a quick informal thought on DayZ in its present state

[6looter 1]

Right now I’m running SE across the debug plains and I’ve got nothing better to do than to write this down (also, I am a little stoned)

Dunno if it’s the vast emptiness of this digital no-land, or the realization that I would soon have to leave behind my 1500 zombie kills and 1114 headshots as well as my trusted 1911 (and incidentally my beloved M14 AIM, best all-arounder ever created to defend one’s freedom) due to lack of food, but something struck me :

DayZ is great alright, great despite the numerous bugs and glitches, too many of those, so many in fact that one could farm 10 PhDs discussing the phenomenology of birth / death symbolism in DayZ, or zombie metabolism and cellular proton-exchange in post-death telomerase, or even more easily deliver megahours of grotesque footage filled with broken legs and hacked AH-64 Longbows. Not my place to criticize the workability of a public alpha.

Still something is working great and I will emphasize it:

DayZ works both as a game and as a meta-game.

The game is “let’s not die”: finding cans, guns, shooting zombies, dying a lot, and just generally tripping.

The meta game is “now what ?” : having survived, being geared, having a whole network of hidden tent-stashes on 9 servers (3 of which GMT+1 just in case), trying very hard not to die, and just generally tripping.

DayZ works because every time you die, you switch suddenly back from the metagame you were playing so enthusiastically yesterday (raiding high-value targets at night while coordinating with 3 or more other players) to the good old game you enjoyed so much what-seems-like-several-galactic-revolutions ago.

The game delivers what almost no other game can: a constant back-and-forth between two phases of the same game that are so different in depth and texture that they might as well be different games altogether. The thrill of the gearing up: ‘how lucky and clever will I be this time ?’ ‘I guess best way to get hatchet-compass-matches-huntingknife real quick is probly to kill this dude…’ , ‘Let’s not agro those, better to keep a low profile so close to the police station’, or ‘Was that a sniper shot ?’ And then, as you soon become self-sufficient and well-armed and you reconnect with your friends and clanmates, the transition to the thrill of group dynamics and politics. ‘Bet those guys must be raiding the NWAF on Dallas-122 as we speak’ ; ‘Road is probably blocked, but I need that gas’, or ‘how the fuck are we supposed to play without thermals now ?’.

Every time I die is a blessing, a thrill, a delight, a chance to start anew. In fact it’s a goddamn rebirth, bathed in the faith that my next-life, this life, will be more glorious, more intense and more vivid than the previous one. More experienced. More skilled. I will be the best noob around.

Possibly no other game has EVER delivered that before. Keep it like that please.

[RayPugh 146]

TL;DR

[Womb Raider 92]

I agree, I love how Day Z doesn't hold your hand in any way shape or form and you're thrust into the wild and it is adapt or die. I really hope they stick with that and never deviate from it, as that is what makes something like Day Z so special.

[nooblord 8]

youre using the phrase "meta game" out of context and it irritates me

[6looter 1]

youre using the phrase "meta game" out of context and it irritates me

possibly, at least I explain what I mean by that, but yeah I could have phrased it differently

[jruhe240@gmail.com 42]

Well put, this game has many glitches yet it is so much fun.

[DemonGroover 8836]

Well said - you should get stoned more often.

Respawning in this game is a blessing - it allows you to try a different gamestyle, tactic, you name it. At first you feel you have nothing to lose and that freedom quickly turns to paranoia once you get enought gear that you fear losing it.

To be honest once i reach a certain level (equipment wise) the enjoyment drains for me. Now each new respawn i try something different, even if it only lasts for 15 minutes.

[6looter 1]

To be honest once i reach a certain level (equipment wise) the enjoyment drains for me. Now each new respawn i try something different, even if it only lasts for 15 minutes.

Absolutely, also the main reason why this 'certain level (equipment-wise)' can still be fun is because you know it's not going to last !

[DuncanM 0]

yeah that was almost poetic, you should get stoned more often