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
Status
Not open for further replies.
I think I'm seeing lower performance in this build as compared with the previous build.
Click to expand...
To follow up on my own post; it could ve because i spawned in the snow biome and I've never been there yet.

 
I got really lucky and found motorcycle parts -competed on day 13. I am having a real hard time restarting with the new patch :-)
Click to expand...
I've made 2 bicycles and a motorcycle, still haven't perked into vehicles yet. :D

 
For your veteran fans or people who are more skilled at the game, this challenge (I feel) comes a little too late. @madmole I’ve seen you mention around day 42 things will reallly pick up and get harder. I’m sure that figure may fluctuate depending on the player and GS but let’s use that figure for now. I assume most people play 1 hour days. That’s obviously 42 hours of gameplay until you are going to be challenged. That’s a pretty big time commitment to put in in my opinion and possibly why I’ve seen many finding it too easy and getting bored.
You may say crank up the difficulty, and I hear you. I can see in the xml it accelerates gamestage, but it also makes zombies tanks, and pumping 10 headshots with a nicely stated ak is a cheap way of making the game more difficult and less fun.

Perhaps an option to start on a specific gamestage (default 0, 10, 25, 50). Yeah we can change in the xml but it’s a lot easier and simpler if it had the option directly in the game.
Click to expand...
I had thought about an option for players to start on Day 29 (or even a short interval before an advanced BM like Day 32). That’s just a different way of conceptualizing the gamestage situation, but the point being that they are behind the curve at that point. Less time to prep for a more advanced horde, and ideally the advanced horde keeps them lagging behind as they have to overcome the handicap.

At any rate, I’m a casual (not a new player, Guppy), so I don’t care much. I’ll put hundreds of hours into the game, but I’m never focused on min/maxing or pushing my limits. I just like building under some pressure, exploring the vast world, discovering all the items and perks, and kicking some zombie ass when I feel like it.

 
Nice work on the latest Exp. Fun Pimps. The game is very playable now. No more super low drops that cause issues. I have noticed a strange thing with FPS now though. When I test with no V-sync, my FPS never drops below 80. So I set my refresh to 75hz and turn on V-sync. When I do that, the FPS will not stay steady. It will drop down to 60fps a lot. Which should not be happening. When I test with no V-sync, the frames stay above 80 for hours. Like wise, when I set my refresh back to 120Hz and use V-sync HALF, the game seems to have trouble maintaining 60FPS even though it will stay above 80FPS with V-sync off.

That doesn't make any sense to me at all. If the game can maintain over 80FPS in nearly all conditions, why can it not do 75 or 60 consistently with V-sync on? That indicates a serious problem with the rendering pipeline. One I don't think you guys can really fix. I understand you were left with little choice but to use the Unity Game Engine as it is the only one available with the flexibility to allow you to do what you wanted to do. I have several games that use the Unity Game Engine and most of them exhibit this behavior as well. Minimum frame times are really an issue with this engine in general.

That said, the game now runs significantly better than A17 did. A fantastic improvement in all ways really. I can also tell that you guys spent a lot of time playing the game and really polished the mechanics of this release. Cheers Madmole and the entire FP crew. Excellent work!

 
Quite a few times I ended up getting myself roasted by trying to throw a molotov to an enemy under me or behind a wall. But not -always-.So I've been trying to figure out why exactly molotovs are so inconsistant, and I think I tracked it down to the randomness of the orientation / rotation speed when the molly is thrown.

This is with two throws with the same crosshair position:

Kb23YpC.gif


The hitbox of the molotov is fairly accurate, but the strong variance on the rotation makes it quite hard to get a consistant throw.

I would suggest to clamp the initial rotation of the molotov to values that have the bottle fly out "bottom first", so that it has the smallest profile for the first few meters, and maybe reduce the initial spin velocity a tad. It might look a bit less pretty, but it would make molotovs a lot less likely to self-immolate people unintentionally.
Click to expand...
Nice GIF, that's a pretty neat test. What happens if you adjusted the crosshair alittle higher? Would all your throws clear the gap then?. I kinda like there is alittle variation with thrown objects....😅

 
So to expand on a previous post of mine, my game wouldn't run well in Fullscreen mode. Choppy, getting 20 fps or lower. It didn't matter what resolution I was at, what my quality settings were in game, whether EAC was on or off, NOTHING changed the outcome. Low, choppy fps. Until I just discovered something odd. Here's my system settings again:
OS: Windows 10 64-bit, version 1809

CPU: Intel i7 4790k 4.0GHz

GPU: MSI Gaming GTX 1080 8GB, latest drivers installed (436.48)

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 32GB DDR3 1600

Motherboard: MSI Z97 Gaming 5

Typically when I play games, I have twitch streams, youtube videos or something of the like going on my other monitor to watch while I play. Turns out if a video is playing, that's what causes my low and choppy fps. As soon as I pause the video, performance increases dramatically! Oh it gets even stranger. Let's say I have the video playing, and I mute my system using my keyboard's mute button. Windows 10 add this little overlay when you mute and unmute your system in the corner of your screen:

Iohvl1F.jpg


Super handy! Especially considering that when this overlay is up, even while a video is playing which normally demolishes my performance... my framerate is buttery smooth. No hitching, no chop. As soon as it goes away, it's back to being unplayable. So this clearly is not a game issue, it's a Windows issue. I have no clue what it's doing to cause this or how to stop it. Funny enough, I get better performance using the Vulkan renderer, until it crashes after a few minutes of play. Maybe some weird interaction with the DX11 renderer? I have no idea. Hopefully someone out there can shed some light on this issue, so I can enjoy A18 in all its glory.
Click to expand...
weird I tried it out and can confirm...doesn't last long

 
The new small piles of canned food on tabletops in POI's are great, they're keeping me going in our 3-player game, and I think it's absolutely hilarious my kids walk right past them all the time. Since they're usually ahead of me that means I get the free food without having to fight every zombie for every can. Win!
Click to expand...
you should ask them if they see the canned food piles on counters/tables next time you find one. someone i play with sees them, i never see them though i do see the command to press E to loot if i mouse over where she says she sees it. we've tested this a few times by having her call me over when she finds them.

 
Then you should read more carefully next time :-)
Click to expand...
Thanks, I did read that :smile-new: It gives "handgun parts" as an example and I was expecting to see other parts named specifically after an item eg I have some "shotgun parts". My confusion is these ones are a generic "scrappable item parts" with a generic ? icon.

So still not sure what I can make from these but I suppose I'll find out...

 
Thanks, I did read that :smile-new: It gives "handgun parts" as an example and I was expecting to see other parts named specifically after an item eg I have some "shotgun parts". My confusion is these ones are a generic "scrappable item parts" with a generic ? icon.
So still not sure what I can make from these but I suppose I'll find out...
Click to expand...
the new icons that looks out of place? like an error? old parts from before patch? you can scrap them into the new parts that are now used.

 
I would like to see a function for looking at the range of stats on weapons you find. Like holding alt when you mouse over the stats shows you the min and max rolls.

 
Thanks, I did read that :smile-new: It gives "handgun parts" as an example and I was expecting to see other parts named specifically after an item eg I have some "shotgun parts". My confusion is these ones are a generic "scrappable item parts" with a generic ? icon.
So still not sure what I can make from these but I suppose I'll find out...
Click to expand...
Scrap them, they'll turn into the new parts that replace them... when I scrapped ak47 parts, they scrapped to machine gun parts.

- - - Updated - - -

the new icons that looks out of place? like an error? old parts from before patch? you can scrap them into the new parts that are now used.
Click to expand...
yeah, what he said. :)

 
I really like A18 and all the changes and new stuff in it and I cannot wait to play with friends on our world.

I have a question tho, since we have A18 experimental, do you know when we can expect A18 stable to be released please ?

 
Open up spawning.xml and look for:

&lt;spawn maxcount="1" respawndelay="3" time="Day" entitygroup="ZombiesAll" /&gt;

&lt;spawn maxcount="1" respawndelay="4" time="Night" entitygroup="ZombiesNight" /&gt;/&gt;

Change maxcount to 5, set respawndelay to 1
Click to expand...
Thank you! My players may not....but I do! &lt;insert evil laughter here&gt;

 
Open up spawning.xml and look for:

&lt;spawn maxcount="1" respawndelay="3" time="Day" entitygroup="ZombiesAll" /&gt;

&lt;spawn maxcount="1" respawndelay="4" time="Night" entitygroup="ZombiesNight" /&gt;/&gt;

Change maxcount to 5, set respawndelay to 1
Click to expand...

Awesome, I’ll try it

 
I really like A18 and all the changes and new stuff in it and I cannot wait to play with friends on our world. I have a question tho, since we have A18 experimental, do you know when we can expect A18 stable to be released please ?
Click to expand...
No....Not even a target date. “It’s done when it’s done” applies most especially to experimental.

 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top