The Decline of DayZ

[DannyGB 16]

It's not opinion, it's fact: The numbers curve plateaued a while ago. New players are coming in and wondering what all the fuss was about. People like me who recruited a dozen folks to play feel kinda dumb that we did so, now that the game is overrun with hackers and cheats. What can I say, success is a bitch!

I have the impression that all efforts are now focused on the standalone game. But there is a big problem with this plan: The people who have played DayZ are largely the same audience for the standalone game. Sure, you'll get a lot more folks than the mod got, but by and large they will be turned off by the difficulty, "smartness", and overall design of the game. Unless that game is radically different from this one, in which case my comments are probably irrelevant. The people here, on this forum, are your main contingency. We love what you are trying to do. Trying, and failing.

Blame the hackers if you want. Blame non-hive, blame us the players, blame the "alpha" state. I don't care who you blame. The devs have no one to blame but themselves for being unwilling to engage the community on improvements to the server model (which servers we host), allowances for some degree of control on our part (which we deserve), and continuing to pretend that this is all part of a grand experiment, bugs and hackers included. You can believe that, but meanwhile your community is going away. The emperor has no clothes, and I hope you realize it and engage this issue seriously before it is too late.

We've seen these projects come and go many times. They don't work on a really successful scale unless they find ways to not bite the hand that feeds, and right now, I'm missing most of my fingers.

[Hydra (DayZ) 472]

I hope you realize that Rocket and the devs do not have infinite time on their hands to work.

The correlation between the devs "focusing on the standalone" and the amount of hackers is that the standalone itself will fix the hacker problem.

And by the way, this whole thing IS a big giant experiment. An experiment to see how people react to this mod and what they do in it in order to produce the best possible and most badass game that they can make.

And about the "community receding", it is true. We lose people every day. It is certainly true, but there is another truth here. We gain members every day, due in no small part to you and other like you that bring their friends and family into the fray.

One other thing before I conclude my "rebuttal": Thank fuck you presented your opinion in an intelligent and understandable manner.

In closing, all who actually give a damn about the game, those who actually embrace it as a project that they are given the privilege of helping with, will stick around. Hell nor high water, nor hackers will shove us off of the edge.

As our characters in the game survive, so must we as testers. If we expect the zenith of DayZ to be anywhere near as badass as we imagine, we will have to endure.

Here's a .gif of a cockatiel shoving a turtle into a trashcan.

Oh, and the people who bitch about the game being too hard and leaving can go back to suckling on mama's teet for all I care.

Edited August 29, 2012 by Hydra

[tsugan 20]

Perhaps, when new players stop coming in so rapidly, the hackers will gradually go away as well? One can only hope...

[Quaby 93]

I stopped playing DayZ regularly a while ago. I find that playing mechwarrior and not buying the standalone is the best way I can express my displeasure ;)

Also, the bird kicks ass. End of discussion.

Edited August 29, 2012 by Quaby

[gatorontheloose 29]

bandit bird for reals

[TheDesigner 1197]

People who say "Oh the devs have lives and need time", need to leave this argument, you obviously didn't play this mod before the big rush of players.

The devs used to update the game weekly and hotfixes would come very quickly. The old artifacting was fixed in a week with a hotfixes, I haven't seen any posts from devs or rocket telling us a fix is coming. The mod is essentially, abandoned. They see big money in the standalone and could care less about the 1.2 million people playing DayZ.

Don't try to argue with some of the hardcore fanboys who come in here and tell you to stop QQ'ing. They're like a pack of vultures waiting to see a thread like this. I agree with you 100%. Hackers have ruined the game and artifacting makes it do I can't go anywhere with military bodies and that is pretty much anywhere usefull.

DayZ has become very dull and I only play it with friends in my group, never alone. Most of our original players have stopped playing because the mod is so ruined and it has nothing at all to do with being in alpha. What Dev team that has a mod inalpha takes this long to fix game breaking bugs? A Dev team that doesn't care, that's who.

Edited August 29, 2012 by TheDesigner

[Ajvkorn 72]

Game does have a pretty big learning curve. Just like in WOW, it's boring until endgame.

[Nyz 42]

Whoa whoa!! Blasphemy!! Never ever ever put WOW and DayZ in the same sentence. /puke!!

[ironman Tetsuo 181]

Everyone thinks "They know" when the only people that really do know are too busy working on the game. Rocket is in San Fran working on the stand-alone in between business meetings and presentations at PAX (you know, what every other dev worth his salt is doing right now!) whilst two devs are at home working on getting the next mod update ready for Dean's approaval to launch when he returns from America, what more do you want?

Of course updates will ebb and flow during different periods in the games production, this was started as an experiment after all but now it has to have a definite plan, you don't get to just wing it once big funding gets involved. You have to be pretty naive to expect a consistent service when the workload has increased exponentially over the last few months. This isn't his bedroom project anymore, he isn't dealing with a handful of player/testers like it was in the beginning so why become so incensed at a change we could all see coming and know to be necessary.

Stick around and play when the goings good or wait for the stand-alone, if not, oh well, your loss not mine.

[beno_83au 11]

I haven't seen any posts from devs or rocket telling us a fix is coming. The mod is essentially, abandoned.

There's an update slated for the 6th (or there abouts).

[DemonGroover 8836]

Geez - its not as if we are talking about the Decline of the Roman Empire here, the fall of Western Civilisation.

Sure Day Z is in a bit of a lull at the moment but i have faith it will get better. Focus is obviously on getting the standalone up and running but i think the real excitement is when Rocket allows the mod to go its own way.

[Nyz 42]

He can focus on the stand alone for all I care. Lingor Island will keep me entertained for a while yet, and I still enjoy regular DayZ. The quicker the stand alone comes out the better as far as I'm concerned.

[kebman 213]

How many programmers did Rocket have? Three, including himself? (Please tell me if I missed something) Eheh... So three programmers are gonna fix the whole game, plus the site? Man, you guys posting before me better take a number and stand in line, cuz this is gonna take a while.

Edited August 29, 2012 by kebman

[Tesla Boy 6]

I agree, OP.

They should at least fix some of the major bugs (tents, graphic artifacts) in a timely manner. Everyone playing this is a potential future customer for the stand alone, and all of the bugs/hackers reflect poorly on that stand alone, even if it ends up being completely bug/hacker free.

I'm still interested in the stand alone, but this game feels so broken right now that I'm going to cautiously wait a week or two to read reviews, before actually purchasing it.

[Tesla Boy 6]

How many programmers did Rocket have? Three, including himself? (Please tell me if I missed something) Eheh... So three programmers are gonna fix the whole game, plus the site? Man, you guys posting before me better take a number and stand in line, cuz this is gonna take a while.

Please.

Day Z is going to be published by Bohemia. They've sold tons of copies of Arma II to people who only purchased it to play the Day Z mod. If they can't dedicate enough people to work on this game, then that's just bad business on their part.

[Maxgor 2314]

The mod was updated more, cause that was the only focus at the time. Now that they have the ability to actually fix most things with the standalone, of course that is where the most focus will be, and in turn creating alot more work for them. Just because a bunch of people bought ARMA2 for DayZ, a mod that was never designed to be anything more than something for people who already have the game to play, doesn't mean they are entitled to the same consistent support a fully released game gets. Everyone...EVERYONE that bought ARMA2 for DayZ, knew they were gonna be playing a bug filled, alpha, mod, and they went for it anyways.

Saying you won't buy the standalone, cause they haven't fixed everything in the mod, is just ridiculous. The reason the standalone is happening, is to fix alot of the problems people have complaining about, which can't be fixed in the mod.

[amaROenuZ 144]

Game does have a pretty big learning curve. Just like in WOW, it's boring until endgame.

I kind of feel like it's the other way around right now. The game is incredibly fun when you first spawn up on the coast, but once you get your hands on a tent, some high grade weapons, tools, it loses that intensity and turns into a feature-laden walking simulator.

[Maxgor 2314]

I kind of feel like it's the other way around right now. The game is incredibly fun when you first spawn up on the coast, but once you get your hands on a tent, some high grade weapons, tools, it loses that intensity and turns into a feature-laden walking simulator.

It can be abit of both. I've had some intense moments when I'm trying to survive, I got good gear, and I'm in a quality fire fight, but I've started to do more spawning on the coast, get some gear, and then just be more closer to people and had some entertaining moments from that. It can be intense both ways, depending on what your going for. I do think the long distance stuff gets abit tedious, when you've spent a few days running thousands of meters constantly in the woods to make sure your away from active towns lol That's why I'm starting to play the game abit differently now, purposefully trying new ways of playing, for a new experience, such as not shooting on sight.

[pariahdr 0]

End game gets boring unless you can entertain yourself. Running around in the north by yourself with little to do isn't fun, so people go to Cherno to kill people, and other people go to Cherno to kill those people, etc. Unfortunately end game now is moving back to spawn points.

Short term options are to deal with it, or forcing yourself to go north en masse. Stop sniping Cherno. Start sniping Vybor. At least it'll move the action where it belongs.

Hopefully in the future, the zombies will become more of a menace. It would be great if they could catch you. I'd love it if there were significant repercussions to even being bitten, i.e. player death, turning into a zombie, spreading the infection more quickly with zombie bites, etc, and the paranoia that goes with it. Conversely, it would be nice if you could "take back" an area permanently as well with enough fortification. This is almost doable already, if they fix the whole zombies walk through walls thing. They can go a lot of directions with this game and I look forward to seeing what they do with it. The hacking and cheating I expect will be fixed simply via an engine that doesn't allow people to run any old script they like.

Edited August 29, 2012 by pariahdr

[sudZ! 115]

None of this should be unexpected. They announced a standalone and you expect them to hotfix a mod every week? That's just completely irrational, sorry to say.

[gywidion@msn.com 80]

As Maxgor said.

Have some beans

[Rodekil 2]

I gave my beans to Hydra.

Btw, yes, this game is very frustrating. But no matter how bad it gets, I'll be sticking around. This is hands down the funnest game I've ever played. Hacks, glitches, dupers and all; this mod rocks with or without them. 100% looking forward to the standalone and the future of this game. Rocket and the team has my full support.

[Maxgor 2314]

Hopefully in the future, the zombies will become more of a menace. It would be great if they could catch you. I'd love it if there were significant repercussions to even being bitten, i.e. player death, turning into a zombie, spreading the infection more quickly with zombie bites, etc, and the paranoia that goes with it. Conversely, it would be nice if you could "take back" an area permanently as well with enough fortification. This is almost doable already, if they fix the whole zombies walk through walls thing. They can go a lot of directions with this game and I look forward to seeing what they do with it. The hacking and cheating I expect will be fixed simply via an engine that doesn't allow people to run any old script they like.

I believe the mechanics for infection were there at one point, but maybe removed to get them working right, such as temperature, as I thought I kept hearing about antibiotics you need to get if your infected, which holds back the infection or something. If the standalone fixes at least zombies being forced to walk inside, that would make them alot more dangerous right there. No more running into a building for safety after gathering a horde and then picking them off at your own pace.

[Zombie Jesus 723]

It's not opinion, it's fact: The numbers curve plateaued a while ago. New players are coming in and wondering what all the fuss was about. People like me who recruited a dozen folks to play feel kinda dumb that we did so, now that the game is overrun with hackers and cheats. What can I say, success is a bitch!

I have the impression that all efforts are now focused on the standalone game. But there is a big problem with this plan: The people who have played DayZ are largely the same audience for the standalone game. Sure, you'll get a lot more folks than the mod got, but by and large they will be turned off by the difficulty, "smartness", and overall design of the game. Unless that game is radically different from this one, in which case my comments are probably irrelevant. The people here, on this forum, are your main contingency. We love what you are trying to do. Trying, and failing.

Blame the hackers if you want. Blame non-hive, blame us the players, blame the "alpha" state. I don't care who you blame. The devs have no one to blame but themselves for being unwilling to engage the community on improvements to the server model (which servers we host), allowances for some degree of control on our part (which we deserve), and continuing to pretend that this is all part of a grand experiment, bugs and hackers included. You can believe that, but meanwhile your community is going away. The emperor has no clothes, and I hope you realize it and engage this issue seriously before it is too late.

We've seen these projects come and go many times. They don't work on a really successful scale unless they find ways to not bite the hand that feeds, and right now, I'm missing most of my fingers.

I can see your point ont he lack of communication lately, but on the flip side it is a small development team that has been understandably busy in the last month. They announce a standalone and started working on it this month, they attend Gamescon, they are currently at PAX, and they are from a small company. How many times can you hear people complain about tents and vehicles (it sucks sure, but at the same time it is still in development and is not supposed to be a polished product) or graphic glitches before you just hunker down and start working on the fixes. What do you want them to say, "we are working on it" when anyone with common sense knows they are both aware of these problems and working on these problems.

I am starting to think Rocket messed up by allowing the alpha to stay open and saying it will receive periodic patches during the lead up to the standalone. If they had pulled the plug or just said this is what you have and handed it over to the community people would have just waited for the standalone, but since they pledged some support they are now burdened with hundreds of whine threads everyday by those who think this mod should be priority number one. Many of us see the potential and many of my friends have come back to the game after a couple week break, while the others are waiting for the standalone. I still find this rough product fun but if you do not take a break and read the reviews when it comes out as a polished product, hackers and bugs will continue to be problem for the mod so if it is too frustrating just hang it up for awhile.

Most of the community is mature enough to understand that the developers are focusing most of their attention on the actual game that will be released and we are also hoping for some new features that increase the ways to play this game while not breaking the immersion.

Edited August 29, 2012 by Zombie Jesus

[rogue246 28]

The correlation between the devs "focusing on the standalone" and the amount of hackers is that the standalone itself will fix the hacker problem.

There isn't a game ever made that wasn't hacked. Do you really think this one will be special? I'll give them 48 hours and it will be back to the way it is now. If you think that's untrue you need your head looked at.