My thoughts on the SA so far.

[JPWiser 251]

So far the progress has blown me away.

 

I was pretty dissapointed after the very first day but since then have had a complete 180 on how I feel things are going.

 

Let me start off with mentioning things I think are great.

 

Load times are phenomenal.

The graphics look fantastic compared to the mod. 

I love the inventory system and think its going to evolve into something even better. 

The clothing options are really cool, I like having everyone looking fairly different.

The attachment options for weapons are cool, also makes it so your weapon seems customizable.

The loot spawning locations in buildings is done well I like having to spend a bit of time searching around a house to ensure you dont miss anything.

The upgrade to the hunger\thirst\sickness stuff seems to be coming along with just some tweaks needed to be more clear on some issues.

New buildings and military camps are great additions.  I really like how along the coast now you see towering high rise apartments overlooking the cities.

 

Im sure there are more but these stick out in my mind atm.

 

 

Here are some things I hope they are working on, and some i know they are via the feedback tracker.

 

Night time - If we are being coaxed to play at night time more we need better stuff to do so.  AKA Chemlights.  I refuse to play at night with a crappy flashlight that doesnt behave as a real flashlight would.  Turning your gamma up only goes so far and does nothing when your in a pitch black building looking around trying to find the proper angle for your flashlight to actually illuminate something. Flares would be a great addition as well, I know a lot of players miss them.

 

Moar stuff! - I know its all going to come in good time.  But I really think the majority of the community is in need of more stuff to go look for.  Once your stocked on medical supplies with an M4 ammo, food, and water with the clothing choices you want, that seems to be it, and leaves people with a "well lets go kill people" attitude.

 

Balance the map! - Balota, north to the military camp, north to zelengorsk, north to the vybor military camp,  north to NWAF.  There is little to no reason for anyone to visit the east coast.  Other than a giant boat that has mediocre loot at best.  Stary Military tents, Berezino Military tents taken out, along with the lack of sprucing up the NEAF got compared to the west + the addition of all the stuff along the west side of the map makes the east coast a sad panda.  Berezino in my opinion should be next to Cherno the next major city.  Add back the military tents, add another hospital, make it better.  As it is I imagine almost every single new spawn immedietly looks west no matter where they are.  This alone will disperse the map better as people wont immedietely migrate to the west and therefore promote map exploration and cut down the KOS slightly.

 

Get rid of this stupid "autozoom" function.  Our eyes are not binoculors.  The + key needs to be disabled.  Same with the right click zoom.

 

Add in a simple logout timer.  This game was supposed to be converting to a type of MMO away from a FPS.  So take a look at the most succesful MMO's and how they do it.  20 second logout timer.  Not hard to implement.  There have been many good suggestions so far that could easily be molded into the dayz version of a logout timer.

 

Fix up the server select menu.  We need to know what the time of day is on a server so we can pick appropriately.

 

 

*added

-Make eating and drinking more realistic.  I understand the system completely however the amount needed to eat to get yourself to 100% is excessive.  And having to spam the drink key at a well is silly.

-ZOMBIES ZOMBIES ZOMBIES (Cant believe I forgot this one)  Obviously Zeds are not even close to where they want to be with it.  I know they are a work in progress but right now the agro radius is retarted, and night time doesnt seem to change that.  Again reverting back to the night time feature.  Nor do suppresors which sucks.  I cannot wait for this feature of the game to start gaining some ground.  And I will say that even as shitty as the zeds are right now, they are LEAPS AND BOUNDS ahead of the mod.

-I think the smoothness of the transition of items in and out of your hands, using the hotkeys and so on, should really get some attention too.  Sometimes I can switch while running sometimes i cannot, its all over the place and is a big factor that hurts realism and gameplay.

 

Feel free to add to this list again just my opinions of what I like so far and what I hope to see in the near future.

 

Cheers to all!

Edited December 30, 2013 by JPWiser

[Khad (DayZ) 293]

Restrict 3rd person. 

Just rip it out of the Engine Òó!

[JPWiser 251]

Restrict 3rd person. 

Just rip it out of the Engine Òó!

 

Tough argument.  Would like to see an improved first person before that happened.  Although I think if everyone was forced to play first person you would eventually get used to it.  Im really on the fence about this issue as I see problems with both views.

[NagsterTheGangster 388]

For me its the zombie aggro radius. For now they should just put a simple 5ft prone, 15 foot crouch and 25 foot standing, along with 40ft sprint.  Just annoying how the aggro is so non consistant at this stage.

[Bakercompany86 347]

A solid post with great points that are well thought out.

 

I agree night time needs some adjustment (for both realism and gameplay).

 

It's actually not realistic for night time to be completely pitch black all the time.  Yes there should be the occasional cloud cover that restricts the moons illumination.  But to be completely pitch black constantly is not only unrealistic, it restricts gameplay heavily on night servers.

 

They are working on timers to prevent server hopping and combat loggers btw.  Good news there.

 

They're also working to balance spawns so Balota hopefully won't be such a terrible place.

 

Agree on the server selection change as well.  Definitely need to know what time of day a server is before joining, especially if we're going to implement timers for server hoppers.

[deevote 21]

For me its the zombie aggro radius. For now they should just put a simple 5ft prone, 15 foot crouch and 25 foot standing, along with 40ft sprint.  Just annoying how the aggro is so non consistant at this stage.

 

I like the new zombie aggro. It seems the zombies are more aware of what they can see instead of what they hear. Ive been spotted by a zombie from at least 100 or more feet when they were looking in my direction, but I can easily run/sprint directly behind one and touch them without them flinching. If they see a player FAR in the distance I like how they will start sprinting towards them. They mostly stop when sight is lost at the greater distance too.

[ZlobaRUS54 441]

I've been exploring the North (and NOT killing people) and there is already some cool content, so far I found a cool huge traffic terminus station and there is a smaller also awesome train station mid-north.

[Zogvarn 118]

Nice write up OP. Wish more people would post something like this instead of the constant whining we get here on the forums.

 

Infected aggro range: I'm actually ok with it. Sure they will aggro from a couple hundred meters (not feet) when you are running, but only if you are in their direct line of sight or fire a weapon in the direction they are. Crouching and crawling actually does lessen the distance they can see you at in my experience. Makes moving around towns (not through) more interesting. I liked the way the mod worked with sound and visibility having a direct impact on the aggro range and can't wait to see something similar happen in SA.