PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

  • A18 Stable is Out!

    Votes: 2 66.7%

  • <img alt=":)" data-src="" src="___base_url___/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" />

    Votes: 1 33.3%
  • Total voters
    3
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I added yellow. I might do orange. I adjusted everything. I washed them out.
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omg yessssssss you are a savior! I cant tell you how many my buddies get in A17 that i use all our dyes to make myself pretty. Thanks hope to see the dye adds!

 
Joel Can you talk about the Mods in A18? I see there are many mods in A17.4 but not being used and the art at least looks really cool!

I would love to see a Cattle Prod or some other cool recopies in A18

 
Ah...a Bikini Bottom traditionalist.
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Do they drive rocks? Don't think so Mr. Mathematician
629ee645-0009-4b29-b077-e4170343180e.jpg


 
@Devs
Has the idea of a recipe display been discussed? As an example you want to make a mini bike chassis; the way it is now is you have to search for the recipe, attempt to memorize what and how many of each ingredient you need to make it. It just results in you constantly opening and closing the craft menu multiple time to keep looking at the ingredient list for an item.
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Think of it as exercise for your short term memory.

 
Joel Can you talk about the Mods in A18? I see there are many mods in A17.4 but not being used and the art at least looks really cool!
I would love to see a Cattle Prod or some other cool recopies in A18
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We added pocket mods for clothing you can craft on day 1 if you have some cloth and duct tape that reduce encumbrance. If you find a book you can craft even better ones that are -2 encumbrance, this helps make it feel like you don't need strength. We remove a whole row of encumbrance too, so its not so punishing early game.

A18 is more about getting everything working smoothly than adding stuff, although that balance effort required 16+ new weapons. We'll do vehicle mods and a proper final mod pass for a19.

 
madmole, I really like the way zombies fall now naturally, receiving a fatal blow. Maybe it makes sense to add the running zombies chance to stumble? Zombies might accidentally stumble, it is not necessary that these be obstacles, it may be other zombies who fell at that moment and try to get up. It can look very natural and will give you lots of fun moments :glee:

 
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I'm not sure, but we've had both lots of annoying footsteps and none, I kind of prefer none. Its not ideal but it is the better solution until we get some sound dampening/occlusion.
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I think the problem is they were overly loud and sharp. The ideal implementation as far as the sound goes would be this:

Give them a limit to how loud they can become based on distance. Even with them right next to you the sound level is quite, like pitter patter.

Next is to shave off all the edges (your sound guy can do this) from the sound to give the steps a more ASMR quality.

Footsteps from a wandering horde has an amazing effect on the feeling and atmosphere of the game. I really hope you add them back in some day. Best memories are from early alphas trying to hide from the horde and hearing all those footsteps close by. It was so damn scary. I know some really miss it.

 
We added pocket mods for clothing you can craft on day 1 if you have some cloth and duct tape that reduce encumbrance. If you find a book you can craft even better ones that are -2 encumbrance, this helps make it feel like you don't need strength. We remove a whole row of encumbrance too, so its not so punishing early game.
A18 is more about getting everything working smoothly than adding stuff, although that balance effort required 16+ new weapons. We'll do vehicle mods and a proper final mod pass for a19.
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Did I read this right? you-all are adding 16 new weapons? :)

 
I've got a question for Joel (hope it's not OT).
On Steam someone mentioned (again) the problem with "ninja zombies"... so I was thinking: will you add something in A18 to have zombies make some noise? (e.g.: dragging feet sounds, moans, and so on...)

I think that would be great and also, in some way, add to the "scare factor".

Imagine being in a POI and hearing a dragging feet sound from upstairs...

Would also solve the ninja zombies problem everyone has been complaining about since A16.

Thanks
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Yes, I can also report that the Steam forum still gets regular complaints of 'ninja zombies': that the first indication of a zombie's presence is getting hit by one. Players swear that there was nowhere a zombie could have spawned except right behind them, which they consider cheap. Now I can't determine definitively if this is attributable to an actual bug, or if there's some widespread misunderstanding of how zombies can spawn and move, but in either case TFP should know this comes up again and again on the Steam forum.

- - - Updated - - -

The shape of terrain blocks is mainly determined by their density values and those of adjacent blocks. This feature was added when TFP implemented smooth terrain. No idea which alpha that was but the necessary basis/game mechanic has been in place for a long time.
Anyway, there's a tool that allows (limited) manipulation of the densities. It can be used to make the terrain flush to cube blocks (and other non-terrain blocks). Afaik it can't be used outside the ingame or world editor though and there are some limitations that seem to have been implemented for ease of use and reasons of safety (You can break stuff by setting unusual density values).

So it's definitely possible. The existing features just need to be improved and then activated for survival mode.
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Like, flush flush? As flush as two adjacent blocks of the same type? Because I've tried increasing the density to maximum and it seems to lessen the gap, but not eliminate it.

 
madmole, I really like the way zombies fall now naturally, receiving a fatal blow. Maybe it makes sense to add the running zombies chance to stumble? Zombies might accidentally stumble, it is not necessary that these be obstacles, it may be other zombies who fell at that moment and try to get up. It can look very natural and will give you lots of fun moments :glee:
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Faatal has enough on his plate right now.

 
I think the problem is they were overly loud and sharp. The ideal implementation as far as the sound goes would be this:
Give them a limit to how loud they can become based on distance. Even with them right next to you the sound level is quite, like pitter patter.

Next is to shave off all the edges (your sound guy can do this) from the sound to give the steps a more ASMR quality.

Footsteps from a wandering horde has an amazing effect on the feeling and atmosphere of the game. I really hope you add them back in some day. Best memories are from early alphas trying to hide from the horde and hearing all those footsteps close by. It was so damn scary. I know some really miss it.
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It needs to happen, just not right now. We can do sound attenuation which would improve it a lot even without any new code.

 
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