As Dean ‘Rocket’ Hall updates the DayZ development blog from the base camp of Mt. Everest (yes, really), we’re able to learn a bit more about some of the new features being planned. One of the most interesting new features is the addition of radios and walkie-talkies, which players can use to talk to other players on the same frequency.

The radios will “allow players to communicate using a basic radio, similar (but more simple) to the popular ACARS radio mod for ArmA2. Players pick up radios, and they can set a frequency and talk/receive text/voice from other players. The microphone or speaker can be turned on or off to allow players to use radios as a listening device.”

“If the player has not crafted a headset onto the radio, then the output is public (either voice or text).”

Animation, map design and inventory design continues to be worked on, with seven towns now fully redesigned and new work being done to give zombies accurate pathfinding inside buildings. Check out the rest at the devblog.

Source: DayZ devblog

The creator of DayZ, Dean ‘Rocket’ Hall, is understandably quite a fan of modding in games — and so it might come as no surprise that, when questioned about it at PAX, he delivered some pretty strong opinions.

“What might make me happiest is DayZ is kind of a big “fuck you” to everyone who said modding wasn’t important,” said Hall to PCGamesN. “I read a comment on 4chan of all places. Someone was asking ‘why is it that one of the greatest gaming experiences I’ve ever had came not from a company but from a mod from some obscure person’.”

“The reply was ‘well maybe it’s because it wasn’t a product of a billion marketing meetings and stuff like that’. Because it was so isolated the idea was allowed to grow as the idea itself.”

In the same interview, Hall also discusses the reasons behind the delay to the standalone game, with most of the blame falling on the new inventory system which Hall describes as essentially a ground-up rewrite of the way objects in the world interact. Fortunately, that appears to be behind them.

“We were really lucky in January and it just all came together really nicely in this inventory system [...] we can now do proper weapon attachments, we just implemented head torches, batteries, gas canisters, torches mounted on your body, all sorts of crafting opportunities and stuff like that.”

Source: PCGamesN

Day Z’s commercial standalone release is still quite a long way off.

“We’re going to review the situation in June, so there’ll be no release between now and June,” creator Dean “Rocket” Hall told Joystiq.

Hall said he’s “quite hopeful” an alpha release will be approved in June, as the game is pretty much ready, but what’s really delaying things is work on the engine’s client-server architecture; unlike the original mod, Day Z will work like a proper MMO, which should eliminate a lot of cheating and hacking among other benefits.

Since Bohemia isn’t especially experienced with MMO’s, it’s nice to see that Hall and his team are keen to avoid a server demand fiasco, like Diablo 3 and SimCity, and will release keys in small batches as servers become available. Hall said he’s thinking about a Kickstarter-like distribution model, with tiered rewards for those who opt into alpha testing.

“The idea is to very, very quickly try to release something out there, because that allows us to start capacity testing. We’ve got one final thing we’re waiting for with the release date, which is the completion of our client-server architecture. It’s basically making the game into an MMO, and pretty much the moment that’s done, we’ll release,” he added.

Source: Joystiq

Bohemia have released a new development video for the upcoming DayZ stand-alone game, in which Dean “Rocket” Hall and Matt “Lightfoot”, er, Lightfoot, narrate 20 minutes of solid gameplay.

You can check out the more detailed environments, the new motorcycle helmets, and the revamped food system (which litters the ground with empty cans and wrappers after eating). Rocket and Lightfoot also discuss the huge new zombie hordes (3,000 of them spawn on each server currently, with more coming) and new social animations like waving. All heavily-WIP still of course, but looking promising. Check it out.

Source: PC Gamer

Process videos aren’t always the most exciting things, but this one for DayZ’s standalone release is pretty interesting for horror fans. Dean “Rocket” Hall and his team at Bohemia Interactive are shown using motion capture to create animations for zombies, and discussing just what it is about their movement that is scary. Stick around through the 20 minute+ video for chats with the team on why motion capture is the best tool for the job; new animation tools employed in the new engine; how the standalone release is progressing; and how the final game will hopefully scare the pants off you.

Source: Day Z Dev Blog

Steam was updated a short time ago with a brand new addition to the family: the official DayZ ArmA 2 mod page. Installing the mod should now — theoretically — be a simple, one-click operation and one that will automatically remain up to date as patches roll out.

The move comes as development ramps up on the DayZ standalone game, which is expected to supercede the original mod. This move may indicate that the DayZ team intend to keep the mod active beyond the release of the standalone, or at the very least that they’d like to archive it in an easily-accessible manner.

Source: Steam (thanks, Spkypwnsuall)

The development team behind the upcoming standalone DayZ release has been bolstered by the return of Ivan Buchta from jail in Greece, and is excitedly moving ahead on a number of new fronts.

A new post on the development blog, released on Saturday, shows screenshots of not only the new female character heads showing different races available, but also new screenshots of an increasingly redeveloped world.

The post also notes increased work on the inventory system and the weapon attachment system, with the reveal that the standalone game will ship with less weapons than the current version of DayZ but with weapons of a higher visual quality and with great customisation options. Content updates with new weapons and items are planned each week.

Take a look at the official site for more information, including Q&A’s from people on Twitter throughout the week.

Source: DayZ dev blog

Ever wanted to try your hand at a bit of writing? Or maybe you’ve already tried your hand at writing and found that you enjoyed it. Well, how would you like to see your own writing on the small screen?

Dean “Rocket” Hall announced today via Twitter that he’d like to have Skyrim-style books scattered about the environment in the standalone Day Z.

The requirements are fairly open at the moment. He doesn’t even necessarily want you to write in English, if you’d prefer not to. What he does want though, is lots of pre-war, pre-zombie stuff. While there are bound to be plenty of, “I can hear the drums in the deep, they [zombies, in this case] are coming…” stories, Hall would like to see some stuff left over from when the world was a kinder place. “Normal short stories, any genre” he said.

Having said that, there were then tens of millions of tweets directed at Mr Rocket looking for clarification, so he has said that he will put down some formal guidelines for your submissions in the very near future. Until then, get your writing pants on!

Source: PCGamesN

DayZ developers Rocket and Matt have teamed up in a new, lengthy developer diary which shows off some of the key changes in the upcoming standalone version of the game. In the video below you’ll get to look at the revamped menu/login system, which now looks much more similar to a traditional MMO, as well as the new clothing system, loot spawning system, and some new map areas which haven’t been shown off before. Check it out below:

Rocket is a cool guy, but even cool guys might get a bit up in arms when they learn that somebody is making their own mod of DayZ — and calling it DayZ Origins. And even using the same logo and everything. Okay, even I’m a little bit miffed on his behalf.

But Rocket? He’s cool with it. “The most personally satisfying part of making DayZ has been seeing the cottage industry crop up around it, and watching all this user created content pop up,” he said to Eurogamer. “There are some awesome, awesome ideas in the Origins mod, as well as in other mods like 2017″.

“It would seem a shame to destroy that kind of creativity by me getting upset about the name,” he added. “So my thoughts for the moment are really, ‘Wow, that’s cool,’ and then, ‘Aww shucks, there go my DayZ: Origins plans!’ From my personal perspective I had some plans that involved the use of DayZ Origins as a name and now, if I were to do what I was planning, then it would forever get confused with that [the DayZ Origins in this story].”

“But you can’t encourage creativity on one hand and beat it with a stick with another.”

Rocket previously blasted The War Z for mistreating its customers, a mistreatment that caused him to come under personal attack from friends and family members who mistakenly thought he was responsible.

Source: Eurogamer

The Standalone release of the notoriously hackable Day Z has embraced some fundamental departures from ArmA 2′s engine in order to reduce illicit activity, lead developer Dean “Rocket” Hall said in a new developer blog.

“Contrary to some who say Day Z will be releasing with no anti-hack mechanisms, one of the key things we are doing with development is entirely redeveloping how the engine works. I can’t stress enough just how fundamental this change is,” he said.

“Day Z’s game servers will function like servers in other MMO style games, that is the server will control the behavior and the sending of updates. No longer will your machine receive all the updates allowing their analysis by various cheats.”

Hall said the team is experimenting with spawning all zombies and loot when a server initialises. Other recent development milestones include an improved inventory system allowing for weapon modification and the beginning of an internal closed test phase. Character customisation is the next major goal, followed by vehicles and base building.

Source: Day Z blog

Dean ‘Rocket’ Hall, the creator of DayZ, has used a Reddit thread to express his frustration at The War Z for both their business practices and how the similarity in their names has caused his own family to be angry at him.

“I am angry about the WarZ. I’m very angry,” said Hall on Reddit. “I’m quite hurt personally because anyone can see how similar the words are, and while the average gamer knows the difference individual people don’t. I’ve had family members/close friends mistake the difference and confront me about what they believed was unethical behavior they thought I was making.”

“I really don’t think anyone can understand just quite how exasperated that can make you feel when you’ve gambled everything on something, put your whole self and reputation on the line. So it hasn’t made my life very pleasant and I disagree entirely with the conduct and how consumers have been treated.”

Read the rest of the thread by clicking here.

Source: PCGamesN