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

Well, it’s 2013 and the world hasn’t ended — but the stand-alone version of DayZ which was supposed to be out before the end of the year hasn’t happened, either. So what’s the score?

“Put simply, DayZ Standalone isn’t here because we had the chance to go from making a game that was just the mod improved slightly, packaged simply, and sold – to actually redeveloping the engine and making the game the way we all dreamed it could be,” explains Rocket in a new blog post. “This blew any initial plans we had dictated to pieces.”

Rocket explains that a closed beta test is to begin “imminently”, with 500-1000 users testing the architecture and stability of the game. One of the major overhauls that the delay has given them time to accomplish is the inventory system, which Rocket describes as “groundbreaking”.

“You scavenge for items now, as individual parts, picking up pieces rather than piles, looking for cans on shelves or under beds. The new system opens the door for durability of items, disease tracking (cholera lingering on clothes a player wears…), batteries, addon components, and much more. If you shoot a player in the head to take his night vision, you will damage the night vision. The changes to this inventory system are huge.”

Check out the development blog for the full details or — if you’re getting bored of running around in Chernarus — why not check out our explorations of other possible DayZ maps?

Source: DayZ Dev

Dean “Rocket” Hall of DayZ fame has mentioned a console release for his zombie apocalypse baby before, and now that work is progressing on the stand-alone game, he’s even more certain.

“I personally think that, assuming we don’t majorly screw up, once the PC development has stabilized and sales have been good – a console port would be very likely,” he told Joystiq. “So, do I think a console port will happen? Yes. But not until the PC is done. And by ‘done,’ I mean finished its creative process.”

What about the stand-alone version, originally slated to release this month? “We really don’t know, it’s still our target,” said Hall. “But the architectural changes are scheduled to be complete next week. These are still on track to be completed then. But we don’t entirely know what effect these changes will have, if any, on everything else. So there could be a massive amount of unforeseen work that comes out, we just don’t know until it’s done and we test.”

“The changes we’ve been making are so fundamental to the game that estimates can be a bit of a stab in the dark.”

Source: Joystiq

In DayZ’s case, familiarity doesn’t breed contempt so much as rob the world of its lustre, providing an easier pathway lined with the bones of your previous incarnations. Familiarity in DayZ, then, turns the weak into the strong, sending them map-wide in search of challenges that recaptures a slumbering mind. From raiding the North West Airfield to becoming self-proclaimed leaders of the sniper capital elect, Stary Sobor, Chernarus’ challenges are many, but they are never infinite. Chernarus’ challenge, like its world, decays over time.

Lucky, then, that a mod begets mods in this PC ecosystem, ensuring those looking for it can recapture DayZ’s uncertainty, plummeting onto new islands where survival and player-driven horror are renewed. From the cold of Namalsk to the palm trees of Lingor Island, we’ve ventured forth with Makarov in hand to bring back postcards from these uncharted regions across Chernarus’ ocean.

Lingor Island

Far from the mechanical hum of Chernarus that haunts its survivors, Lingor is, in stark contrast, a sun-baked getaway. Billboards invite the visitor to kick back, relax, and soak in the sun, but Lingor is different now: the zombies have moved in. Still, it’s refreshing even while they chase, a less imposing place where forests are sparser and the sound of tropical birds tease you with memories of a better day that has long since passed.

Smaller than Chernarus yet bigger than Namalsk, visits to any of its cities are a much more reasonable goal for a new survivor, making Lingor a perfect location for those looking to gear up quickly, whether with a squad or alone, and get down to the business of player vs player firefights.

Trouble is, Lingor’s blessing is as much its curse, a largely front-loaded affair: its spawn locations centre around its southern beaches, close to its capital Calamar, which plays host to supermarkets, numerous hospitals, and an airfield rivalling Chernarus’ North West both in size and willingness to cough up high-powered military gear.

The result is a clear gradient in play time and activity stretching south to north, the cities caught amongst its larger inland hills and valleys seeing less action than Calamar, as does its western offshoot island of Benio, but anything further north is usually reserved for those who have something to hide, or bandits preying on unsuspecting survivors who wandered a few GPS coordinates too far north.

What action there is to be had will be seen down south, playing out in a predictable manner that can come as a welcome reprieve for anyone wanting to enact plans with some certainty to their resolution. Still, predictability is always going to be DayZ’s least attractive quality, but as a bite-sized chunk between other excursions it’s a worthy getaway, especially for those rolling with a geared group, planning on running Calamar with an iron fist.

Recommended for: A palate cleanser between “planned for three days” excursions; Groups or friends looking to find each other and gear up quickly; those who enjoy a wealth of well-protected firepower and a target to shoot them at.

Points of interest:

Calamar Airfield: Calamar’s Airfield is its most successful piece of Chernarus-inspired geography, with the added intensity of being minutes from newly-spawned survivors. The airfield sits slightly east of Calamar itself, so close you can turn 180 in either direction and have clear overwatch of either.

What makes this deadlier than NW is its constant threat of watching eyes, with forest and pyramid-esque bunkers hugging its eastern edge while the city’s radio tower and accompanying hill on the west cast it in the constant shadow of a sniper lying in wait. The airfield’s best approach is from its southern edge, keeping close to bushes and concrete walls, and those who are able to get in and out with speed or silence will profit the most.

Namalsk

If you were left disappointed by the majesty of Skyrim’s snow-capped mountains, devoid of jittering NPCs caught in a snowstorm or cloaks held close in the night’s chill, Namalsk may well be a videogame environment junky’s dream come true. If Skyrim were considered cold, Namalsk would be hypothermic.

Namalsk trades in Chernarus’ temperamental dispute with rain and sun, and Lingor’s sun-tan colour scheme, instead a desaturated island ravaged by dry days and colder nights, in what may be the most captivating representation of the majesty of winter’s hold over a videogame landscape.

And what a land it is. Patchy northern forests give way to plains and a southern region of snow-capped mountains, with a wind that brings whispers of children’s voices crying out for help: Namalsk benefits greatly from its previous life as a single player campaign focused on deconstructing a survivor’s resolve.

The result is a map that alters DayZ’s play style like no other, featuring Chernarus’ ebb and flow of progress with a smaller map that means a threat is constant, bubbling up to the surface at will, and the subtlety of Namalsk’s layout ensures it’s a challenge that remains. Through geographical asymmetry it achieves a perfect harmony of DayZ’s three characteristics: of zombie, player and landscape working against a survivor.

Rather than altering inventory slots or character attributes, Namalsk toys with the perceived notion of DayZ play, sending survivors in search of warm clothing and heat packs if they want to keep a steady aim. And its hate for a comfortable survivor is no clearer than when you realize it features just two supermarkets and a solitary hospital, located on an offshoot eastern island, accessed by a land bridge that may as well be a pre-dug grave.

Recommended for: Those wanting to recapture Chernarus’ fleeting survival against the elements; for anyone who enjoys making plans but loves reacting to their sudden demise even more; those obsessed with videogame landscapes.

Points of interest:

Old Hospital: Namalsk is an island built on smart decisions, and Old Hospital is perhaps the one most worthy of praise. Old Hospital is a cramped collection of buildings: a hospital, supermarket, and a school with a view down its corridor-like main street, drawing to mind a fitting image of a cut and dry western where guns are drawn quickly and fired often. Old Hospital’s reputation precedes it, the location of Namalsk’s only hospital and as such is the perfect spot for bandits to prey on. Its main road is masked in forest to its south, though be on the lookout for snipers camping its building tops.

Object AII: For all of Namalsk’s optional challenges, Object AII is its ace in the deck. Situated in a valley between two of the island’s largest, snow covered mountains, AII is the spot for military loot, and in turn, other players. Its solitary barracks can appear a measly target for a player to risk their life on, but AII hides its treasure underground, stashing anything from M24 sniper rifles to rocket launchers for those brave enough to face its only entrance: a ladder into the dark. For those who tempt it, it’s recommended you bring a grenade or two. And even then, be on the lookout for the telltale sound of a nervous player reloading their gun.

Sebjan Dam: While not the only way to access the northern portions of Namalsk, Sebjan Dam is the most popular, namely for its ability to attract players who see its crossing as a quick and easy escape from the southern cold. The Dam is, all told, one of Namalsk’s most active areas, surrounded on the north, south and east by towers where the silhouette of a player means you should be iron sighting or running for cover.

Landbridge: Who would have thought a stretch of land could be feared this much? The landbridge is the quickest route to Old Hospital: an open expanse visible all the way across from either end of its highway of death. It’s telling that there are no real tips to impart for its crossing, other than run run run as fast as you can, and keep eyes peeled for the sign of movement both behind and ahead. Most of all? Keep your fingers crossed.

Panthera

Panthera is a baffling addition to DayZ’s growing stable of maps, though over time you come to appreciate its place in this lineup: a shy land not willing to divulge its secrets in simple introductions. Its circular shape and the roads that follow it mean it’s an easier place to navigate for newcomer and experienced player alike, and its wealth of towns offer civilian gear in droves.

This northern area is where most players will spend their time, fighting over Enfields and shotguns, but break free of the community squabbles and Panthera reveals itself as a more directed DayZ experience. Its circular nature does come back to bite it – roads soon swallow themselves as you make your way around, due to its smaller size, and its centre isn’t much more than plain, mountainous hills, but Panthera can be relaxing in that way, largely devoid of the threat of finding yourself lost.

Its military gear, then, is split between its northern airfield and southern edges, where forests give way to a desert overlooking the sea, where the true weapon riches are held. It is, also, a more light-hearted affair given few ever make it far enough to gear themselves as they’d like, so instead the attention usually turns to Panthera’s overabundance of vehicles, which makes it the perfect place for the vehicularly inclined.

Here its predictable roadway turns back in the survivor’s favour, and Panthera finally completes its reveal as the place for vehicular frivolities and convoy hold ups, situating yourself on an intersection hill or in trees near a gas station and awaiting your prey. Panthera’s challenges don’t stretch much further than that, but its island is worth at least a trip or two around: a location for the apocalypse sightseer at the very least.

Recommended for: The vehicularly inclined; those looking for a more directed, welcoming DayZ experience; did we mention all of those vehicles?; anyone interested in an extended DayZ early-game of Enfields and winchesters.

Points of interest:

Airfields: A side-effect of Panthera’s smaller, circular focus is its lack of any major locations that whet the appetite of a Stary Sobor junkie, yet its airfields – three in total – should be marked for their military equipment alone. Its eastern airfield, the one most will grow familiar with, is largely uneventful, while its northern and western variations usually hold more interesting gear.

Zappado: Zappado is the capital of Panthera’s southern desert: a strange juxtaposition given it overlooks the ocean. On scarce occasion you might find yourself spawning nearby, but otherwise it’s close to empty any other time of the day, rewarding anyone willing to make the long (ish) trip south with four barracks, a hospital and supermarkets to boot.

Installation Instructions:

DayZ installation is no longer the laborious process it once was, a tale of copying files to strange folders three levels deep and hoping you’d managed to Inception’ise ARMA II into thinking it was a zombie sim. Of the launchers/installers/magical installation weapons, DayZ Commander is the most reliable, turning the process into a one-click affair.

1. Download DayZ Commander from this website here, and once complete run the installer.
2. Start DayZ Commander and select the “Settings” tab in the top-right corner.
3. Here, DayZ Commander should have automatically detected your ARMA II and ARMA II OA directories. If not, simply click “Override” and enter it yourself. Note: For Steam users this will be within your Steamapps\common folder. For those using a GreenManGaming copy of ARMA II, this will be in Program Files(x86 for Vista/7 users)\CapsuleGames.
4. If you would like to launch DayZ through DayZ Commander with the Steam Overlay – to allow easy communication with Steam friends, as well as the use of Steam’s screenshot function – tick the “Launch using Steam” checkbox.
5. Finally, click on the Install/Update tab, also in the top-right, and you’ll be presented with a list of update options. From top to bottom DayZ Commander lists your current ARMA II version (Beta updates required for most servers), your DayZ version, as well as whether or not you have any maps installed, and their corresponding versions.

As DayZ Commander knows where your install directories are, all you need to do is click “Install” next to ARMA II and DayZ, and away you go. From there you’re free to install additional maps in the same way, choosing the version your server supports and clicking “Install”.

Dean “Rocket” Hall has taken to the official Day Z development blog to outline to major changes they’re implementing behind the scenes of the stand-alone game. In the post, Hall explains that the move to a client-server model is “a massive departure” from what they’re currently using, so much so that he claims it is, essentially, an entirely new version of the engine.

“Release will be on Steam,” claims Hall, “using many of Steam’s key features such as delta patching, VAC, server browsing technology. Patches to steam can be deployed by the click of a button in our build pipeline thanks to new technology developed by Steam, that is making our process extremely easy and exciting.”

Hall also discusses the change to a more streamlined UI, completely re-thought controls, cleaner, more responsive animations and the way that server and client handle decisions. Minecraft is cited as an inspiration multiple times during the post, with Hall claiming that lessons are being learned from the Mojang title that will enable players to feel more engaged with their environment.

What do you think, banditry fans? Want a bit more Minecraft in your Day Z?

Source: Day Z Dev

Just yesterday we reported that ‘DayZ Bounty’, a website dedicated to running a specific Chernarus server where you could earn cash for kills, was set to launch. Today, Bohemia are gearing up to put the kibosh on the bounty-hunt before it even begins.

In an email sent to PC Gamer, DayZ Production Assistant Matthew Lightfoot at Bohemia slams the idea as “undermining” the spirit of DayZ and commercially exploiting it. “The DayZ development team and Bohemia Interactive is not involved or has had any contact with with DayZ Bounty and it’s creators,” reads the email. “While we fully support modifications created by the community, to improve the gaming experience for players of DayZ and ArmA II, we do not support their creators putting a cost on them. As commercially exploiting their small additions to DayZ undermines the work done by the original team.”

“We believe that the elements of gambling that DayZ Bounty introduces challenges the basic game design aspects that DayZ is built upon. It changes the focus of DayZ from being a creative, enjoyable, gritty gaming experience to a game that is based almost solely on financial gain and that is not something we want to be associated with.”

“We will be contacting the owners of the DayZ Bounty website directly over the coming days, to ask that they cease their activities in their current form.”

Source: PC Gamer

Ever wished you could make money from killing other people in DayZ? Sounds like a dream come true for many, and DayZ Bounty are trying to make it happen.

To take part you need to sign up to the site, download the kill-monitoring application and play on their own custom version of Chernarus, but the rewards are many and financial: every ten zombies gets you a penny, and every bandit player you take down gets you 25 cents. Take down The Outlaw — the bandit with the most kills — and you’ll get $5, plus whatever they were worth when they died.

How does this thing sustain itself? Well, you buy lives — in bundles of $5, $10 and $15 respectively. Bohemia are yet to give their official blessing to the project and the whole thing is in alpha, but head over to the website and check it out.

Source: PC Gamer

Astronomically popular ArmA II mod Day Z has received an unexpected patch, with a long list of bugs fixes and content updates to make the game more fair and more fun. I say ‘unexpected’, as many community members didn’t expect the mod to be kept up to date this close to the release of the standalone game.

The list is quite extensive, so if you’re interested click on through the jump below to check it out. Most of the changes seem to focus on making the game more realistic and to take care of some glitches that players would use for unfair advantage. For example, being unable to create axes out of thin air, being unable to consume food and water if it isn’t in your inventory, and switching skins will no longer fix broken legs or take away your pain shakes — and most of all, no more bashing Alt+F4 to log out instantly. Seems fair to me!

Clients

• [NEW] Tents can no longer be placed on concrete.
• [FIXED] Building checks for tent placement (No longer place tents in buildings).
• [FIXED] Tents now are one click place.
• [FIXED] Fixed function for checking if in buildings.
• [UPDATED] Vehicle repair menus now all replaced.
• [NEW] Vehicle menus now list all damaged parts no matter if you have the item or not.
• [NEW] Vehicle repair menus will now let you know the exact item you need to repair on failed repair attempts.
• [FIXED] Vehicle Damage is now fully working.
• [FIXED] Vehicle Killed is now in effect fully destroyed vehicles will now set correct in db.
• [FIXED] Tents Now add and remove from db.
• [FIXED] Food can no longer be consumed if the player does not have in inventory.
• [FIXED] water can no longer be consumed if the player does not have in inventory.
• [UPDATED] Updated UI control.
• [NEW] Toolbox is now needed for all repairs.
• [NEW] New Combat System If you fire a weapon, someone fires a weapon near you, or a bullet/object impacts near you, then you go into combat. During combat, “ABORT” is disabled. If you ALT-F4/close anyway, your character is considered “combat logged” and instantly killed and leaves a body.
• [NEW] Alt-f4 is now locked and will only open your status menu.
• [Fixed] No longer possible to drink/eat/pitch a tent/put on clothes/build sand bags/cat wire/hedgehogs/consume medical supplies/free filled water without consuming the item.
• [FIXED] No longer possible to create axes out of thin air if you already have one
• [FIXED] Switching skins no longer repairs pain shakes/broken legs/resets/dupes/screws/resets ammo
• [FIXED] Duping no longer possible through zombie corpses/backpacks/etc
• [FIXED] Tents Now add and remove from db.
• [FIXED] It should now be impossible for a new spawn to spawn unconscious.
• [FIXED] You can no longer cook infinite free meat from camp fires
• [FIXED] Survivors should no longer pickup a single item at the same time and both receive it.
• [FIXED] You can no longer generate multiple tents while packing up a deployed tent.
• [FIXED] You can no longer change clothes/eat/drink/etc. while in a vehicle
• [NEW] combat 30 sec timer.
• [FIXED] Zombie death animation is delayed (now it plays instantly)

Servers

• [FIXED] Object Gear syncs happen based on radius not just on menu.
• [FIXED] Vehicle Position is now updated with client position.
• [FIXED] Vehicles save fuel properly

Source: Day Z Mod Forums

The island of Chernarus continues to (re)take shape in the upcoming stand-alone version of Day Z, expected to release before the end of the year. The development blog has released nine new screenshots, showcasing redesigned interiors and some new locations designed specifically for the stand-alone version.

The shots include a sneak peek of an entirely new area, “created on the map by Ivan and Martin, the two developers at Bohemia who are currently being held in Greece. They conducted a revamping of the map to add some new areas, tidy up bugs, and rebalance the placement of ponds, fountains, and such.”

“Ivan was a big fan of DayZ, and the key architect behind the original Chernarus map – so we’re excited to get the map back out into everyone’s use. The usable area of the map is actually extended by their work.”

We’re warned to expect a bunch of new screenshots soon showcasing some of the Take On Helicopters content that the developers are bringing into the game, including military helicopters, fire engines and police cars.

The official DayZ developer blog has been updated with the first pictures of what the newly-revamped building interiors for the stand-alone version of the game will look like.

“Our artists have been very busy, methodically going through all buildings in Chernarus and adding interiors,” writes Dean ‘Rocket’ Hall. “The task can be pretty difficult, when the buildings where made interiors were not considered so it an be a challenge for the artists to make the interiors both look correct and work properly.”

Creating interiors for all the buildings is conflicting with the team’s need to scale back graphical lag. “Most focus has so far been on the buildings that are situated outside of the center, but focus now is turning to doing interiors for the city buildings. This is complicated by our desire to dramatically increase performance, and given the scene complexity inside cities we need to balance this with the desire to increase building scavenging opportunities inside the cities.”

Head over to the official developer blog to check out a slideshow of the interiors.

Source: DayZ Dev

The creator of Day Z, Dean Hall, has spoken about the game’s release schedule as well as Bohemia’s update plans for the future. At the moment, the current plan is still to release a solid base of an alpha in November or December, with regular updates following.

“I think the most important thing is we deal with hacking, bugs, duping, new content, tidy up some of the features and expand them a bit. I think if we can get that base – by the end of November or December – then that means January and February will be really happy, fun times,” he told VG247.

“Code-wise, the updates will be quite well planned – like Minecraft updates ended up being with update Fridays and all that. I think with content, the content will come out as it’s done. I think if it’s done and it’s tested, we’ll roll it out.”

Source: VG247

You know what I love? Dying. In those games where death is both probable and permanent, death might not be the victory I was striving for, but its inevitability gives a sense of intensity and foreboding while I still live, and a powerful narrative closure once it overcomes me.

Several games of late (and countless games throughout the years) have depended on the inevitability and permanence of death to create powerful, gripping experiences. Most recently, I’m thinking of DayZ and FTL.

In one of my first sessions of FTL, before I really knew what I was doing, boarders teleported onto my ship and took out my ship’s oxygen supply. I dealt with the boarders and, subsequently, with their ship. It was the toughest battle I’d yet fought, but I came through mostly unscathed. It felt overwhelmingly good. But then I noticed the red haze across my ship — the oxygen supply the boarders took out at the start of the game had not been fixed yet, and my ship was now nearly out of oxygen.

My four crew members ran across the ship to the O2 room, their little green health bars slowly depleting as they pulled out their spanners and desperately tried to fix it. But they were never really going to make it. One by one they died. I watched as my one last crewman just fixed the O2 system before he too suffocated and died. I was left with nothing but an empty, useless, practically unscathed ship just floating through space, silent and dead.

In DayZ, every single second could be my last. I am constantly on edge, waiting for the sudden sniper shot to end my life faster than I can blink. I can spend dozens of hours with a single character, scrounging around for beans, worrying about every spent bullet, and then it can just end like that. Sometimes, though, the deaths are less quick. Once my brother and I entered a city to look for a box of matches, but the horde of zombies we stumbled into had other plans. We managed to get out of town, and turned to finish them off. But little did we know we had run right up to another zombie-infested building, and more zombies heard our shots and flanked us.

My brother went down, and I fired two whole clips at the zombies piling onto his corpse before the game told me he was dead. Then I turned and ran, leaving him. I camped out on an apartment stairwell and used the last of my clip as the zombies piled through the door. As one finally got to me and knocked me down, I saw I was standing on a box of matches: exactly what we had ventured into this damn city to try to find in the first place.

In both these games, death is ultimate. It is the end. When I die, that is the end of that experience and everything I achieved during that session. I go back to square one — washed up on the beach, piloting an underpowered ship across the galaxy.

But far from rendering the time spent with each game meaningless, the fact that I am almost certainly going to die eventually is what makes each of these games so much more satisfying to play. It is death that, typically, is the story that I am left with that I want to tell people. I don’t play FTL or DayZ because I expect to ‘win’; I play them because I expect to die in a way interesting enough that I will always remember it.

FTL and DayZ are both interesting story simulators—they create experiences that I want to tell people about. And any story is only as good as its ending. That is why I love dying so much. It is the crescendo of the story, the narrative closure that posthumously gives every action up to that point a certain gravity. Dying doesn’t simply abolish my accomplishments; it immortalises them, tying up these little narrative arcs with a start, middle, and, most importantly, an end.

DayZ developer Dean ‘Rocket’ Hall has been facing the crowds at the Eurogamer Expo in London over the weekend, and naturally his DayZ panel turned largely towards the subject of hacking.

“Hacking is the issue,” said Dean, explaining that literally every second post on the DayZ forum is a complaint about hackers ruining people’s day(Z). Every second post on his Facebook wall is about this as well, he joked, saying “Even my mum knows that there’s a problem.”

Dean also spoke on optimising for the stand-alone release of the game, discussing details such as removing calculations for the individual bones of each finger in each hand of each player and zombie. There’s also going to be a strong focus on getting sick, with Dean revealing that Bohemia has been motion-capturing vomiting animation and is even trying to figure out what will happen when your character needs to poop. Yes, really.

PCGamesN has a great roundup of Dean’s talk, so head over there for the full details.

Source: PCGamesN

Over at the Eurogamer Expo, Day Z‘s Dean Hall has spoken about changes coming to the game as it transforms from being an ArmA II mod to it’s own standalone game. The team are pushing for authenticity, tension and freedom and have many “radical ideas planned”. What aren’t planned are PvE servers, as he wants the standalone game to be more “survivor vs the wild”.

Many of the features of Day Z will be redesigned from the ground up, including the zombies themselves. There will be a more complex damage model that will mean you can break ribs! Also on the list of things that can be broken are objects in the world! These include weapons which will jam, nightvision goggles that can be damaged or run out of battery, and that sort of thing.

As Hall has stated before the game hasn’t had too many issues with piracy, but they will be taking hacking and exploits in the standalone very seriously.

The team are aiming for a December release as it “has to be out by the end of the year”, but there will be further additions come January and February.

Source: VG247