Development priorities and the latest patch

[Ravenblade86 14]

Let me just start by saying I'm fully aware that the game is still very early in alpha, and that from the first week when I picked it up I've been very impressed by how stable and solid the game is given the fact it's still in an early alpha form.

 

Saying that though, having spent some more time with the latest patch this evening I can't help feeling that the dev team got their priorities badly wrong with some of the changes that they made in the latest patch. It does have a lot of nice changes in when you look at the new items they added and the fact they added a new town and have seemingly made a good step forward with server performance etc. So what do I think they got wrong?

 

1) Drastically reducing the amount of loot spawn before implementing a loot respawn system.

From what I have seen so far, if you join a full server after it has been up for 2-3 hours (especially if your a new spawn) your chances of even finding a can of food are going to be slim if someone else has been in the area before you. Oh, and if you find a can of food? Good luck trying to get into it, I think I saw two items that would open canned food this evening and that was in unlooted towns.

Personally it is the survival aspects of the game that appeal to me so making loot harder to come by is all well and good, but without any sort of loot respawn or alternative methods of getting the basics like food (be that hunting or gathering resources) you are only taking a step back with the game imo.

 

2) Increased number of zombies? and new types of zombies added while they are still capable of running through walls.

Personally I have no real interest in seeing hordes of zombies running about, but they have definitely been in very short supply before the latest patch. It's still not hordes of zombies, but I have seen more than normal running about (have I just been unlucky? or have they actually been increased?) and they still seem very capable of running through walls and generally just being as glitchy as they have been since Standalone released. The new soldier zombies also have extra armour according to Chris Torchia tweet (one of the dev team). When you add all that in along with the reduced amount of loot making it a lot harder to even find a melee weapon, perhaps releasing an improved/less glitchy version of the zombies should be a priority over adding more/tougher zombies.

 

3) Canvas pants. Really? What's the point? Four inventory slots which is the same as jeans, and they look nasty. Do we really need extra things like this? I know different parts of the dev team work on different things, and some parts of game development take a lot longer than others but surely this sort of addition is something that could come later?

 

4) Patch notes that don't include all the changes. Adding in little stealth items might be a nice little suprise for the players, but at the end of the day this is an alpha test and the dev team are looking for feedback on the game to help improve it. Without giving the players a complete and comprehensive run down of all the changes we can't give proper feedback if something is working properly

 

While the game is in alpha, this isn't your typical alpha test that would only been available to people working on it and it isn't an invite only closed test. Over a million people have paid money to get early access to the game and be part of the development process (even if only a very small percentage provide any feedback on it) those people have to be taken into consideration when it comes to the game updates, in the same manner that would happen if it was a game update for a fully finished game. Maybe these sort of things are just teething problems that game devs are just going to have to work though, the idea of an Early Access game is still a fairly new concept in the games industry. 

[hogscraper 328]

1. Loot is supposed to be scare and you should already be doing everything in your power to leave the coast anyway. Complaining about loot in coastal towns is a waste of time unless you are on a server that hasn't restarted in more than six hours. I think there needs to be some respawn mechanic once they stabilize things enough that server restarts aren't happening every four hours, but up to that time, it seems fine to me. 

2. No amount of zombies>fireaxe

3. Pointless addition that adds almost nothing to the game. However, if its just a reskin that team/person might not have anything to do. 

4. Couldn't care less

You said it best when you said, "the game is in alpha". I'm sure some feedback on content is necessary but our testing right now is about mechanics. BIS aren't new to early access and suggesting their not bowing to design suggestions made by players as 'teething problems' is a fairly arrogant thing to say. They had a very successful run through Arma 3. Having been through that one from the first second I could buy I already understand that I only have a small amount, (nearer to none really), of say on content choices they make. Why? They have their roadmap laid out of what they want their games to be as well as when and where they want them at every step and other than tweaks for balance, you need to prepare yourself for the FACT that you are only along for the ride. They have to be this way. Their goal is to make hardcore games that follow a very specific vision. Changing that because people want it could end up destroying the soul of what they are trying to create so they probably will always step lightly and take a long time considering changes.

[chaossound 101]

Let me just start by saying I'm fully aware that the game is still very early in alpha, and that from the first week when I picked it up I've been very impressed by how stable and solid the game is given the fact it's still in an early alpha form.

 

Saying that though, having spent some more time with the latest patch this evening I can't help feeling that the dev team got their priorities badly wrong with some of the changes that they made in the latest patch. It does have a lot of nice changes in when you look at the new items they added and the fact they added a new town and have seemingly made a good step forward with server performance etc. So what do I think they got wrong?

 

1) Drastically reducing the amount of loot spawn before implementing a loot respawn system.

From what I have seen so far, if you join a full server after it has been up for 2-3 hours (especially if your a new spawn) your chances of even finding a can of food are going to be slim if someone else has been in the area before you. Oh, and if you find a can of food? Good luck trying to get into it, I think I saw two items that would open canned food this evening and that was in unlooted towns.

Personally it is the survival aspects of the game that appeal to me so making loot harder to come by is all well and good, but without any sort of loot respawn or alternative methods of getting the basics like food (be that hunting or gathering resources) you are only taking a step back with the game imo.

 

2) Increased number of zombies? and new types of zombies added while they are still capable of running through walls.

Personally I have no real interest in seeing hordes of zombies running about, but they have definitely been in very short supply before the latest patch. It's still not hordes of zombies, but I have seen more than normal running about (have I just been unlucky? or have they actually been increased?) and they still seem very capable of running through walls and generally just being as glitchy as they have been since Standalone released. The new soldier zombies also have extra armour according to Chris Torchia tweet (one of the dev team). When you add all that in along with the reduced amount of loot making it a lot harder to even find a melee weapon, perhaps releasing an improved/less glitchy version of the zombies should be a priority over adding more/tougher zombies.

 

3) Canvas pants. Really? What's the point? Four inventory slots which is the same as jeans, and they look nasty. Do we really need extra things like this? I know different parts of the dev team work on different things, and some parts of game development take a lot longer than others but surely this sort of addition is something that could come later?

 

4) Patch notes that don't include all the changes. Adding in little stealth items might be a nice little suprise for the players, but at the end of the day this is an alpha test and the dev team are looking for feedback on the game to help improve it. Without giving the players a complete and comprehensive run down of all the changes we can't give proper feedback if something is working properly

 

While the game is in alpha, this isn't your typical alpha test that would only been available to people working on it and it isn't an invite only closed test. Over a million people have paid money to get early access to the game and be part of the development process (even if only a very small percentage provide any feedback on it) those people have to be taken into consideration when it comes to the game updates, in the same manner that would happen if it was a game update for a fully finished game. Maybe these sort of things are just teething problems that game devs are just going to have to work though, the idea of an Early Access game is still a fairly new concept in the games industry. 

I have to agree that the priority the dev teams seems to be working under is strange. Zeds were glitchy as fuck in the mod but they are even worse in stand alone, the only improvement to the zombies so far is that they run proper lines instead of back and fourth and sideways and running away only to charge you 2 seconds later. But atleast in the mod they didn't walk through everything like ghosts.

Edited January 24, 2014 by Chaossound

[ZedsDeadBaby 2287]

In the reddit thread below, rocket speaks at some lengths about the team's priorities and why things you might consider low priority are getting done while others that seem critical are not. Your time would be well spent going there and reading what he has to say. Everyone here is going to have a lot to say, but can't really speak for the team. 

 

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

[Flight96 99]

In the reddit thread below, rocket speaks at some lengths about the team's priorities and why things you might consider low priority are getting done while others that seem critical are not. Your time would be well spent going there and reading what he has to say. Everyone here is going to have a lot to say, but can't really speak for the team. 

 

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

Beans for you

[Ravenblade86 14]

1. Loot is supposed to be scare and you should already be doing everything in your power to leave the coast anyway. Complaining about loot in coastal towns is a waste of time unless you are on a server that hasn't restarted in more than six hours. I think there needs to be some respawn mechanic once they stabilize things enough that server restarts aren't happening every four hours, but up to that time, it seems fine to me. 

2. No amount of zombies>fireaxe

3. Pointless addition that adds almost nothing to the game. However, if its just a reskin that team/person might not have anything to do. 

4. Couldn't care less

You said it best when you said, "the game is in alpha". I'm sure some feedback on content is necessary but our testing right now is about mechanics. BIS aren't new to early access and suggesting their not bowing to design suggestions made by players as 'teething problems' is a fairly arrogant thing to say. They had a very successful run through Arma 3. Having been through that one from the first second I could buy I already understand that I only have a small amount, (nearer to none really), of say on content choices they make. Why? They have their roadmap laid out of what they want their games to be as well as when and where they want them at every step and other than tweaks for balance, you need to prepare yourself for the FACT that you are only along for the ride. They have to be this way. Their goal is to make hardcore games that follow a very specific vision. Changing that because people want it could end up destroying the soul of what they are trying to create so they probably will always step lightly and take a long time considering changes.

 

 

1. Loot is supposed to be scare and you should already be doing everything in your power to leave the coast anyway. Complaining about loot in coastal towns is a waste of time unless you are on a server that hasn't restarted in more than six hours. I think there needs to be some respawn mechanic once they stabilize things enough that server restarts aren't happening every four hours, but up to that time, it seems fine to me. 

2. No amount of zombies>fireaxe

3. Pointless addition that adds almost nothing to the game. However, if its just a reskin that team/person might not have anything to do. 

4. Couldn't care less

You said it best when you said, "the game is in alpha". I'm sure some feedback on content is necessary but our testing right now is about mechanics. BIS aren't new to early access and suggesting their not bowing to design suggestions made by players as 'teething problems' is a fairly arrogant thing to say. They had a very successful run through Arma 3. Having been through that one from the first second I could buy I already understand that I only have a small amount, (nearer to none really), of say on content choices they make. Why? They have their roadmap laid out of what they want their games to be as well as when and where they want them at every step and other than tweaks for balance, you need to prepare yourself for the FACT that you are only along for the ride. They have to be this way. Their goal is to make hardcore games that follow a very specific vision. Changing that because people want it could end up destroying the soul of what they are trying to create so they probably will always step lightly and take a long time considering changes.

 

1) I wasn't strictly talking about coastal towns, I was running about well in land this evening and in unlooted towns but the amount of loot was in short supply. My point was that if anyone had come along after me, they would have found next to nothing. That is a going to be an issue if your a new spawn on a busy server until they implement the loot respawning system, so why reduce the amount of loot before you do that? The loot system should be fully functioning before your tinker and balance the amount of loot spawning imo, they have plenty of time to make those adjustments.

 

2) Yeah sure a fireaxe still one hits zombies, but if you can't even find a baseball bat because of the reduced loot spawn then more zombies become an issues. Plus, a fireaxe doesn't stop them running through a wall or attacking you from under a floor. Right now the zombies are a buggy mess, fixing that should be priority.

 

3) That might be so, but I highly doubt that they don't have a massive range of different item types that are in the pipe lines that might need more testing than canvas pants.

 

4) So, if you want to give feedback on why that saline bag didn't restore the amount of blood it should have? Oh, that's right you don't have a clue what exactly changed the saline bag values to so you can't...never mind the stuff they added and never mentioned.

 

Oh, and I'm not saying they drop their road plan of what features they want to add because players want giant pink elephants in the game. My point is that even though this is an alpha test, the fact they have all these people playing it who have handed over money should make them pay more attention is what order and how they implement those features they have planned. A normal alpha test, they could knock up a new feature and throw it into the latest build and if it breaks the game? Oh well, remove it and re work it. With this situation though? More care should be taken in my opinion to make the process smoother.

 

That's just my opinion though.

 

Edit: Yes I have seen Dean talking about how something being a "top priority" feature doesn't mean it will be in the next patch. Well aware that some features take longer than others to make, and that maybe some things have been in the works a lot longer. That doesn't change my opinion that they should take more care with what order they implement those features on the stable branch though. If the zombies are still running through walls but you can add more zombies because of improved server performance, why not hold off on adding the extra zombies until you fix them glitching through walls?

Edited January 24, 2014 by Ravenblade86

[w0lf3x 6]

In the reddit thread below, rocket speaks at some lengths about the team's priorities and why things you might consider low priority are getting done while others that seem critical are not. Your time would be well spent going there and reading what he has to say. Everyone here is going to have a lot to say, but can't really speak for the team. 

 

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

Just read this entire thing, and it's quite a read tbh. Many people seem to grasp the idea that it IS only Alpha, yet expect huge differences in every patch; Such as with games in beta and complete release games. In reality this game may not be up-and-running like say the mod for instance until late 2014 - early 2015. I can kind of grasp how the dev team is mapping out the road though. It seems (to me) like they want to put in a fair amount of weapons, food, etc to get somewhat of a foundation down... then afterwards refining everything to the vision(s) they have. Like Rocket had mentioned, they are "low-manned" atm (if of course I'm interpreting that right) so thing WILL be slow right now. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw more improvements in the next few months as they are hiring more people to help work on it. If you think about it, the money we spent on getting early release is also helping them hire more "man-power" so to speak to get things rolling possibly faster. 

All-in-all, great read and also cleared things up a little better :)

[w00j 4]

1. I do agree they should be focusing on a loot respawn system, however I also feel loot was far too abundant before patch.

 

2. 100% agree, fix zombies first before adding more.

 

3. More variety the better.

 

4. Also 100% agree, stealth updates at this stage of the game makes no sense.

[Judopunch 523]

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.

 

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.

 

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.

 

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.

 

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.

 

WARNING: THIS GAME IS EARLY ACCESS ALPHA. PLEASE DO NOT PURCHASE IT UNLESS YOU WANT TO ACTIVELY SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAME AND ARE PREPARED TO HANDLE WITH SERIOUS ISSUES AND POSSIBLE INTERRUPTIONS OF GAME FUNCTIONING.