With experimental 0.45 Update we have seen the introduction of flares into the game DayZ Standalone. These items spawn in numerous locations across the map tending to appear in barns, storage areas and warehouses.



What a flare provides DayZ Standalone is something completely new. It offers up the proposition that enables a player to make an obvious statement visually in the gaming arena. It enables someone the ability to call out on mass to any incoming player. Whereas before we could fire guns, which may well have meant there was a conflict and therefore warn anybody nearby, but the meaning would a range of different possibilities including taking down zombies . Now you can lay down a marker that suggests that there could be a conflict coming, rather than happening. Psychologically this has a different affect on players.

Rather than thinking you’re catching someone unawares, which will often be the case if there is firing up ahead when potentially the element of surprise is yours, you are entering into a situation where someone may be watching. So with a lit flare ahead of you and that red light shining through the buildings, you have to be more cautious if you’re protecting your kit. This is facilitating a trap or ambush scenario in a completely different way.



Lighting a flare is therefore an obvious statement, even if the player doing so did not intended it to be so. Obviously in the early stages of 0.45 Update people may just want to see the effects of the flare, but as the game develops people will become bored of this and used to their effects.



Not only can flares be used as a trap to entice but they can also be used to distract or redirect players. If someone puts a flared down it’s an obvious statement that someone has been there before. This will mean that that area probably has been looted, and could, for some, be a marker to avoid and they will then concentrate their efforts elsewhere.



But lighting a flare and having that red light on the map my will also be a draw for bandits. It could be a red light of potential conflict that some players would want to engage with.



The flare is therefore a divisive item, one that can induce events and make players act in a particular way. It can elicit an emotional response from players, some may fear it and others may embrace it and allowing the adrenaline to coarse their body as they searched the building where the flare has been lit.

A flare in reality is often a call for help but in DayZ Standalone this has almost been flipped on its head because when you see a flare it will more than often sum up dread and anxiety and ultimately probably make you steer well clear of that area.