Roland

Go eat a pretzel!

I mean at this time and during this phase. I mean to say starting 10 years ago until today all updates are developmental in nature. Yes, some updates had exciting new content and features because they were building the game from the ground up but those were to implement basic features that hadn't been introduced. No update in this game has been of the type that acts as an expansion to the basic game. All updates have been for developing the basic game-- the list of goals on their original kickstarter. That's why certain people with expectations of updates being expansionary complain that TFP isn't extending the end game or adding more end game content. That is the essence of expansionary updates-- creating new experiences for veterans of the game who have already played all the basics. Your desire for them to add new workstations instead of polishing up the existing ones is exactly an example of this. You want expansions to the game but TFP isn't going to do that until they have fully developed their base game and released it as their gold version. And you would be wrong. Resoundingly. The good news is that you being wrong even benefits you. Based on what evidence? They are pouring bucketloads of money into this game because it is so successful and they see that it has a long future on PC, Xbox, and Playstation. What do you even mean by "keeping it running for the sales". If what they were doing wasn't successful there would be no sales. On the one hand you say they have ruined the game and it is going to die but then you say that it is this huge money cow they are using. They have a completely different team on that from those working on 7 Days to Die. You've never spoken to or seen anyone working on that next project and whatever they are doing has nothing to do at all with the people working to finish 7 Days to Die. It is inaccurate in the extreme to think that the staff working on 7 Days to Die puts a few hours in on this game but then spends most of their time on the next project. It isn't even the same people. The people on 7 Days to Die are completely dedicated and working constantly to bring it to completion. It is their only priority.

What did that have to do with what I said other than the fact that we both referenced phones? That line is infamous because Blizzard announced a mobile game for casuals to an audience of hardcore Diablo fans that were expecting more content for PC. My point was that if playing a modded PC game is unacceptable for extreme casuals, at least they have mobile games to keep themselves occupied. In other words, 7 Days to Die on the PC doesn't cater to extreme casuals. They can play, of course, but the expectation is that you will play the base game and then move on to modded versions of the game for additional experiences. Therefore, modding is the solution for changing the gameplay from the default version to some other desired way to play. No, I seem to think that you reject modding as the way for players to tailor the game for themselves. It seems that way because you stated it clearly. Whether you expect TFP to tailor the game the way you and your wife like to play it, I have no idea. I only have what you actually said to go by and it sounds like you can't or won't use mods and don't think they should be what people are expected to turn to if they want a different experience than vanilla. You certainly are. Don't interpret my disagreement with your opinion about the role of mods with this game as some kind of statement that you can't post at all. I have no problem with you listing your own preferences and what you would like to see the game become. I never refuted any of your personal preferences. My disagreement with you was solely about your statement about mods not being the answer. I believe that mods are the answer. The developers planned from the very beginning that mods should be the answer because they built this game in such a way that PC gamers who aren't afraid to use mods or who are somehow too busy to install mods could tailor the game for themselves.

Repair Kits will be a secondary fuel for your vehicles depending on where and how well you drive them...

Not to mention that they will hire someone specifically for this purpose and it will not add any development time. The team, when they were smaller, did a lot of these things themselves and while it is true that they are "good enough" or "functional as is" they made a decision to hire specialized talent to polish the game and make it look more professional. Getting a programmer/artist that specializes in the look and design will bring the game to a new level. The TFP team at the time of A13 were good but they didn't have specialized talent/skills in these different areas. Now they have people dedicated to level design, environment art, character art, AI, sound, etc. that they've hired to up the quality of the game.

In almost all these cases it is hostility breeding hostility. People who come here looking to be invited find an inviting community. People who come looking for a fight and to burn bridges find an uninviting community. The lion share of the responsibility for fitting into a community is on the individual who is joining the community and not the community itself. That's not just true of forums but of life in general. With how IzPrebuilt openly admits that he feels about this game and his non-future as a player of it, there is very little chance that he was going to fit into this community. He hates the game, has no respect for the developers, and is too ingrained in caustic sarcastic and insulting methods of discourse. He isn't really a typical example though. A more typical example is someone who really does like the game but is angry about some part of it or about how development has been conducted but communicates that criticism in a hostile, insulting, and ignorant manner. This person is probably not going to get an inviting community response but if they can chill and step back from that behavior they will find that this community is super forgiving and willing to let the past be the past. Plenty of people post their dissent about the game and development without hostility and toxicity and they are treated very well. This community is predominately positive. We like to joke and have fun. We admire TFP and the work they've done. We trust that they will continue to develop the game and finish it and go on to new and great projects. We may not be happy about certain design decisions but we can discuss those things without being angry about it. There are other communities for this game which are predominately negative. They like to insult, mock, and be derogatory about TFP and the game. They are convinced the game will die and never be finished and nobody will support any future game that TFP puts out. They are not happy at all and cannot post about the game or the developer without a tone of anger. Their assumptions for every decision TFP makes are always nefarious, dishonest, lazy, anti-player, etc. In those communities, if someone posts something positive they are immediately leapt upon and insulted in the worst ways possible. So there are plenty of communities that someone can go to regardless of how they feel about the game and feel that the community is inviting. If you want to be insulting and crude and flame others who like the game then don't come here. Go to the community that will reinforce your behavior. If you can be friendly, good-natured, and respectful towards the devs and other players even if you don't agree with all the decisions that have been made then come here and you will find an inviting community.

Updates at this point are developmental instead of expansionary. That's just the way it is. If you are bored with the existing base game then put it aside and wait until after release when they start expanding it beyond the base game.

It seems to but it is also a hacky methodology. The developers operate differently than modders and have more considerations than modders do. I don't fully understand the coding aspect of it other than that I know that TFP chose not to hack the microsplat technology and instead chose to change farming to farm plots for technical reasons. Maybe they had secret design purposes they didn't share with me but at the time their stated reasoning was technical concerns. I'm glad there are mods that get around it and work though for those who don't like farm plots.

No, its never been that way. Ammo and weapons have always been plentiful. A wooden club is a zombie killing machine and it is craftable on day one and always has been. The game was less puzzle-like in the past with POI's just being open empty shells with no maze to traverse which also brings up visibility. The game was much less limited in what you could see back then. Open a door and immediately see all zombies in the room. No, the game has never been a dedicated survival horror game although it has always been able to be played that way if you made adjustments-- just like now. Except that I would even argue that it is easier now to get a true survival horror vibe than it ever was before--again thanks to the POI redesigns since A17. I agree that XP rewards for killing zombies ruin the simulation survival aspect of the game. It makes it more arcade and gives the player incentive for hunting zombies when in an actual scenario players would more likely avoid zombies as much as possible and only engage with them when absolutely necessary. That being said, you don't have to go out of your way to farm zombies for xp. That is a choice you are making. That's why iPhone games exist... Extremely casual players by their nature are stuck with whatever they are offered. Its always been that way and it will always be that way. "There are mods" is always an acceptable answer for anyone, casual or not, who wishes to play the game differently than it is designed. If someone can't be bothered to mod because their life is so busy, then that person has to take whatever is offered and the developers can't be expected to tailor-make the game they want for themselves. It's right there in the label YOU chose to describe yourself: extreme. Extreme anything is exactly why mods exist. The base game is going to have broad appeal to most new players. Players in extreme categories whether that be extreme veteran, extreme hardcore, extreme casual, extreme survival sim, etc. need to mod the game to make it the extreme experience they want. I feel bad for you that the game has moved beyond what you enjoyed and that your life is so filled to the brim with obligations and work and whatnot that you can't take any time to try out mods. But, those are choices you are making and probably more important than a video game anyway.

Oh, they're going to overhaul the UI. Just get used to that idea. It is definitely happening. They are polishing the game for gold. It is going to be a boring process for veterans of the game. They've stated that they plan to add expansionary updates post gold but for now they are just trying to get the basics in and polished.

I've never called LBD a placeholder as I never felt like it fit that label. The problem with LBD is that people just look at the trees instead of the forest. The forest is "player progression" and TFP has done a lot of development in that area starting in Alpha 11. There is an obvious general arc of development if you can step away and lift your gaze from LBD itself. When progression began it was a rudimentary system of crafting where your tools and weapons would advance through crafting them-- pure LBD but limited to crafting. Over the next several alphas LBD advanced into skills but there were books and skill points added as well. After A14 LBD slowly but surely declined in its presence in player progression first disappearing from crafting where it began. It finally disappeared altogether in A17. There was a definite iterative process to the player progression aspect of the game. It was not a situation of an LBD placeholder being implemented and then replaced all at once by the true Central Pool XP mechanic. It was not TFP flip flopping back and forth. It was a legit development process and we were witness to it because of early access. This type of process is exactly what I like about early access but I realize others hate it and wish that TFP had finalized all its actual development before releasing on Steam and that all the updates were purely expansionary updates instead of development updates.

It was Portal Knights. Yes, water volume would fill and drain. But in that game the world is destroyed and blown apart into remnants so that you are only playing in very limited arena-- a few chunks at a time and floating in space so that digging down can only go a dozen layers or so-- so much less demanding than 7 Days to Die. Still, a very cool water mechanic and hopefully something that could be done someday on a larger scale. I would love a fully voxel first person Terraria-type game someday with the insane spelunking depths and water/lava draining/filling mechanics of that game--not to mention all the rest.

I agree with you about item degradation. I think it is needed badly. However, it seems to be a polarizing issue with as many people for it as are against it. Probably best left as a mod. Also, farming was not switched from being tilled on terrain to farm plots for any balance reasons. It was simply that they switched to a new tech for generating terrain and it no longer allowed for changing terrain within a biome away from its basic type for that biome. To preserve farming at all they switched to the box plots.

Your video? Sorry, didn't open it. I was discussing the forums and the date I joined was February 9, 2014. *karate chops sillls in the throat*

I found out about this forum from the Steam forum since they talk and complain about its existence ALL THE TIME going back 9 1/2 years ago...lol

Back when smell was in, the developers briefly considered having bathing be represented where you would periodically have to get wet and "use" soap in order to get rid of a smelly debuff that would attract zombies.

They are getting direct updates and information through the event Discord straight from Prime and Crater Creator as soon as it is available. The streamers aren't looking for news in the dev diary thread or twitter.

I think this past weekend would've been ideal for the summer sale if they could've been ready. It would be best to be able to finish up experimental and have stable A21 be the version that updates along with the sale instead of stable A20. They still might have time to get to stable before the sale as A21 is probably the most polished version yet but that window of possibility shrinks with each weekend that slips by. That being said, marketing concerns are always secondary to programming concerns. It is exactly for this reason that indie studios exist and why working conditions for programmers in triple A studios are often criticized.

We for dang sure aren't food!

Fit its genre? SInce 7 Days to Die borrows elements from several genres to define its own hybrid style, I'm pretty sure that whatever it does is going to fit its genre. If you want to emphasize one particular genre like Survival Horror then you'll need to adjust your playstyle and/or change the settings and/or mod the game. It isn't sad. It's fantastic. Survival Horror typically involves severe limits on ammo and weaponry and relies mostly on mood, setting, creepy sound effects and music, limited visibility, evasion, and puzzle solving. To me, pure survival horror would be doing a quest at Higashi Tower at night with a handheld flashlight and no weapons and the settings put to maximum difficulty so that zombie HP is too high for you to be able to actually kill them. They could be set to walk at night or perhaps jog but you would need to constantly run and evade, shut doors behind you, build barricades, get knockdowns with your fists to buy yourself time as you loot and try to accomplish the quest with relentless zombies constantly on your tail. Will you get cornered? Will something jump out unexpectedly from the darkness? That is what adds to the suspense. That would be closest to classic survival horror but I'm glad the game isn't purely defined by that. I can try doing it as a challenge or to get that survival horror feeling but then the next time I can go in with plenty of ammo and do it more like an arcade shooter or I can go in the next time and try to stealth as much as possible.

I am a volunteer moderator of this forum. I have access to the TFP team and know what TFP is working on but am not employed by TFP. I am one of a team of individuals who enforce forum rules of conduct and it is my job to warn people who are being unruly and if they ignore those warnings to ban them from the forum. Bans are always initiated by council and not by individual moderators. I'm glad you have decided to participate fully in the forums rather than just lurk and I hope you can have a positive experience here. Happy to start over. Be my Chekov!

Or maybe a winner... It is too late for this thread. Maybe the next one...

We don't have a caste system in the United States. Sorry. Many people feel perfectly comfortable with officials acting and talking casually. I feel perfectly comfortable being an official who is glib, friendly, jokey, and at times sarcastic. If you don't like it then don't engage with me. As I stated before, until now, I have never spoken to you directly and really won't feel like I'm missing out if we never speak to each other again in the future if that suits you. Every post you have made so far has been fixated on me-- someone you've never directly interacted with before. If you don't want me to be "casual" with you then don't initiate conversation with me and just let others decide for themselves whether my style of interaction is something they are okay with. When was I even impolite to someone? I'm at a loss here. And, again, it wasn't even to you? You got angry because of how I posted to someone else and not even THAT person has complained or spoken up for themselves? How can I even begin to possibly post in a way to keep you happy if you are going to not only feel insulted by imagined personal attacks against yourself but also vicariously for every one else on the forum.....? I know some people are easily offended but you have found a new level, my friend. So you just gotta be you but everyone else has to be the way you want them to be. Well....I just gotta be me.

No. Why would you take it that way? I was simply wondering whether you would choose to remain and post or go back to lurking given your attitude. What does this even mean? Uh....yeah. That's why it was such an insulting comparison. And I can say it without highlighting my text. What guys are you even talking to and what is it you think you need saving from? Please, just post normal opinions about the game and stop whatever this is that you are doing. OR ELSE! (kidding!)

This is a pretty insulting post right here by someone who is claiming to want civil discourse. In fact, the entire library of your posts so far are antagonistic. Why not start with a new community by being friendly and asking questions instead of starting on the attack and making accusations? Let me guess: Because you're the customer? heheh...we'll see where this leads...