PC Developer Discussions: Alpha 17

[Zadwanaa]

Honestly I'm amazed at the folks that are defending this design change. This is a core gameplay loop that has always existed in the game. It would be like if Diablo 2/3 stopped letting loot drop except from chests and act-bosses. Maybe it would be "more realistic" that every random zombie and skeleton weren't dropping gold and swords, but that would go against a core gameplay element of the game since the beginning.
It's about game design. You design a game to be fun, and if you design it in such a way that it disincentivizes players to participate in the game systems that are supposed to form the core of the fun, that is a flaw that will take away from the overall fun of the game. Even most of the folks saying they like the change will end up changing their game behavior in their personal games.

Kind of odd comparing a loot pinata ARPG like D3 to a survival realistic (obv. to an extent) zombie horror game. Since D3 is ment to have gear fall from the sky. Also, gold means very little in D3 outside of empowering GRs.

From my experience.. Zombies in vanilla never really dropped much, just hopes and expectations that were shotdown. Outside of military zombies, the loot was always meh. Always felt that the pois were where the big loots were at. ive never jumped off the mini bike and kill every zombie i saw for all the lootz.

But hey, we'll see how the game feels once we can play it, right?

 

[merlinfire]

Kind of odd comparing a loot pinata ARPG like D3 to a survival realistic (obv. to an extent) zombie horror game. Since D3 is ment to have gear fall from the sky. Also, gold means very little in D3 outside of empowering GRs.
From my experience.. Zombies in vanilla never really dropped much, just hopes and expectations that were shotdown. Outside of military zombies, the loot was always meh. Always felt that the pois were where the big loots were at. ive never jumped off the mini bike and kill every zombie i saw for all the lootz.

But hey, we'll see how the game feels once we can play it, right?

Dozens and dozens of people, many of whom have thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of hours in the game, have a very good idea of how their gameplay will be impacted when 90% of zombie loop evaporates.

 

[skullpoker]

What's this about a spider meme?

 

[Anabella]

Those same spots may be seen. Windows, doors, holes in wall. It can change. You can bust a hole in a wall, see the zombie, leave, come back, it fails to respawn in that spot, because it can be seen.
What is weird is, sleeper volumes don't despawn until you are 30 meters away from the cube and then 30 seconds after that. Sounds like a bug, since 30m is a long distance.

Has to be a bug then because I can have a sleeper spawn and then move 10-15 blocks away and then come back and it will be gone or a different one in place of it.

 

[merlinfire]

Looting every zombie after a horde night could add up.
The problem is, we don't see 7 day or wandering hordes as delivery guys. =)

What of noticeable value to a zombie apocalypse survivor do you have in your pockets right now? =P

With all due respect, should not the concerns of the players come first?

 

[Jedo]

Honestly I'm amazed at the folks that are defending this design change. This is a core gameplay loop that has always existed in the game. It would be like if Diablo 2/3 stopped letting loot drop except from chests and act-bosses. Maybe it would be "more realistic" that every random zombie and skeleton weren't dropping gold and swords, but that would go against a core gameplay element of the game since the beginning.
It's about game design. You design a game to be fun, and if you design it in such a way that it disincentivizes players to participate in the game systems that are supposed to form the core of the fun, that is a flaw that will take away from the overall fun of the game. Even most of the folks saying they like the change will end up changing their game behavior in their personal games.

I can't really speak to your Diablo comparison (I never got around to #3), but I remember on release that people were talking about the many changes. Even now, a quick google search reveals that many people think that core gameplay elements were removed. (Aside, I'll point to Breath of the Wild's removal of classic/core gameplay elements. It's still a great Zelda game.)

"Fun" is a subjective word, as you can tell from the many discussions past and present on this forum. This means that certain elements of the game are fun for some and not fun for others. Also, it's weird to say that the hazards of a game are a core element that people would choose to participate in. When playing classic Mario, I was more than happy to avoid tangling with Goombas and Koopas and Bullet Bills. This did not take away from my fun.

Finally, citing the fact that people will change their strategies is a non sequitur from the rest of your argument. Changing strategy does not mean that people suddenly are not having fun.

 

[merlinfire]

I can't really speak to your Diablo comparison (I never got around to #3), but I remember on release that people were talking about the many changes. Even now, a quick google search reveals that many people think that core gameplay elements were removed. (Aside, I'll point to Breath of the Wild's removal of classic/core gameplay elements. It's still a great Zelda game.)
"Fun" is a subjective word, as you can tell from the many discussions past and present on this forum. This means that certain elements of the game are fun for some and not fun for others. Also, it's weird to say that the hazards of a game are a core element that people would choose to participate in. When playing classic Mario, I was more than happy to avoid tangling with Goombas and Koopas and Bullet Bills. This did not take away from my fun.

Finally, citing the fact that people will change their strategies is a non sequitur from the rest of your argument. Changing strategy does not mean that people suddenly are not having fun.

So you can't see any issue with disincentivizing base defense gameplay.

 

[Guest]

Dozens and dozens of people have a very good idea of how their gameplay will be impacted

You have described an extremely small and unrepresentative minority. Having thousands of hours in-game does not equal to anything more than they enjoyed playing it, there are a lot more unheard players which might or not embrace the changes. We do not have any numbers for the 90% of the loot being gone, its just pure speculation at this point. All that happened in the past 2 days since the video was released is based on interpretation and not on specific numbers or well-defined/explained mechanics.

 

[gav_328t]

What of noticeable value to a zombie apocalypse survivor do you have in your pockets right now? =P

A Smart phone. Google maps for the win, i can find ANY shotgun messiah, AND find out if it’s open!!

I can also order chinese, cantonese, etc. At least the delivery zombie won’t nick it, they tend to eat brains instead of noodles, lol

 

[Jedo]

With all due respect, should not the concerns of the players come first?

No.

There. That was simple.

(To expand: Remember back in the day when players didn't have any input on their games? The game was released. If you liked it, you bought it. If you thought you might like it, you bought it, then returned it or sold it if it wasn't what you wanted.)

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So you can't see any issue with disincentivizing base defense gameplay.

That's what you took from my quote? Dang. No wonder it's so hard to have a conversation with you.

My base defense gameplay won't be disincentivied by the change.

 

[KingSlayerGM]

I don't think there will be an A18. We'll probably do a beta update and go gold after that. That doesn't mean there won't be some content updates though.

So in which alpha are you planning to release the bandits?

 

[Menace312]

Looting every zombie after a horde night could add up.
The problem is, we don't see 7 day or wandering hordes as delivery guys. =)

What of noticeable value to a zombie apocalypse survivor do you have in your pockets right now? =P

May it also have a little to do with, encouraging us to try out the new POI dungeons?

No shame in that... It is experimental after all.

I imagine the loot drop chance could be increased later if so desired... By mods even...

 

[KingSlayerGM]

I'm pretty sure I could destroy you in any game, I used to smash whole teams of people against me alone in quake and counter strike and was offered to be sponsored years back to travel and compete but I was wanting to make games so I declined. I do stupid stuff deliberately to make the videos entertaining so think what you want to think. I already proved the game can't kill me in my dead is dead video series I posted an alpha or two ago, and look at my kill 20 dog challenge video. After we shipped Gore (a pvp shooter) the best guy who was hands down the top player in the whole community challenged me and I smoked him 20 to 3.
And your the one who is comical, the pvp player base is less than 1% of our customer base. Maybe its 40% of the vocal minority community, but its literally nothing, all our players are friends playing coop with friends or single player on private servers.

MadMole, in a friendly way:

by the shots you missed using the bow in your video, it looks like you are very rusty

 

[merlinfire]

No.
There. That was simple.

Would have been nice to have that as a disclaimer in the Kickstarter. But I'm assuming you do not speak for TFP.

 

[Aldranon]

I'm not sure it makes sense to use real-world logic to justify an in-game change that was made for the sake of performance. Kill zombie -> get loot is a CORE GAMEPLAY LOOP in 7D2D and has been since the earliest alphas.
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I mean, zombies aren't real in real life, so I guess they should be deleted from 7 Days. It just makes sense, and we're all about 100% fidelity realism here

You could get 28 Days Later type of "Zombies", if the Rabies virus mutated to have no dormant period.

 

[KhaineGB]

What of noticeable value to a zombie apocalypse survivor do you have in your pockets right now? =P

A lighter.

Now if I were out of the house, it'd be lighter, wallet (good source of paper), keys (less useful but could be melted down) and phone (screen is quite shiny so could be used as a mirror for scouting around corners)

 

[Andrivullar]

Jedo is probably a goonswarm member, if you've played any MMO's at all, you'd gather its best to just ignore him. [Although, he does remind me of one nerd I used to spawn camp back in ultima.]

 

[Jedo]

Would have been nice to have that as a disclaimer in the Kickstarter. But I'm assuming you do not speak for TFP.

You thought that backing a Kickstarter campaign meant that you get to make decisions on the project, whether directly or indirectly? I know that Kickstarter looks like what investors do, but it really isn't and it doesn't afford you that privilege. You didn't become a shareholder, and TFP isn't beholden to your views or input.

Basically, TFP said, "We have this idea for a video game," and you said, "Here's some money to help you make your vision a reality." In exchange, you get access to the game throughout development, maybe some special merch or whatever other things they offered to you. Still, TFP makes the game that they want. End of story.

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Jedo is probably a goonswarm member, if you've played any MMO's at all, you'd gather its best to just ignore him. [Although, he does remind me of one nerd I used to spawn camp back in ultima.]

No idea what that means. I don't play MMO's. (At least I don't think that I have.)

At any rate, I'm sorry that logic is such a burden that so many here can't be bothered with it.

 

[Tarquinn]

Always Ready

What of noticeable value to a zombie apocalypse survivor do you have in your pockets right now? =P

Taurus .357 Revolver (with licence to carry it) :cocksure:

 

[eidobunny]

Theres millions of silent customers who just played the game solo 2-20 hours who never used the forum in their life.

If we're talking about active long-term players in multiplayer servers and disregarding single player or private servers, there's a significant active PvP community as a portion of all active players.

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Servers numbers does not account the thousands of single player games lowering your pvp percentage considerably I think.

I'm talking about active multiplayer players, I'm not even considering single players or people who bought the game and never played it. Considering the set of active multiplayer servers, a good 20-30% are PvP-centered.