Dear developers, hear my plea. [priorities, not additions]

[bobotype3334 160]

To the lovely crew behind DayZ's Standalone. Could you PLEASE prioritise these things, before anything else, to better the experience for people who paid $30? :) Because I had thought all my Christmases had come at once with the update, only to find that all the glaringly urgent game problems with the alpha had been ignored, and some of the new additions were:
"-Loot: Added color variants of all shoes into loot spawns"
"-Loot: Added hiking pants"

"-Loot: Added hacksaw"
"-spraypaint"
"-fifty billion other separate things"

To clarify, I'm not upset that we get these nice things. I Know That This Is An Alpha. 
However, I would really like to have the most important things fixed before we get all this other minutiae- I don't care about shoe variants. I want, in this order:

-Fixing player clipping through walls so it STOPS HAPPENING and my 10-hours-of-running character doesn't fall to their death out a second story wall by teleporting through it. THIS IS IMPORTANT.

-Fix-upping of zombies so we can tell when we have hit them, please. A gore spray would do that nicely.
-Introduction of at least one type of repairable land vehicle, requiring 4 different metal parts to repair it and jerrycans to fuel it, with the vehicle having 40 different spawns, more frequently inland.

-Loot on zombies. There is no reason to kill zombies at present unless you're cornered. Zombies need to drop a rare handgun, helmets, chest holsters, and sometimes water bottles, ammunition and other stuff which could conceivably be in a zombie's pockets. Balance to this could be achieved by making military supplies a little rarer.
All these things being made a priority before anything else will make things so, so much more fun for the alpha owners than just more types of civilian loot. Thanks for reading.

[dulix11 731]

"Priorities, not additions"

 

-Introduction of at least one type of repairable land vehicle, requiring 4 different metal parts to repair it and jerrycans to fuel it, with the vehicle having 40 different spawns, more frequently inland.

 

I don't like having to walk everywhere, but I can live with it. For now, at least.

[elf cakes 559]

"Priorities, not additions"

 

 

I don't like having to walk everywhere, but I can live with it. For now, at least.

was gonna comment exactly the same thing here, op you contradict yourself so much. although i do agree to an extent that the things that require the most focus currently are performance and amount of zombies. i dont see why they're adding all this new content when there's so many fixes to be made. arma was legendary for its horrible performance, and dayZ currently is too. why not spend time making the performance playable for people without a GTX Titan?

[Lady Kyrah 1110]

Dare i mention that at the present time the devs priority is not to make the game bug free, stable or even enjoyable?

[bobotype3334 160]

-Cars are going to be implemented eventually anyway, and that's the way they had it in the original mod, so I assumed that was they way they were going to have it-broken down repairable cars. I wasn't making an addition, just a suggestion that the priority would be to prioritise development of cars first, even as long as they only do 1 kind for now. That isn't an addition, assuming they do it like they did in the mod.

 

-Where did I contradict myself? And as for performance, I run the game comfortably on medium low settings on a g6 laptop. I believe at this point gameplay is more important than performance, because gameplay effects everyone no matter how good or bad their rig is, and the mod was well known for being demanding in terms of performance.

 

-Well then what are the dev's priorities? Because if they have time to add multiple kinds of shoes in an update, they have time to do these 4 things. That's all I'm saying.

 

ps: Sorry, still learning how to quote posts properly. I've been familiar with the game and mod for a long time but not so much the forums.

Edited January 23, 2014 by bobotype3334

[fluxley 2228]

All of your suggestions are being held back largely due to server side performance issues, this is something that they are working on constantly in the background, 

Meanwhile other members of the team are working on things like models and fixing the smaller bugs.

Edited January 23, 2014 by Fluxley

[DropBearChick 1216]

"Priorities, not additions"

 

 

I don't like having to walk everywhere, but I can live with it. For now, at least.

Not when each server resets you on join

[bobotype3334 160]

Well what I really really want is for whoever is working on these models for 50 billion recolourations of pairs of shoes, and other civilian crap that nobody uses as soon as they get military grade equipment, to just go to work on zombies dropping loot, at least one vehicle, zombie gore spray and player clipping. That's what I'm saying: these things need to be prioritised over crappy cosmetic items.

[thedogfoodyayho 295]

They have people to work on issues.

And they have modelers.

 

What, you want the modelers to go home?

Its not like its Rocket and two other guys. 

[ZedsDeadBaby 2287]

http://www.reddit.com/r/dayz/comments/1vg7bu/brian_hicks_working_on_finalizing_work_on_the/

 

Read this reddit thread. Rocket addresses a post much like this and speaks at length about the team's current priorities.

[Roshi (DayZ) 397]

Agree with your basic point about some fundamental stuff needing fixing BUT from what Rocket has said previously they have a variety of specialized people on the dev team so all the work on engine issues, map changes and new items occurs in parallel. I.e. just because hiking pants etc have been put in doesn't mean that they're not going nuts on the big bugs.

[xTITANx 25]

This is the problem with releasing an alpha. Please stop telling the people who know how to build and design a game what to prioritize. They get paid to prioritize what they know is the most important to the game, not to you. All of the things that you ask for are being worked on but their priority has nothing to do with when they are going to be done. The harder the task, the longer it will take and adding more people to a task won't make any difference. That's not how engineering works.

[SunTechNick 3]

So you are trying to say that designer team should go for vacation? Those things you mentioned, it's parallel development branches. Part of the people is fixing bugs, another part creates new content, another work on stability. Obviously you have no idea what is IT project :)

 

P.S. Deamn, couple guys said same things before. All of you got my beans :)

Edited January 24, 2014 by SunTechNick

[whothehellishe 81]

I do like updates as soon as they ready from different teams, but i think having a major merged update once in a while instead of small updates frequently might be better.

[Monkfish (DayZ) 339]

The thing that seems to escape a lot of people's thought process is the amount of time and effort required to implement things. Adding in something complex like a vehicle, with all of the mechanics to support it, or making a major update to the way servers behave, or fixing/introducing something else similarly complex takes many people many many hours of dev time to even get working in a basic way, then they have to test it to make sure that it is working and won't break everything else in the game by fucking up the balance or something. Adding some more coloured shoe/trouser variants? Relatively easily and can be done by, I imagine, a single modeler as they can quickly (relative to the rest of the items) add lots of new variations because all they're really doing is copying existing models and making some slight variations to a few values. And besides, they're a modeler and their priority is modeling. They get on with that while other members of the team get on with their own tasks, which might be something big and significant like vehicles or getting the core of the game working properly.

 

This is why each patch will see a lot of small, seemingly insignificant, items added whilst larger things are relatively infrequent. It's not because the developers are all huddled around a single machine fapping over a new shoe model, it's simply a case of how much effort is required to add said items. Big updates need more time, small updates do not. It's simple, really, if you use some logic and common sense.

 

Furthermore, it has barely been four weeks since the New Year started and we've already seen a handful of patches, the most recent one fixing a fairly major bug (zombies and wall clipping) as well as a decent smattering of new items to play with. In short; quit fuckin' whining.

 

I sincerely hope we're not going to have one several of these threads bitching about what the devs are doing with their time every time there's a patch.  :rolleyes:

 

Edit: Grammar

Edited January 24, 2014 by Monkfish

[AP_Norris 1018]

Early access alpha is to add features, bug fixing is meant to come with befa.

I don't think there's anything game breaking though.

[LaughingJack (DayZ) 767]

Like I wrote in the patch-announcment thread, everytime I read something like this ("they focus in the wrong things", "The should not add that before they fix this", or something along these lines) I think you imagined the following scenario, happening a week before the latest patch:

 

Developers Meeting, they discuss something, Dean enters. First developer looks up to Mr. Hall and says: "We need to focus on resets and implement more zombies and also fix that they are going through walls, that should be in the next patch!"

Dean looks at him in total disgust, jumps on the table and screams "F*** off with that! Ignore it until December! I want PIPSI in the game! Pipsi and short pants, thats the TOP and ONLY Priority!"

 

...really?

 

But i wont repeat my rant now, since other people found nicer words here *throws beans at them*

 

 

Edit: typos.

Edited January 24, 2014 by LaughingJack

[Lady Kyrah 1110]

The accepted standard for making a game is the following:

 

• come up with an idea.
• write down your design doc: game concept, take decisions on features, mechanics, etc.
• build a proof of concept prototype.
• (Alpha)pile on the features and functions that are required by your design doc step by step, eventually adjusting things as testing goes.
• fix glaring bugs that completely prevent internal testing (systematic crashes, features that simply don't work).
• feature freeze (no more feature will be added from this point)
• (Beta)fix all the bugs by order of importance, tweak balance, some minor features may be added. AI work. (Not all bugs ever get fixed before release due to time constrains).
• (Gold)The "shipping" version is ready for release.
• (Post release support, optional) one or more patches to correct add what could not be done in time or to correct bugs/balance issues discovered post release.

Edited January 24, 2014 by Lady Kyrah

[bobotype3334 160]

 

What, you want the modelers to go home?

Its not like its Rocket and two other guys.

Obviously I don't. What I do want is for them to get working on these other, more important things, if they have the time to be implementing and placing these other things in the game, and I know it's not just modelers around because there has to be someone there not currently working on serverside issues who's able to implement things such as fixes to the way items display and lots of other such things, someone not just in the art department.

 

Rocket, in the linked Reddit article, says that "we needed to wait and see, what the key areas are." And that's what these priorities are, key areas. The entire OP was just suggestions for key areas, and pointing out that the people working on variants of cargo pants, Pipsi, hacksaws, spray painting, inventory sizes, player corpse despawn,loot spawning, hand glitching, player animations, berry collection, rabbits, AND AN ENTIRE NEW TOWN could better spend their time working on the four things I mentioned, and the skills for all those things I listed that they did release in the update all seem to be the same skill set required for adding at least one vehicle, adding zombie loot drops, and possibly fixing the zombie hitbox somehow. I don't know if the people in Rocket's "skeleton crew" have the know how to fix player collision detection [even though it's really important], but I think that with all of the different trivial/useful but not vital things they were able to release up there, those people definitely had the skills to be working on three of those four things.

 

xTITANx

 

"All of the things you asked for are being worked on but their priority has nothing to do with when they are going to be done"

 "priority has nothing to do with when they are going to be done"

 

Do you even realise how stupid you sound?

Also, yes, they get paid to prioritise things. Do you know who ultimately pays them? The consumer. Do you know what I, the person who spent $30 on a copy of standalone DayZ, am? Oh wow, a consumer. And don't fucking tell me it's in alpha. I know that, that's why now is the time to make suggestions so that our gameplay experience is better sooner. Don't tell me not to tell them what to prioritise. THIS IS THE SUGGESTIONS PAGE, MORON. IF THEY DIDN'T WANT SUGGESTIONS, IT WOULDN'T BE HERE. My favourite quote from your post: "adding more people to a task won't make any difference."

 

 

Monkfish

The thing that seems to escape a lot of people's thought process is the amount of time and effort required to implement things.

I realise that, which is why I said "at least one type of vehicle." I know it can take time to model 30 or so different kinds of vehicle. But all of those car models are purely cosmetic, so if we just get one car model with a working driving and fuel system and rudimentary repair game mechanics, I'd be happy. I'm not asking for a helicopter just yet because all of that will tie up a lot of time, I just want one car model. It's not whining mate as much as serious advice on priorities, and sure that shoe model could be easy to put together for a modeller, but it isn't just that they added, it's actually far more different things. I want to see all the power going to these four tasks before anything else goes ahead because they could be better dealt with faster, which is why I didn't call for "MORE ZOMBIES!"

 

LaughingJack

"we need to focus on resets and implement more zombies"

I didn't say more zombies myself, but yeah. I don't think the dev team are that silly by far, and I know that they don't necessarily have a hard on for shoes and short pants. I'm just suggesting that the people working on all these little additions should get to work on the more important things.

Sorry about the size of my post, editor won't let me copy+paste or quote for some reason.

[bobotype3334 160]

 

Lady Kyrah

• [Alpha]pile on the features and functions that are required by your design doc step by step, eventually adjusting things as testing goes.
• fix glaring bugs that completely prevent internal testing (systematic crashes, features that simply don't work).
• feature freeze (no more feature will be added from this point)

I think that zombie gore spray, basic addition of vehicles and zombie loot drop would fit in nicely with "pile on the features and functions required by design doc" if you consider bringing back all the features of the original mod a design doc. Seeing as player clipping fails to work only 25% of the time, I guess fixing players teleporting second story walls to break their legs barely falls into "features that simply don't work".

[LaughingJack (DayZ) 767]

Sorry that it wasn't exactly your words, the quote was from a rant from me about something similar, made here: http://forums.dayzgame.com/index.php?/topic/165709-rolling-changelog-stable-branch-032114557/?p=1698279

Edited January 24, 2014 by LaughingJack

[xTITANx 25]

Do you even realise how stupid you sound?

Also, yes, they get paid to prioritise things. Do you know who ultimately pays them? The consumer. Do you know what I, the person who spent $30 on a copy of standalone DayZ, am? Oh wow, a consumer. And don't fucking tell me it's in alpha. I know that, that's why now is the time to make suggestions so that our gameplay experience is better sooner. Don't tell me not to tell them what to prioritise. THIS IS THE SUGGESTIONS PAGE, MORON. IF THEY DIDN'T WANT SUGGESTIONS, IT WOULDN'T BE HERE. My favourite quote from your post: "adding more people to a task won't make any difference."

 

You shouldn't attack people when you do not understand that the term ALPHA, which you claim to know that the game is in, means that they do not care about your experience right now. That stuff is for beta. You obviously don't get how games are made, which is why you make uninformed statements like these, and tell me how stupid I sound. 

 

You chose to join an alpha stage game. Feel free to offer suggestions but telling the devs they need to prioritize something you want is so silly. 

Edited January 24, 2014 by xTITANx

[bobotype3334 160]

 

xTITANx

"tell me how stupid I sound."

I do understand the term "alpha", as I fucking well made clear. If they didn't care about our current experience, the game wouldn't be in open play alpha for $30 with fairly constant updates, and we wouldn't have a suggestions branch of the forum, and Rocket wouldn't be doing AMAs at this time. Being in alpha means they are continuing to add features. What fucking dictionary are you reading? Nowhere in an alpha's definition does the phrase "they do not care about your experience right now" come into it. I do get how games are made, and I probably get it a lot better than you do, so stop jumping on the "it's an alpha" bandwagon and shitting mindless drool out of your mouth. Instead, take some time to realise that me asking for the game basics first is something they can easily ignore, but if they do listen and implement it, it's a positive thing anyway. You bitching at me for making the suggestion is not fucking helpful, when we could be having A FUNCTIONAL BASE GAME EARLIER AND VIOLET PANTS LATER, something which is good.

[TomJeff 12]

Fixing Zombies and performance issues is #1. I think everyone agrees on that.

 

At the same time its not like adding items that are purely cosmetic (new tshirt colors i mean) is that much additional work at this point.

[somethingbloody 118]

Some-one doesn't listen. Adding pants and boots variations are not done by software engineers who work on server stability, they are done by artists. They are not trained in the same programs. They take wildly different amounts of effort and time. They are working on it, and you are just complaining and insulting everyone who tries to educate you.

And can that rubbish about being a consumer. You paid $30 bucks to be a tester, being a consumer comes later. There was a disclaimer when you bought the game, and there is a disclaimer you click "I understand" on every time you fire up the game. The best you can do is make an account on the bug tracker and upvote the issues that concern you, which I can guarantee are already there.

Given the state of these forums, I doubt the devs come into the suggestions area very often, and probably don't pay attention to threads that don't get a lot of beans. And given that you insult everyone and think typing in capitals help people understand your urgency better, I doubt that is going to happen.