplay architecture changed so much that things we have learned (repairing vehicles, filling a jerry can, giving a blood transfusion) will have to be re-learned?

A: Yes

Q: Don't you think 150 players is a little high?

A: In our testing during DayZ mod, its clear that the vast majority of people stick to the urban centers, and the carnage ensues. So I think, that with more people, it will make the cities both more lucrative (dead people loot), more scary (more crazy "nononononononono' people), and more risky (more bandits). I think this merges in quite well. At the end of the day, it will be the community that decides what the optimum number will be, because they set the terms of how the servers are. Popular servers will see more similar configurations, less popular ones will not be populated. Darwin would be proud!

Q: Do NVGS or Rangefinders need batteries? Do the Red Dot sights ever run out of power?

A: It's done. That's what "weapons as entities" system has provided us. We can now require any object to use batteries or have components added to it.

Q: Have you thought about implementing a radio system, like ACRE?

A: Ideally approaching the ACRE guys and hiring them to do a radio system would be ideal. But this kind of stuff will be later this year.

Q: What about side chat? It's useful for building a community instead of server hopping constantly.

A: Yes agreed, but I'd love to see the option of an "Out of Character" chat that can be enabled/disabled by admins on the fly. Yes just like in SS13 I shamelessly got the idea from there! It works really well there, at the end of the round or when problem is experienced - admins can enable the OOC chat and talk about it. If folks dont want their immersion broken they can hide the OOC chat all the time.

Each attachment will require an engine supported proxy object and we need to get that into the engine ASAP and then start the art pipeline on them.

Q: What are your plans for melee weapons?

A: We discussed it at lunch today. I favour going in depth "mount and blade" style. But this would take quite a long time, it's something we'd consider later. Initially it will be a tidied up version of what we currently have. There are IK anim issues, but they're not insurmountable. But they take quite a long time, we don't have time I would say for the first half of the year. But more and more I am thinking melee is becoming very important in the new standalone.

Q: Will we be able to disassemble weapons?

A: There is a finite limit to just how much we can do and not kill performance. On paper I considered this kind of thing, but it requires a considerable amount of extra art work, textures, and materials. More materials is a really GPU performance killers. More materials = more sections (which means more passes by your GPU before it renders to screen). Already attachments are bad enough, we're lucky that zombies have no weapons, and also have just one material (and just one section!). So the weapon attachment system (confirmed, as of today, it's in full development) is kind of a compromise on this.

Q: Will Heinz, Pepsi, Coca-Cola etc be in the standalone?

A: None of them have returned our calls so I doubt we will see them in game despite our best efforts, unfortunately. We tried pretty hard on this one. It was a tremendous fail, we didn't even get any call backs or replies to emails. I was really hoping we could get something going with Heinz at least.

Q: Can you elaborate on what testing will involve? Will there be focussed testing days, do you want normal bug tracking/reporting done or is it more focussed on stability, performance etc.

A: kju asked me this the other day. Quite literally, it starts with "does it explode?" Then gets more advanced. At the start we're not even looking for bugs we just want to see if it is physically possible to have a full server, etc... etc...

Q: How are zombie spawns going to work?

A: We're probably going to spawn all zombies + loot at the start of the mission on the server to decrease lagspikes and to remove the spawning issues we had. This also allows the potential for the whole "roving zombie" crap people keep harping on to me about (seriously, I get facebooked every day with this one request).

Q: Doesn't that mean all zombies will eventually be killed?

A: The zombies respawn, but it's done at a server level, not client like previously (which was a nightmare).

Q: Where is the closed test, is it delayed?

A: Closed test? Here's the deal, I wasn't happy with the zombie anims or the pathfinding at all. So redoing for the closed test. Honestly we're pretty close to beginning the closed testing. Today though, I felt the architecture was looking good enough that I increased by optimism about what we could actually test with the closed test, so I figured that I would make the zombie changes part of that milestone. That reflects some serious progress on the part of our programmers, considering in December I was biting my nails with nothing to show for it. It's going to be a "slow and steady" progression from the first online tests outside of the company to everyone around the world playing it. It's not really fair to say it's delayed, it's more that I wasn't happy with the zombie pathing/anims to the point of saying that it would form part of the closed test.

Q: Will there be zombie children?

A: Looked seriously into this. Aside from the PR nightmare, the killer of the idea was that we would have to make: A new model (not a big deal), a new skeleton (reasonably big deal), new animations for every animation, on the new skeleton (a MAJOR deal. Vast months of work) So the idea just wasn't really feasible.

Q: Can we expect underground construction?

A: Playing games like SS13 have made me see the real potential of an underground construction instance. So yes, this is something I want to see. Both underground in Cherno and some kind of base building. But we are talking Q4 2013 at best here.

Q: Have you considered a whisper type chat for very close range?

A: Interesting, I'll include this on the list of our chat revisions. Currently the whiteboard in my office has: Server/OOC chat (clients can hide/server admins can enable/disable live), Direct Chat, Radio Chat (selectable on a frequency e.g. 800 - 1700) and (obviously we leave vehicle chat in) Could maybe look at splitting out Direct Chat. Will investigate.

http://www.reddit.co...for_harder_and/

http://www.reddit.com/user/Rocket2guns

Edited January 23, 2013 by smasht_AU

[boneboys 7988]

I like the 150 players.

I hope it can be achieved.

Edited January 16, 2013 by Boneboys

[DemonGroover 8836]

150 - geez!!

[Va3ryn 36]

150 would be interesting. I would feel claustrophobic though

[Embroil 27]

Hmmmm base construction, how will it look like? Making construction vehichles tobuild fences, wachtowers and barraks.

[Embroil 27]

150 would be interesting. I would feel claustrophobic though

I already imagine that in cherno there will be more people than zombies.

[w.westhoeve@hotmail.com 5]

Great questions, getting more hyped for the standalone every day.

150 is reasonable I guess, since there are more locations inland, there is more interest in going there and players will spread.

I hope..

[Mr Nasty 1023]

Great read. Thanks for posting. Vehicle customization is a very interesting topic. My excitement level rises daily. Huzzah!

Edited January 16, 2013 by Mr Nasty

[*Exile* Sami 188]

Nice! Looks amazing!

Edited January 16, 2013 by samirocks24

[m00tley 50]

I already imagine that in cherno there will be more people than zombies.

I don't think so. I think places like cherno and elektro will probably the focus of many diseases, and people will probably avoid going there unless it is extremely necessary. I think that going to cherno and elektro will be almost like suicide, cause you will not only expose yourself to bandits, you will be exposing yourself to diseases, so even if you are successful on your run, you will end up having a bad time. I hope we see more people spread throughout the map.

[mdmonnik@deakin.edu.au 139]

As borat would say.... I AM EXCITE!!!

[Trizzo 632]

150 would be interesting. I would feel claustrophobic though

Not when new loot is spread out the map, new locations, more enterable buildings etc...There is no reason to visit most of the outlying towns because the buildings cannot be entered. This is changing. Even the cities will have far more complex interiors. I trust in the Dev team testing the balance over random hype and speculation.

Q: How often will updates come out?

A: Daily/weekly. Pushed through steam as delta updates (<3 you steam!)

Thank **** I won't miss you Six but Commander ... I will shed one tear

Edited January 16, 2013 by Trizzo

[PracticalTactical 164]

150 players....40 makes the map crowded.

[Embroil 27]

I don't think so. I think places like cherno and elektro will probably the focus of many diseases, and people will probably avoid going there unless it is extremely necessary. I think that going to cherno and elektro will be almost like suicide, cause you will not only expose yourself to bandits, you will be exposing yourself to diseases, so even if you are successful on your run, you will end up having a bad time. I hope we see more people spread throughout the map.

well there aren\t many hospitals on the map, most of them located in major cities

[SmashT 10907]

well there aren\t many hospitals on the map, most of them located in major cities

[St. Jimmy 1631]

150 sounds pretty much because it means there is 1 person in every 1,5km². I won't bash it now but looks like servers might be pretty crowded at first :D

[m00tley 50]

I don't think that 150 is that much. As long as they do a good job and and change the way the game works, it should be fine. The problem atm is the fact that they have a giant map that has no use, cause there are only 4 places on the map that u need/must/want/should to go (Cherno, Elektro, NWAF and Stary). If they make a poor job, we will have 50 guys at cherno, 50 guys at elektro, 25 at nwaf and 25 at stary, but if they make a good job and give you reasons to go to other cities, there shouldn't be a problem.

Edited January 16, 2013 by m00tley

[jaymacca 52]

I actually like 150, as it stands, even with 40 people on at the same time, I still feel like the only one far up north scrounging through the airfields and small towns, everyone seems to be sticking it out in Electro and Cherno, having a number like this will force people to venture further and thus establish a greater player presence throughout the entire map.

Edited January 16, 2013 by jaymacca

[SmashT 10907]

Mmmmm rat steaks

[ninjan777 104]

Mmmmm rat steaks

Feels like Runescape!

[Sutinen 635]

New weapons, game running on the same settings (With graphic improvements and enterable buildings), updates weekly..

This is gonna be awesome.

[barrett_killz 229]

The Seattle map from TOH would be nice though.

[Fuzzx 1]

awesome QnA thx!

would want more information on the progress for the standalone as well

Edited January 16, 2013 by Fuzzx

[irishcavemen@yahoo.ie 65]

I feel like I run into someone on a 60 player server ALOT.

Hopefully the implement it so that you spawn Everywhere.. Like berinzino WHY ISN'T There a spawn in berinzino?!

[jaymurphy98@hotmail.co.uk 32]

150 players, maybe rocket and the devs are increasing map size. So it may not be bad.

(Excuse me if it is confirmed map size is same.)