DayZ 1.0 and why I'm worried about it being early.

So my reason for concern is primarily the constant state of "things will be better by the next patch" feeling we have all had as long as DayZ has been in Alpha. I'm really sad to see that we are still going to be in that state when DayZ hits 1.0. This has happened throughout DayZ's history but to talk in the more recent terms...



We were waiting on the renderer for better performance, it came, loads of people came back and tried the game, they were impressed with what they saw but it still wasn't right for them so they mostly strayed away from the game quickly. The renderer patch didn't come with the player controller, we waited over two years (are still waiting) for the player controller patch to hit stable to make the game more fluid and playable, but when it hit experimental there were very few guns, no scopes, no lean, no jumping, so again loads of people (less than the renderer patch) came back and tried the game, realised there was stuff still missing and decided to leave it for now despite there being lots to like.



DayZ only has so many chances to gain that playerbase injection. Each patch so far we have seen for the last 4 years 10 months has come with a side order of "it's moved us forward, but the next one is better!" So every patch sees a slight uplift in playerbase before it goes away, reduces some more over time and then there is a new "not quite there patch." The cycle has continued that way through the course of development. You'd expect a game released 58 months ago to have a dwindled playerbase of course. However we've been sold the "vision of DayZ 1.0" for five years plus, in December last year the vision was reduced a little and our expectations adjusted, now 2 months from full release of the game, we are still not playing DayZ beta on stable, buts its going 1.0 in December and again the 1.0 launch has been reigned in even further!



Steam concurrent playerbase matters massively to how the launch goes for DayZ. Both in terms of PC sales at 1.0 but more so as a shop window for the Xbox and PS4 release and their sales. If the game is right on release, a load of players will come back to the game and hopefully a high number of them will stay and play, at least for the mid term. The more complete and fun the game is, the better the launch goes, the more people play it, the more people will stream it and that success breeds further sales and more success across all platforms.



Of course I have a vested interest personally in DayZ being popular, streaming it pays my bills. But at heart I am a DayZ fan and nothing more, it's my favourite game of all time. I long for it to be popular on release and be the showcase for survival games that it should be. Based on the sales seen by Scum, there is clearly a huge desire for games in the survival genre still, I was really hoping DayZ would be filling that niche for the many, not just the few left in it's community now. By release month it will have been sold on stream for 60 months and in development for a some months before that. Is there really a defensible case for having the game in early access alpha for 58 months (so far) of those 60 and then push to Beta in month 59 and full release in month 60? It smacks of a last minute rush to call it finished, perhaps to allow for the game to be sold as finished on Xbox and PS4? But it wont be the game we have waited for, for five years, and of course paid for.



Unfortunately we are now getting a "it will be better on the next patch" 1.0 experience like every other patch to date thus far. I'm really disappointed that we are getting a "DayZ lite" at 1.0. We are highly likely to see what we have always seen with previous patches. An influx of returning players who come back, realise its still not right and then move on. The huge difference here is that 1.0 is the watershed patch, where if people are arriving back and realising there are only 11 or 12 guns in the game and 2 years ago there was 40 odd, they realise there is no broken arms/legs and that was a feature 4 years ago, there is no true sniper rifle (SVD with PSO is far more DMR like and is more of mid range gun than a true sniper rifle) in the game and there was one at launch in December 2013, there is no bus like before and that was a cool way to get a big group together etc. These returning players will realise that they are playing a 1.0 that is not feature complete but also some of the cool things that they enjoyed in the past versions of the game are missing from the 1.0 game, they will back away again! But they will never get another nudge from you guys in the future as powerful as the official launch of the 1.0 game. Social media, steam itself, reddit, forums, twitch and YT will be singing "DayZ release" when it hits 1.0, if ever a player who has not played dayz in ages was gonna come back and see the game, it as at 1.0. They are very unlikely to be installing it again after that and giving it a try as the game incrementally gets to a real finished state over the months (years?) after it launched at 1.0.



I think you guys are massively under valuing the importance of variation in the guns in DayZ. It's a survival game of course, all people play it differently and there are so many way to play the game. But the loot variation is one of the biggest tools available in your sandbox game. It's one of the main things that keep it fresh, hour after hour, respawn after respawn. The early life guns in DayZ 0.63 are uninspiring fayre at best. As a new spawn you are basically relying on the makarov or the izh rifle and whether you can luck out on finding the bullets/mag for one, they are really hard to get firing with a suitable amount of bullets and they are so poor that you need to get into the map quickly and get to the better areas, its not worth the hours of investment for those guns when mil bases have plentiful supplies of good guns. The civilian spawning guns are such a small part of the game now, there is the Makarov, IZH, CR75 (very, very rare), and Mosin (but you can never get bullets until you are at a mil base when you don't need them anymore cos you have an AK/M4 and inifinity mags). There is little point staying in civilian areas to hunt for a weapon, the game now lends itself to running straight to a mil base and picking up an assault rifle. The AK and M4 are so much better than every other gun in the game that there is no need for anything else, the best guns in the game are easy to get and so powerful that one trip to a mil base and you are set for your characters life. Everyone you kill has the same gun so you never need loot again. It doesnt feel like there are more than 10 guns in DayZ, it feels like there are four (the Mosin if you fancy a change, the AK or M4, and the SVD if you are lucky).



The variation in guns available adds a huge amount of richness to the game. Sniping is a huge part of DayZ, absolutely massive. I was sold on DayZ before I was ever a PC player watching Frankie's Arma 2 series with all the variation in gameplay on offer. The ability to sit 800m from a player and choose whether to shoot to kill, or go and talk is a cool dynamic. Some of the most memorable moments PVP wise in DayZ are around seeing a rag doll of a player at a crazy distance. Long range gun play is something DayZ is kinda famous for. It's such a rewarding skill to learn in DayZ and takes many hours to get right! Now we are getting no sniper rifle, not only that, no rag doll either, which we had years ago. You are releasing with no real sniper rifle? Long range gun play is not the same without a true sniper rifle, and we've all had that for the past 4 years in DayZ standalone yet we wont get it in the 1.0 version though?



That loot variation is massive as you gear up in DayZ, as you travel inland with your bow/ improv bow/Sporter/Trumper/Carbine/Repeater/blaze (with no scope)/Magnum etc etc with a handful of rounds only and try to plot your way through dangerous areas to get better gear. This dynamic is at the very core of what makes dayz so cool. Perhaps as you journey inland some M4 fully kitted player attacks you and you die, it sucks right? But 1 in 5 times that happens, you kill them with that amazing Repeater headshot, or with Sporter spray and prey! Those "David Vs Goliath" moments are DayZ at it's very finest! They are the true palm sweating, heart racing moments that keep people coming back respawn after respawn, now all we do is go to one mil base and everyone is Goliath!



We have a choice between looting house after house, town after town, hour after hour in civ areas for a makarov or an IZH or just cut that out and run ourselves straight to an end game M4/AKM, there is no progression. The first base we get to can only really have those guns plus the mags/bullets for them and so we are pretty much assured of getting them. Even in 062 you could loot Tisy and the NWAF and still come out the other side with just the repeater you went in with, you'd find ak74mags but no gun, AK101s but no mag, an aug but no mag, SVD mags but no SVD etc. Now we go to Tisy and come out like we are Arnie at the end of the film Commando because each base is overstocked with the only end game guns they can possibly have, and lots of them! You can't just make these rare because there isn't enough choice in other options due lack of variation in loot and so it's just too unavoidably easy.



The SMGs are rendered pointless in the current build as assault rifles are so much better and so easy to get and they can fit in your backpack. Even if you can get an SVD you still use an M4/AKM as your secondary in your backpack. You may change the inventory size so that guns like this wont fit, but it's already been confirmed that two guns on your back is coming so again, the SMG class is meaningless.



"End game" for a DayZ character used to look vary different for different players, with different gun combinations (primary and secondary) and also hugely different clothes etc. Now the weighting on clothes mean nearly everyone selects the same outfit cos of the weight effect on stamina, they choose the same backpack too, and there is no point choosing anything other than AK/M4 in the current game. The end game is a "one size fits all" scenario now that can't really be varied for the majority. Every character is heading for the same end game where almost everyone West of Stary Sobor is a clone of each other from head to toe and carries the same gun too.



There have been some huge strides with 0.60 and now with 0.63, really massive! The cars are feeling good, the frames are amazing, the map has moved forward loads, server performance appears to be stunning, I really love the feel of survival in 0.63 with the stamina, it feels more of an adventure. There are some real positives, but these are all things for the most part the game HAS TO HAVE to function.



The things that are NICE TO HAVE, are what separate the great games, from average games. It's a really tough sell to a long standing player that key features like getting your leg broken in a fire fight and mending it are gone. My very first (terrible) YT vid in July 2014 sees my getting my leg broken at the airfield by a big group of players, but when they realise i'm legged and defenceless, they stop shooting and start talking, they patch me up and let me go. That interaction FROM 2014, wont be possible in 1.0 dayz, that is not a good thing. Never mind that I was shot by an SKS, one of the most iconic guns in DayZ (again not in 1.0).



DayZ is a lot about choices, the choice you make as you progress your character through it's life. The missing features massively reduce the choices available. It's leading everyone to the same destination most of the time character progression wise in a very linear and short way. Base building looks like it could be so cool, but will we really need bases apart from a few more RP type servers? Each mil base is a place that stores loads of AKs and M4s, I dont need to build my own store, as that is what the mil bases are effectively now. End game load outs are easy. Don't get me wrong, base building is feature I'm desperate to try, but do I need a loot stash if the finished version of the game has very little variation in loot and it's all easy to get?



DayZ 1.0 for all it's improvements in so many ways. Is going to be missing the things that finish it off. The house is built, the gas and electric are installed, but the furniture is mostly being omitted. It's gonna be a sandbox without a load of the toys that allow people to play in it with the freedom that makes dayz so great. I understand these features will come later, but we've waited nearly five years, I'd personally rather wait a bit longer before you wrap it up as 1.0. Rather than blow the last best chance of propelling DayZ back to where it should be in terms of player base (therefore selling far better by default when launched at 1.0 on steam and on console).



I still believe in the vision you guys have for the finished version of DayZ. But I was kinda hoping there would be a large amount of people enticed back to a "finished article" DayZ 1.0. I was hoping there would be a redemption for the game after the slog through the last five years of EA at 1.0. Not just another "well yeah, this is it for now, but it will be better on the next patch!" Leaving the small community that is here now still playing it and mostly likely not many else.



It just feels like you've done five years hard graft on this game just to shoot yourselves in the foot as you get to the home straight.



I still love DayZ, it's still my favourite game,



Paul

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