PC Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

Alpha 18 Dev Diary!!

  • A18 Stable is Out!

    Votes: 2 66.7%

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    Votes: 1 33.3%
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Well, I thought all zombies should be slow stupid shamblers and it was my fault in assuming so. The fact that it is alpha has nothing to do with zombies being smart or not, since TFP are trying for a long time and most likely will make the zombies even smarter, not stupid. It was just me thinking that zombies should not be smart. :)
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No typically we over use new features then dial them back. Hey look heres a floor trap... lets use that a lot because its cool. "Hey can you dial back on the floor traps? The 15th broken leg in one hour is a bit too much". We wanted a challenge and Shawn made it too hard, so we dial it back and bring back some elements of the past that were good. As I said they will jump off ledges and take damage now, and some are randomly smart, some are stupid now. Its a nice mix IMO. We introduced smart in 17 and it was too much, so we kept it but its on random guys, where others like to try another entrance. It feels a lot more organic now, I suggest you watch my horde night videos you should see a big difference.

 
My only gripe with "smart zombies" is that somehow on blood moons allot them intuitively know to move around to the South side of a building climb a ladder to a 2nd floor and then run inside a building to batter on a door on the roof, when not even a normal player would be able to figure the ideal route so quickly.
Granted, it sounds like in a18 there has been changes in that regard.
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I Like smart zombies it switches things up!

 
Let's not forget the AI is not final yet. I wouldnt be surprised if zombie AI changed again after bandits are added in.
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I think its pretty close now, but when bandits go in we want to leverage some features needed for bandits like patrols. I want zombies to wake, roam about to random patrol nodes in pois so you hear footsteps but they aren't coming at you, they are just walking around mulling about. That will make stealth way more interesting and be scary at the same time.

 
no issues whatsoever, drop frames on top of spikes to make a temp walkway and move around as needed, that way you can reach any place and repair/replace any spike.
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Hmmm, maybe spikes should not support weight :) Thanks for pointing this bug out.

 
Oh, but there is method to my supposed madness. You notice the ramps that the spikes are not placed down? I can easily jump on top of those and gain easy access to all the spikes around the tower. The barbed wire fence I have no issue jumping over. Sure, it's not a long-term design (not a feasible one anyway), but it works decently for what it's supposed to be. I don't mind losing zombie kills in A17 (unlike A18). Also, I'm probably going to install a guardrail along the outside rim of the bars to prevent me from falling off the edge.
Edit: This was after the horde. I was only in fly mode this one time (and the previous time before the horde started) for screenshots.

JIT1xIL.png
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Look at those rekt icons and tiling dirt! God Bless A18 and all of its glory!

 
@Madmole

I am trying to figure out a spiral type base with traps ending at a door. Would the zombies just bash through a straight line to me or follow my route. Am not very interested in creating a square block surrounded by spikes as it reduce building creativity.

 
Twas a good read! Food poisoning is a small step towards creating a dent in your food supplies unexpectedly and it encourages making the more complex high calorie recipes because every time you eat there is that small chance, so if you eat large meals less frequently you in theory at less risk of food poisoning, so there is value in not just nibbling stacks of meat or bacon and eggs and being end game on food on day 1.
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Love this direction. Food was a non issue most of the time.

 
For cooked foods its like a 2% chance, very small so 1 out of 50 meals you might throw up. You can buy perks to remove it, but why, its actually great change to the game IMO.
Right now all prepared meals have a 2% chance, only canned food is 0% chance.

I actually enjoy it, its that rare hazard that puts a dent in your food supply or causes you some unexpected grief. As always preparation is king.
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It will be nice to see some of the earlier foods have a higher chance vs the more complex meals vs. A flat 2% across all foods

 
This is a pretty unpointed criticism. In land of the dead they used tools and the mechanic zombie hung out at the gas station and messed with the gas pump. A pain animation and sound gives the player feedback that you hurt them, to remove that feels like a bad idea just to pretend to be a zombie purist. What you need is a mod that beats down the AI to the point of lemmings I suppose. Most players find the fat cop interesting, it gives zombies a ranged attack a bit more believable than the zombie in quake 1 that tore his own flesh off and threw it at you.
Back to my opening sentence: What is your issue, is the game too hard with interesting AI or your immersion is broke because they play pain sounds? A zombie is anything that this mindless and likes to eat people. There is no standard lore of what a zombie is or isn't, so we make our own that gives the player good combat feedback and an increasing challenge without spawning 5000 zombies on day 200. Our zombies do not have any self preservation in mind, they walk off tall ledges again and get hurt taking damage. They keep coming if you remove limbs.

Anyhow, if every zombie or vampire movie had the same lore it would be pretty predictable and boring IMO. So we take creative license to do what we think makes the game more interesting. These radiated zombies were radiated humans before they turned. They had regenerative abilities in life from some kind of mutation effect from food or atmosphere. I just don't see the issue, its a fun game. End game cannot be dig a 200 meter trench and watch them all die.
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Mm, you guys probably dont need more ideas for zombie types but I thought I would share anyways.

I ran across this cool zombie manga that has an interesting take on zombies (evolution stages).

https://mangarock.com/manga/mrs-serie-100267786

 
My previous save wouldn't load so I started a new one and it was a series of unfortunate events until I finally gave up. I was doing a no-spending-perk-points for the first week type of start so that at the end of the first bloodmoon I could take inventory of whatever weapons I had and use that as a guide for which attribute I would start in.

I began in the snow. My previous map was a nice "Snow in the north and Desert in the south" map with large bands for the biomes. So I started walking south when what I should have done was check out my coordinates on the map. yep, I was already at 750 S when I spawned and I was now going deeper in-- but I didn't know this because I didn't check my map.

I came to a small town with an empty looking military encampment. I knew those tents would be packed full of baddies but one of the watch towers seemed unguarded so I thought I might tiptoe up to the top and look around. I did so and there were no zombies at all but there were two shotgun messiah crates, a small ammo stash, a small medical stash, and a munitions box. I scored big time. I got a hunting rifle, a stun baton, a crossbow, reinforced iron club, leather chest armor, leather boots, lots of ammo, and some mods. It was all poor quality but way better than the wooden club and primitive bow I had been using.

Oh, also two sticks of dynamite.... I threw one down at the largest tent and it exploded with a satisfactory explosion killing some zeds that were sleeping inside.

Why did it I do it? Because......I had two sticks of dynamite.

Well the encampment woke up. Tons of zombies came out of the nearby tents as well as a couple of dogs and started pounding on the supports of my watch tower. I threw my other stick of dynamite and saw a small group of zombies go down but there were plenty more. I shot some with my crossbow but it was futile. I finally jumped to the roof of a nearby tent and then juked around and ran between a few of the outlying mines and got away hearing a couple of nice explosions as my pursuers didn't navigate the mines as well as I did.

I got to the nearby road and continued following it south until I saw a boar standing in the middle of the road. I stopped. I thought to myself, 'I have a hunting rifle and some new armor and a rumbly tumbly'. So I equipped the rifle, sighted the boar's head and hit it. It didn't die. It ran toward me. I shot once more but missed and then it was on me. I switched to my reinforced club and whacked it good three times before it gored me to death. Boars are a lot healthier and nastier in A18, btw.

I respawned way to the North just above where I had started in the snow and was surrounded by green. GAH! Now I realized I had gone the wrong direction and checking my map confirmed that I had been at the northern edge of the snow biome. I did not feel like treking all the back for my stuff at the moment so I started fresh and finished my newb quest which I had been avoiding. I came to the classic scrapyard near the border of the snow biome and since I had recently watched Neeb's I thought...why not?

I broke in and cleared out the yard though I did not enter the building. There was a ton of good useful stuff in the trash bags around the yard. I found the needle and thread book and needle and thread and was able to craft myself a sturdy long sleeve shirt for my eventual return to the snow. I also found two molotov cocktails.....heheh. No way was I going to waste these like I did my dynamite. Night came and I just chilled in the yard on top of one of the commercial dumpsters. There was a washing machine on it and I used it as a container emptying all the odds and ends into it.

Then a small wandering horde came by and decided that they were going to go through the scrapyard instead of around it. I waited until they punched a hole in one of the walls and threw both of my molotovs into the gap. They died and I smiled. But the commotion attracted a wolf who broke the rest of the way in but couldn't reach me before I killed him. I gutted him for meat and built my campfire. I was able to get three charred meat out of it and wolfed them down. Then noticing I had one clump of fat in my inventory I shrugged and popped that in my mouth too.

I threw up. My food and water and max stamina immediately went to 25. What a disaster! It was almost morning so I ran out and went to the snow digging up snow and rushing back to my campfire. I had found a pot and I installed it now and noticed a change I didn't know about. I had to melt the snow into murky water first and then boil it from murky water to something drinkable. With my hydration taken care of I went out again and decided to go to the trader whose icon showed up when I made my campfire. He was in the snow biome but I headed that way starving and with very little stamina to do much of anything but run-walk like was doing interval training or something.

I arrived at the trader and was able to kill a deer just outside the compound. I harvested some meat and got my stamina almost back up to normal. I decided that I would do a buried treasure quest because those usually had food in them so that is what I did. I was able to find the treasure without too much digging though I had to dodge two mountain lions, a dire wolf, and two bears on the way. Lots of dangerous wildlife in the snow biome for a starting character....

The treasure had hobo stew which took me way up past 100% on both food and water so I felt great again and after completing the quest with the trader I decided to go get my backpack. I ran over to it as it was just a km to the south of the trader and OF COURSE there were three lumberjacks standing around it. I managed to kill them all using an iron spear I had found during my day's journey and augmented by a beloved toilet pistol I also found and opened my pack.

It was good to see all that sweet loot I had stolen from the army camp. I put the armor on and was trying to decide which weapon I would equip when I suddenly heard the growls. A pack of dogs had spawned and were on me at once and there I was in my menu making accessory choices. CRAP! Why is it so hard to exit out of the menu when it really matters? I ran but I was fully encumbered and already bleeding. I got my handgun and started shooting. I killed two but the other three kept coming and killed me, again. I guess Kenny Rogers was right. You should never count your money when you're sitting at the table....

I spawned back at the scrapyard and quit for the night. It was a lot of fun and a lot of scary moments. Puking out all my food and water was a major setback but I didn't feel like just quitting and starting over because of it. It was a challenge to get myself back to 100% and felt good once I got there. Those dogs, though.....
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I never thought I'd say this, but I just lived vicariously through Roland. . :apple:

 
One of my favorites, its kind of an unknown cult classic.
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I used to be the projectionist at a arthouse cinema and played this one maybe 100 times. Loved it each time!

One of my ex-girlfriends was a total gore and horror movie fan, books about serial killers and trying to get into their heads kinda girl (I probably should have been worried)...until I played her this and laughed pretty much all the way through it. She was totally disgusted and horrified about my reaction - and starting to think me a sicko and get worried that I might have latent psychopathic tendencies. I mean, how can anyone laugh at the zombie-baby-in-a-blender? The dentist pulling zombie teeth joke? The custard? Lol. So many great scenes in that movie.

But apparently it's not cool to laugh at it or people start to doubt their safety around you.

 
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Socket rail system? Are elevators and mine carts something you are considering in the future? Or am I just reading this wrong?
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Something I've pitched over the years but nothing that ever gets on the roadmap, because you have to ask yourself... do I want elevators more, or bandits? Do we want to fix what was wrong with 17 or add more sandbox stuff that only mid gamers will appreciate. The rational voice wins every time, but once those heavy decisions are out of the way we might be able to get it in, or perhaps with grand master Faatal and his new trusty side kick Dude K, we can it in sooner or later.

 
Something I've pitched over the years but nothing that ever gets on the roadmap, because you have to ask yourself... do I want elevators more, or bandits? Do we want to fix what was wrong with 17 or add more sandbox stuff that only mid gamers will appreciate. The rational voice wins every time, but once those heavy decisions are out of the way we might be able to get it in, or perhaps with grand master Faatal and his new trusty side kick Dude K, we can it in sooner or later.
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so many chooses

 
@MadMoleSerious question: is it more that it's a dislike, because prefering a different API is totally valid, or is there something that seems backward/counter productive?

Note I'm avoiding using the term stupid... Trying to be productive here.

The Unity Engine natively supports it and there have been realworld tests that show it runs very well in most cases. ...I'm just trying to gather if it's even worth discussing legitimate points of confusion or if TFP is too tightly tied to DirectX currently.
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I honestly don't know what it is, I've looked it up at least 5 times in the last several years and then go "Oh well that's a no go" over something and delete it. I'm not going to bother looking it up again, until a team member says "We've got to add Vulcan support and shows me why, its going to remain deleted in my head.

 
@Madmole in a few alphas will there be like Different weather Like Sandstorms or something crazier?

and will there be new defenses/traps ?

 
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