DayZero Thoughts

[beatSTV 631]

 

 

So no:  The mods will always be recylcling the same idea over and over whilst the SA is actually improving the core gameplay as well as bringing a shed load of new content.

 

I have to seriously disagree with that statement fraggle some of the stuff we have developed already its mind blowing let alone the ideas that are currently in progress. 

[The Jackall 55]

I think it's unfair to say "they achieved more in lesser time".

We can't just ignore all the development made previously by the original team and the community devs on vanilla.

Don't you think the Dayzero team took a huge foundation so they could "mod" and release their version?

 

if you look at the following two things you may agree. the podagrosk map and enterable buildings?

[SmashT 10907]

if you look at the following two things you may agree. the podagrosk map and enterable buildings?

 

Podogorsk has been around for a few years now, it was even ported to DayZ back in December last year (although the project was later abandoned). I don't think they have modified it a great deal because the entire top half is still empty. The building models are a topic of much discussion, it's strictly against the TOS to modify original, binarized ArmA 2 models without permission from BIS. From what I have read, permission has not been granted but they have just taken the approach that they will remove it if requested. Many other modders have requested permission and been denied. Obviously the official mod is not going to take this approach.

 

On the topic of enterable buildings, the Sahrani mod developers over at opendayz are currently in the process of opening up buildings that were used in ArmA 1 Sahrani and reused in ArmA 2 Chernarus so the official mod can also use them. The ArmA 1 MLOD models have all been made available by BIS so there are no legal issues there. http://opendayz.net/threads/sahrani-mod-developers-arma-1-arma-2-building-project.11351/

 

I think DayZero is pretty great but it's a bit naive to call the official mod developers useless when they legally can't make these same changes. Also Rocket hasn't worked on the mod since it was handed over to the community devs close to a year ago now. Anyone can contribute to the github you just need to PM R4Z0R49 or AlbyBDPK to get access.

Edited September 2, 2013 by SmashT

[Hellsing (DayZ) 6]

The building models are a topic of much discussion, it's strictly against the TOS to modify original, binarized ArmA 2 models without permission. Permission has not been granted but they have just taken the approach that they will remove it if requested.

 

It's better to ask for forgiveness, than to ask for permission?? or is it the other way around..... I just can't remember :P

[Fraggle (DayZ) 15720]

You made it sound like the DayZero guys broke laws.

I'd never do that, especially with my limited understanding of such laws or DayZero.  I was generalising about the state of modding in general and some of the liberties that people take.

 

When a mod get's released with limited servers I ask myself "why?".  

 

In the case of Origins it was so that they could make money from it, they held a monopoly.  If you wanted/want to run an Origins server you had to pay "GamersPlatoon" for the rights to do so which in turn meant you were paying "Kinghunt", the mods developer.  So what's wrong with that?  Well it's not his to sell.  They took peoples work, bagged it up as there own and profited.  They also threatened legal action against others that tried to use it, effectively stopping people from using community written content (they, or at least someone proposing the be from the Origins team also asked/demanded that I removed a post I made about it a few months ago as well as other negative posts made by our members on these forums, I ignored them).

 

Lets be clear:  Modding is a hobby, not a profession.  People do it for many reasons, improving their skills, demonstrating ideas/concepts, a passion for coding, getting noticed, CV/portfolio building, fun, and so on.  It's great for fledgling coders/developers/artists/map-makers because they get to use a developers resources and many pre-made assets for free and basically mess around with them.  Being able to do this for free comes with certain responsibilities both ethically and legally.

 

If you want to make money from game development modding isn't the way to do it (unless you intend to pay for the rights to do so further down the road as in the case of Invasion 1944 - a popular Arma mod that went on to become a game in it's own right).  You need to pay for the correct licences etc.  If I want to make a game right now using the Unity engine for example I need to pay them for the right to do so because they've invested a hell of a lot of money building that engine, if I want to add sound to that game I need to make it myself or seek permission/pay somebody to to it for me, the same goes for art assets.  I can't just pluck anything I want off of the interwebz, shove it into my game and then sit back and watch the dollars rack up.

 

If I want to make a mod for a game and explore some ideas, that's cool and as I said BIS have been actively encouraging the modding scene for years, more so than most publishers out there.  If I want to make money from developing something that's a whole different kettle of fish and I need to start seeking permission from the people, developers and publishers who's assets I'm using.

 

Anyway, to be clear I'm just generalising about modding in general.  I have no Idea how DayZero have been able to make performance enhancements by only editing the files that they as modders have access to when literally hundreds of other talented coders/modders before them haven't managed to.  We could speculate all day about it, maybe they hacked/altered the EXE. files, maybe they're just seriously good coders, maybe it's something I have no idea about.  Who knows? I don't.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Fraggle
edited for grammar :/

[Fraggle (DayZ) 15720]

shitballs, that actually looks good. DayA got a ring to it.

I'm gonna go way off topic but I'm mildly drunk so humour me.

 

Imagine a survival mod inspired by DayZ but using the whole alien theme instead.  Basic survival would be your main goal (as I hope it will be again in the SA) but the threat of Aliens opens up so much potential.

 

Imagine at night there's massive AI/scripted harvester ships that slowly and ominously hover over the map sucking people up into the ship (like WOTW's).  Imagine having dog-fights with AI alien fighters, them in futuristic fighters and you in a traditional plane or heli (Independence Day stylee) and their glowing blue contrails lighting up the night sky.

 

Imagine in the daytime small AI groups of them scour the map on foot attempting to clear up the last of the humans.

 

In DayZ I'm dead against AI being used because I think all "humans" on the map should be real players, I think that's core to DayZ itself but in a mod like that, it'd rock.

 

GODDAMIT, if I had any skill or talent, that's what I'd be doing right now.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Fraggle

[beatSTV 631]

I'm gonna go way off topic but I'm mildly drunk so humour me.

 

Imagine a survival mod inspired by DayZ but using the whole alien theme instead.  Basic survival would be your main goal (as I hope it will be again in the SA) but the threat of Aliens opens up so much potential.

 

Imagine at night there's massive AI/scripted harvester ships that slowly and ominously hover over the map sucking people up into the ship (like WOTW's).  Imagine having dog-fights with AI alien fighters, them in futuristic fighters and you in a traditional plane or heli (Independence Day stylee) and their glowing blue contrails lighting up the night sky.

 

Imagine in the daytime small AI groups of them scour the map on foot attempting to clear up the last of the humans.

 

In DayZ I'm dead against AI being used because I think all "humans" on the map should be real players, I think that's core to DayZ itself but in a mod like that, it'd rock.

 

GODDAMIT, if I had any skill or talent, that's what I'd be doing right now.

 

hmm i like it 

[Fraggle (DayZ) 15720]

hmm i like it 

I like it because it's different enough to open up some new gameplay ideas but it can keep the core elements of what peeps like about DayZ.

 

Also (bearing in mind I know nothing about coding) it solves the constant and ongoing issues the modders have with trying to manipulate the current soldier AI to make zeds work.  If you used intelligent Aliens you could literally just use the already existing AI from Arma, it's all just there waiting to be used, whether it's groups/squads of them or anything else.  You could probably keep the animations initially too, it'd just need some nice moddeling/texture work to really sell the idea.

 

Imagine looting a futuristic weapon off of an alien, laser battles in Arma would be pretty epic if done well (tracer fire already looks nice at times and could maybe be toyed with/enhanced to simulate lasers). And mixing that with the real world weapons we (the survivors have) would rock.  

 

Adding some scripted events (such as the harvester thing at night) or maybe the odd fly-by of a squad of alien fighters would really sex things up a bit too.

Edited September 2, 2013 by Fraggle

[dgeesio 1034]

alien sex yes !

[t1337dude 101]

I much prefer DayZero to any other form of DayZ at the moment. I just wish they gave us a DayZero version of Namalsk as well - that map was extremely enjoyable and unique in its playstyle. I honestly don't think I've had as much fun in DayZ as I've had on that map. But as many have already stated - I really enjoy DayZero for its performance, anti-hacking measures, subtle map improvements/variations, new weapons, and a bunch of populated first-person servers.

[Avallanche 121]

I'm gonna go way off topic but I'm mildly drunk so humour me.

 

Imagine a survival mod inspired by DayZ but using the whole alien theme instead.  Basic survival would be your main goal (as I hope it will be again in the SA) but the threat of Aliens opens up so much potential.

 

Imagine at night there's massive AI/scripted harvester ships that slowly and ominously hover over the map sucking people up into the ship (like WOTW's).  Imagine having dog-fights with AI alien fighters, them in futuristic fighters and you in a traditional plane or heli (Independence Day stylee) and their glowing blue contrails lighting up the night sky.

 

Imagine in the daytime small AI groups of them scour the map on foot attempting to clear up the last of the humans.

 

In DayZ I'm dead against AI being used because I think all "humans" on the map should be real players, I think that's core to DayZ itself but in a mod like that, it'd rock.

 

GODDAMIT, if I had any skill or talent, that's what I'd be doing right now.

It sounds a lot like the tv show "Falling Skies".

 

Tasty.  :beans:

Edited September 3, 2013 by leodacosta

[OrLoK 16185]

Hello there

 

I've kinda skimmed over the last few pages, so I may have missed some salient comments.

 

What I will say is that the default Mod is evolving into something rather splendid and way beyond what I was expecting.

 

To me the Mod and the SA are just two different but parallel forks of the same idea.

 

I think what the mod will be bringing to the table in the future will trounce many of the existing offshoots.

 

To write off the vanilla mod IMHO is a fools errand. I cannot elucidate more than that, but even when the SA arrives there will still be a fanbase for the mod.

 

We are getting two amazing games on a similar theme. We are very lucky things.

 

Different beasts but both superb.

 

I plan to be a fan of both.

 

Rgds

 

LoK

[broguenz 333]

Tried the Pandaria .. er I mean Pandagorsk or what ever it is and apart from not knowing where the hell I was it seemed ok. In fact not knowing made for a nice change.

[The Jackall 55]

I'd never do that, especially with my limited understanding of such laws or DayZero.  I was generalising about the state of modding in general and some of the liberties that people take.

 

When a mod get's released with limited servers I ask myself "why?".  

 

In the case of Origins it was so that they could make money from it, they held a monopoly.  If you wanted/want to run an Origins server you had to pay "GamersPlatoon" for the rights to do so which in turn meant you were paying "Kinghunt", the mods developer.  So what's wrong with that?  Well it's not his to sell.  They took peoples work, bagged it up as there own and profited.  They also threatened legal action against others that tried to use it, effectively stopping people from using community written content (they, or at least someone proposing the be from the Origins team also asked/demanded that I removed a post I made about it a few months ago as well as other negative posts made by our members on these forums, I ignored them).

 

Lets be clear:  Modding is a hobby, not a profession.  People do it for many reasons, improving their skills, demonstrating ideas/concepts, a passion for coding, getting noticed, CV/portfolio building, fun, and so on.  It's great for fledgling coders/developers/artists/map-makers because they get to use a developers resources and many pre-made assets for free and basically mess around with them.  Being able to do this for free comes with certain responsibilities both ethically and legally.

 

If you want to make money from game development modding isn't the way to do it (unless you intend to pay for the rights to do so further down the road as in the case of Invasion 1944 - a popular Arma mod that went on to become a game in it's own right).  You need to pay for the correct licences etc.  If I want to make a game right now using the Unity engine for example I need to pay them for the right to do so because they've invested a hell of a lot of money building that engine, if I want to add sound to that game I need to make it myself or seek permission/pay somebody to to it for me, the same goes for art assets.  I can't just pluck anything I want off of the interwebz, shove it into my game and then sit back and watch the dollars rack up.

 

If I want to make a mod for a game and explore some ideas, that's cool and as I said BIS have been actively encouraging the modding scene for years, more so than most publishers out there.  If I want to make money from developing something that's a whole different kettle of fish and I need to start seeking permission from the people, developers and publishers who's assets I'm using.

 

Anyway, to be clear I'm just generalising about modding in general.  I have no Idea how DayZero have been able to make performance enhancements by only editing the files that they as modders have access to when literally hundreds of other talented coders/modders before them haven't managed to.  We could speculate all day about it, maybe they hacked/altered the EXE. files, maybe they're just seriously good coders, maybe it's something I have no idea about.  Who knows? I don't.

 

I must admit your post made me think about a few things. The Dayzero guys are not forcing anyone to pay for their content which I think is a great approach. I do however think BI should have been profiting from their sales in some way,and if they didnt then I would be suing.

 

Anyway, some people might prefer paying to get that extra kick from the game, and credits to the guys that put all this time and effort into one amazing mod. I actually think that they havnt just made a great Mod, but also have been marketing it brilliantly. It leaves you wanting to pay so you dont have to wait for extra slots to open up, or to start with one bandage. Also the fact that they keep their code in place and dont give it out to anyone is a good idea, as it protects the theme behind DayZero, which basically means not any dumb fuck can host a Dayzero server and fuck it up for us all. 

 

I also do feel that dropping vanillia was the biggest mistake Dean has ever made, and if he took a page from these guys he would have made some dollars already, and perhaps spend those dollars on a bigger team of developers in order to get quality and speed into the standalone (yes i know he doesnt want to rush it bla bla fucking bla).

 

At the end i agree with your comment that modding is a hobby and skill test, but if guys can produce quality content at this scale, then i am surly willing to pay for that content too.

 

I think the fact that they are calling it a donation and not subscription, saves them from battling in court.

 

 

anyway here is the zombies donation page for those who dont know what i am talking about.

 

 

 

And here is one of the packs available at bmrf.me

 

Edited September 3, 2013 by The Jackall

[Hellsing (DayZ) 6]

Hang on.... for $25, not only do I get a reserved slot on ANY server (so no more sitting around refreshing to find a server to join for an hour, at least) but I also get to spawn in with all of that stuff (dependant on which one I choose)... AND replacement skins.

 

hmmmm I would SOOOOO buy that!!!!

 

Thanks for the heads up Jackal! (gets credit card out.....)

Edited September 3, 2013 by Hellsing

[Inception. 9443]

 

The game is really amazing and actually brings you back to when you first started playing Dayz.

 

 

That's somewhat contradictory. Just saying.

[The Jackall 55]

Hang on.... for $25, not only do I get a reserved slot on ANY server (so no more sitting around refreshing to find a server to join for an hour, at least) but I also get to spawn in with all of that stuff (dependant on which one I choose)... AND replacement skins.

 

hmmmm I would SOOOOO buy that!!!!

 

Thanks for the heads up Jackal! (gets credit card out.....)

 

just remeber the skins pack is US based only, and the other one with reserved slots only is UE based only with no skins pack.

[The Jackall 55]

 

That's somewhat contradictory. Just saying.

 

please explain?

[Inception. 9443]

please explain?

 

Well, you said that DayZero brought one back to the vanilla greatness of the DayZ Mod [in its earlier stages, I presume], however there is an option for players to purchase and spawn with gear.

[The Jackall 55]

Well, you said that DayZero brought one back to the vanilla greatness of the DayZ Mod [in its earlier stages, I presume], however there is an option for players to purchase and spawn with gear.

 

Like i said, the skin packs are for US servers only (which i am not interested in). And I personally will not buy one of those packs as i think they are too expensive, and secondly i would love others buying them so i can kill them and take all their gear.

[broguenz 333]

I must admit your post..

 

It isn't that much better than DayZ in my opinion 

 

In fact given how they are using this pay to 'win' model and trying to profit from another's idea it has put me off real quick. 

 

Just because they are marketing it better or have made improvements doesn't make it any less rip off. The fact they have to use donation rather than sub proves they know it.

[The Jackall 55]

 

 

It isn't that much better than DayZ in my opinion

 

In fact given how they are using this pay to 'win' model and trying to profit from another's idea it has put me off real quick. 

 

Just because they are marketing it better or have made improvements doesn't make it any less rip off. The fact they have to use donation rather than sub proves they know it.

 

 

i think you are wrong. the improvements are major and if you hvant seen them then you havnt been playing the game for long, or even moved down to the airfield. And do you think these servers they host on are for free? The game in general is more stable on these servers, and they are not forcing you to donate.

 

I will be donating to thank them for the time and effort they have put into the mod.

Edited September 3, 2013 by The Jackall

[Fraggle (DayZ) 15720]

I think it's undeniable they've done some great stuff, my friends that have played it love it and speak of it as highly as you do.

 

But...  That pay to win bollocks (and that's what it is) couldn't be further away from the core concept of DayZ if it tried.  And as I said before, if you take up modding to make money you're in it for the wrong reasons.

 

People managed to make Arma mods (some extremely professional ones too) for years without getting the urge to try and profit from it.

 

Why do they need to host their own servers at all?  That's what bothers me.  If a mod is good it'll take off regardless.  That's what modding is all about.  It's a community driven thing made by the community for the community, not a business venture.  As I explained before, if you want to make a business out of it there's a whole different way of going about it.

 

I mean cummon, 25 euros for unlimited access?  That's not cheap, they'll already be in profit and it won't stop there.  Servers really don't cost that much.  Good luck to them but it's not something I want a part of tbh.

 

Modding is a creative hobby, that's just what it is, all I see now is people cashing in.  To me that goes directly against the whole concept of modding itself.  Saying "we accept donations" is very different to charging for certain perks in-game, optional or not there's a fundamental difference. 

Edited September 3, 2013 by Fraggle

[broguenz 333]

i think you are wrong. the improvements are major and if you hvant seen them then you havnt been playing the game for long, or even moved down to the airfield. And do you think these servers they host on are for free? The game in general is more stable on these servers, and they are not forcing you to donate.

 

I will be donating to thank them for the time and effort they have put into the mod.

 

 

 

Of course they don't force you too, they can't. 

 

What they can do is take advantage of human nature by giving people an upper hand if they do.

 

A simple donate button would cater for those who wish to help out of the goodness of their hearts.

 

What is it.. something like a 1.80 a slot per month, your paying by way of donation for about a years worth of hosting charges.
I wouldn't give the mod of the mod that long of a life considering that's all it really is.

 

Edited September 3, 2013 by RogueNZ

[beatSTV 631]

this is what bothers me about DayZero the pay to win and the fact that the server files are not open