Alpha 20 Dev Diary

[wolfbain5]

can I have an official response to how far away from a volume you can be before triggering spawns? not just them showing up, but also them being calculated in?

[faatal]

3 hours ago, wolfbain5 said:

can I have an official response to how far away from a volume you can be before triggering spawns? not just them showing up, but also them being calculated in?

It is 8m in XZ for them to start spawning. Don't know what you mean by calculated in.

[wolfbain5]

8 minutes ago, faatal said:

It is 8m in XZ for them to start spawning. Don't know what you mean by calculated in.

thanks. uhm, calculated in, bad wording, but didnt have a better way to phrase. as you drive by buildings, you get near volumes, I didnt know if the game calculates them as you approach to get them ready to render or not. basically hold in memory before you get close enough to render.

[wolfbain5]

Another question for @faatal with the drop quests, I can share them with party, and no matter who kills the zed. bear, animal, female, any. they count for anyone on the quest, except dogs. Is this intentional, or something not hooked in like the vultures? are the quest kills meant to be individual the way dogs are, or party kills as all others are?

 

edit: another correction

snake is counted as zombie kill instead of an animal kill

Edited March 6 by wolfbain5 (see edit history)

[NinjaMoa]

On 3/6/2021 at 1:22 PM, faatal said:

It is 8m in XZ for them to start spawning. Don't know what you mean by calculated in.

What is done for the Y aspect then?

 

The main problem I have found with this is dropping / climbing into another room and having them appear as i do so.

[madmole]

On 2/16/2021 at 11:09 PM, Zombiepoptard said:

Most of the time spent in the game is at end gaming. I would have liked if there was one pipe gun that shot all the bullets that you picked up just so you could have a gun when you start out. Since it's a little late for that can we have junk ammo like what's used in the turrets for our pipe weapons? are the pipe weapons going to be crafted?

Pipe weapons are easy early game craft so you can start specializing right away. They will share ammo with existing weapons of their class which will drop in scaled quantities.

On 2/17/2021 at 3:29 PM, Blake_ said:

How is the improved shape menu coming along ? Sounds like the most annoying, OCD and time consuming task on the face of the Earth. Gazz is on it for sure lol.

It's looking really sweet. Allan and Alloc have done most of the work there AFAIK and Rick designed it based on our numerous discussions, but others have contributed for sure. It is going to change building in a big way and make this the best building system of all time IMO.

On 2/17/2021 at 5:28 PM, roughgalaxy said:

Question. Is there any plan to allow us to tie XP to difficulty? I know we can manually up the xp when we up the difficulty, but it would be nice to have a more dynamic option. (Risk vs Reward scaling)

We are planning a biome difficulty that scales so if you want more xp faster, you can go to the harder biomes.

[madmole]

On 2/17/2021 at 10:10 PM, Shineblossom said:

 I would dare to completely disagree. While there are people using those, most of people i know only equip helmet when going to serious fight (or play on PvP server). I am already sad that we won't be able to customize our bodies (did i get it correctly?) and so i won't be able to have flat chested latina with thicc thigs.
I understand why are you remodeling faces, but saying that everyone uses closed helmes and you won't see those faces sounds really generalizing.

Also, i know that i am asking this for multiple alphas already, but i would love a truck for A21, when you finish with A20.
(and by truck i mean actually truck, like the military ones in army base, that will be slow but sturdy with huge space, not pickup, which Americans like to call "trucks")

I love games with heavy character customization, but unfortunately we can't add 2 years of scope for this. We can always go there in future products.

No more vehicles are planned, but I'm sure a modders will do it.

On 2/28/2021 at 4:58 PM, luki12163 said:

Are there any mods (for vehicles) that are already ready or in development? I would really love to know what mods are planned and how will they work?

 

Also is there any news about drone and if it's coming to A20?

 

 

Vehicle mods should be about wrapped up. We'll reveal them later unless Faatal already spilled the beans.

Drone is getting closer I'm confident it will make it this time.

On 3/1/2021 at 6:45 AM, Weazelsun said:

@madmole @faatal Will the animals particularly the bear and mountain lion animation become more smoother? Right now they're a bit janky when attacking and jumping.

Yes at some point.

On 3/1/2021 at 11:26 AM, faatal said:

These are the planned vehicle mods:

 

Fuel Saver - Works

Off Road Headlights - Works

Super Charger -  Works

Expanded Seat - TODO

Reserve Fuel Tank - Working on today

 

None of them are fully done, since they still need icons, schematics and put in loot lists.

 

Drone should be in a20.

So much for holding back info

[Blake_]

4 minutes ago, madmole said:

I love games with heavy character customization, but unfortunately we can't add 2 years of scope for this. We can always go there in future products.

No more vehicles are planned, but I'm sure a modders will do it.

I would understand that no primitive boat is added (IF swimming animations were good enough), yet... no water threats ? No plans for that sexy Zombie shark?  Water is completely empty and right now it's little more than a waste of space. You guys are making animals for a20, what's one more that adds awesome jumpscares at the cheap cost of a couple of weeks of dev time tops ?

[madmole]

On 3/1/2021 at 11:47 AM, beerfly said:

I guess that there will be limitation on mods on a single vehicle. Lets say 3 or so, where we could choose a build for our vehicles such as offroad, long roam, team work and so on ? 

The idea is more mods than there are slots so there is some choice.

On 3/1/2021 at 4:09 PM, Hasoup said:

Any plans for upgrades or higher tier workbenches/forges/chem sations/campfires etc? Late game is kind of jarring having 20 or so forges being on and managed at the same time.

 

It'd nice to have access to something with more slots at least for work stations, maybe having something like an industrial tier for them wold be nice and be more aesthetically fitting as well.

Seems to me that is just a balance thing, and 20 is OCD if you as me, I have 2-3 max and build some large bases. They could simply smelt much faster so we don't need late game ones. We've talked about an industrial forge, but with some simplifications coming I don't see a need for it.

[wwiiogre]

With the coming scaling of biomes, can we get a toggle in the game system setup for starting locations. I personally do not mind starting in snow or burnt or desert biome when starting a game. Each has its own difficulties, but are nice to start in as a change. Currently on RWG I almost always start in forest biome. That is getting old. Granted I have 3500 hours playing the game but seriously. Do we always have to start in forest. At least let us toggle this choice, allowing starts in the other biomes, outside of wasteland would be ok for me and if its a choice it will not affect the new players.

 

Great work, game is looking better and better. 

 

Chris

 

[Guppys Fur]

22 minutes ago, madmole said:

. We've talked about an industrial forge, but with some simplifications coming I don't see a need for it.

 

Dear Mr. Mole, i hope you guys reconsider here.

 

I was really looking forward to this, as im sure many others too.

 

Just imagine the level of satisfaction, having this icon of progression in your lategame. Positivly forcing you to re-design your craft room to create place for that Beauty

[Survager]

53 minutes ago, madmole said:

Seems to me that is just a balance thing, and 20 is OCD if you as me, I have 2-3 max and build some large bases. They could simply smelt much faster so we don't need late game ones. We've talked about an industrial forge, but with some simplifications coming I don't see a need for it.

 

I think I will give the request of a lot of players: Joel, please stop simplifying the survival game!!!

[madmole]

1 hour ago, Blake_ said:

I would understand that no primitive boat is added (IF swimming animations were good enough), yet... no water threats ? No plans for that sexy Zombie shark?  Water is completely empty and right now it's little more than a waste of space. You guys are making animals for a20, what's one more that adds awesome jumpscares at the cheap cost of a couple of weeks of dev time tops ?

Eventually you'll drown when swimming and you run out of stamina. Hopefully we can put some creepy water logged zombies in there that pop up and scare the @%$# out of you or something, zombie catfish.

38 minutes ago, wwiiogre said:

With the coming scaling of biomes, can we get a toggle in the game system setup for starting locations. I personally do not mind starting in snow or burnt or desert biome when starting a game. Each has its own difficulties, but are nice to start in as a change. Currently on RWG I almost always start in forest biome. That is getting old. Granted I have 3500 hours playing the game but seriously. Do we always have to start in forest. At least let us toggle this choice, allowing starts in the other biomes, outside of wasteland would be ok for me and if its a choice it will not affect the new players.

 

Great work, game is looking better and better. 

 

Chris

 

No because that just isn't how the game will work. You'll spawn with a trader nearby to get started and a better tutorial integration. If you want to skip all that leave the easy forest, but you'll pretty much insta die in the harder biomes without gear IMO. Cold will be harsh and radiation even harsher. Desert will be somewhat harder but survivable for a little bit without some gear. So the standard way to play will be to gear up in the forest then attempt harder biomes.

36 minutes ago, Guppys Fur said:

 

Dear Mr. Mole, i hope you guys reconsider here.

 

I was really looking forward to this, as im sure many others too.

 

Just imagine the level of satisfaction, having this icon of progression in your lategame. Positivly forcing you to re-design your craft room to create place for that Beauty

We might change the forge to a normal workstation instead type of work flow and that will change everything, so it's too early to comment on an industrial forge.

6 minutes ago, Survager said:

 

I think I will give the request of a lot of players: Joel, please stop simplifying the survival game!!!

Simple is great, stop being married or emotionally attached to old designs. A lot of stuff was prototyped as a work around because we didn't have programmers to do exactly what we wanted so streamlining is a normal part of the alpha experience. I wouldn't expect major changes to everything, but as we go gold stuff gets redesigned in a better way that is easier to understand and more streamlined. It's not going to change what the game is or how it feels, just less clicks or a smoother experience.

[Xtrakicking]

47 minutes ago, madmole said:

Simple is great, stop being married or emotionally attached to old designs. A lot of stuff was prototyped as a work around because we didn't have programmers to do exactly what we wanted so streamlining is a normal part of the alpha experience. I wouldn't expect major changes to everything, but as we go gold stuff gets redesigned in a better way that is easier to understand and more streamlined. It's not going to change what the game is or how it feels, just less clicks or a smoother experience.

 

The burnt forest, pine forest and the plains required no extra clicks.

Edited March 8 by Xtrakicking (see edit history)

[hiemfire]

@madmole Is how apparel crafting is going to change with the new system something you're willing to touch on right now?

[pregnable]

5 hours ago, madmole said:

Simple is great, stop being married or emotionally attached to old designs. A lot of stuff was prototyped as a work around because we didn't have programmers to do exactly what we wanted so streamlining is a normal part of the alpha experience. I wouldn't expect major changes to everything, but as we go gold stuff gets redesigned in a better way that is easier to understand and more streamlined. It's not going to change what the game is or how it feels, just less clicks or a smoother experience.

 

True.  The simplifications you have made to 7 days have been great.  Really like the repair kits.  Not that hard to make, but could lead to disaster if you forget to bring one. 

 

I am interested in your next unreal game. 

 

I would love to see a 3rd person game that borrowed heavily from what diablo 2 did right, with their skill system and loot system. 

 

I would also probably copy the combat and spell mechanics from Dragons Dogma with that game.  Dragons Dogma had some great combat, and is one of the few games that really nailed playing as a mage. 

 

 

A Diablo 2/Dragons Dogma hybrid game with survival and building elements, based on dota mechanics, where building requires gold, which you primarily find dungeon crawling and fighting in the open world. 

 

How close am I?

[faatal]

On 3/6/2021 at 8:58 PM, NinjaMoa said:

What is done for the Y aspect then?

 

The main problem I have found with this is dropping / climbing into another room and having them appear as i do so.

Y is about 1m, but it varies depending if up or down. Y is low because I don't want AI spawning in rooms above or below you and dropping your FPS. We may possibly do some type of entity caching before we go gold.

[AtomicUs5000]

6 hours ago, faatal said:

Y is about 1m, but it varies depending if up or down. Y is low because I don't want AI spawning in rooms above or below you and dropping your FPS. We may possibly do some type of entity caching before we go gold.

 
What if there was some intermediate object like a simple version of the instance that should spawn there without any AI or animation... and it gets replaced at the moment the real entity would normally pop into existence?

[Blake_]

3 hours ago, AtomicUs5000 said:

 
What if there was some intermediate object like a simple version of the instance that should spawn there without any AI or animation... and it gets replaced at the moment the real entity would normally pop into existence?

We had that talk already at some point or another. Short answer: not easy at all, so it's a slim chance that they try it. Reasons ? a lot, but to name a few:

 

1-There's no easy way to switch from block to entity in Unity in real time without feedback problems. If you shoot that Zd block from far away, it can't switch fast enough for it to receive the damage as an entity. It needs to store the health value, so in other words, the block health receives damage and then through new programmed variables you transfer the data to an entity which spawns with said hp value, but if its head explodes, then the player will notice a clear delay ; if it doesn't explode you will notice it nevertheless because it's not instantaneous as it goes through a few checks. Akin to an Skyrim character dying from fall damage: it falls and then it suddendly dies after a few seconds when the fall damage is calculated. 

 

2-Aside from point 1, the other apparent problems are visual and dev related(have to do 1-3 extra models per Zd as blocks in different postures and in the moment of switch the entity has to have that specific posture to make the switch seamless. Needs extra code and quite a bit of modelling time.

 

3. You would lose performace when you make the switch, more than right now. The performance gain from having the blocks spawn first not only gets nullified when they switch but it doesn't compensate having to process a block to entity switch time and time again in a continuous fashion. 

 

4. If you make blocks, you would lose the very gameplay you are trying to fix. Isn't a Zd game supposed to wake everyone up when you make noise? If you have blocks, they won't wake up. You would have to make the block transfer to entity with a lot of code and more performance loss than you think and the gameplay not only would worsen, but it would be predictable to low end computers (we can "feel" when an horde spawns, we would also "feel" when a volume designed as you suggest "switchs" models).

 

I hope this helps to clarify why that innocent idea is a HUGE can of worms that won't be easily fixed with optimization tweaks such as switching entities for blocks. A hypothetical implementation would decrease performance, arguably maintain the gameplay as is (probably even worse due to switch delay) and it would also need tons of work and dev time. 

 

 

 

[faatal]

10 hours ago, AtomicUs5000 said:

 
What if there was some intermediate object like a simple version of the instance that should spawn there without any AI or animation... and it gets replaced at the moment the real entity would normally pop into existence?

As Blake_ had said, there are many issues with that.

 

The main overhead is instantiating the entity, not AI or animation. There are ways to speed up spawning and they are not trivial, but it will probably be improved at some point.

[KhaineGB]

15 minutes ago, faatal said:

As Blake_ had said, there are many issues with that.

 

The main overhead is instantiating the entity, not AI or animation. There are ways to speed up spawning and they are not trivial, but it will probably be improved at some point.

You could probably spawn them all at a further distance and then just enable the renderer when the player is within X distance.

Or the gameobject. Gameobject might be better because it stops all scripts running on the entity until it's re-enabled. Just not sure how you'd hook that into LOS/distance in a "cheap" way.

[faatal]

1 minute ago, KhaineGB said:

You could probably spawn them all at a further distance and then just enable the renderer when the player is within X distance.

Or the gameobject. Gameobject might be better because it stops all scripts running on the entity until it's re-enabled. Just not sure how you'd hook that into LOS/distance in a "cheap" way.

It is not about distance or rendering or scripts. All those GameObjects and their components are expensive to create, which means lag spikes. It need further analysis to find all the slow parts and find solutions for each.

[MechanicalLens]

Will the Feral Sense slider apply to horde nights?

[MechanicalLens]

Will trader sell prices be adjusted in A20? If so, I would recommend cobblestone. A stack of cobblestone is, at its base price, approximately 350-400 dukes (I don't have the exact number on me), which is dirt cheap; the traders are almost throwing it away. Maybe doubling the price would be a worthy piece of feedback to consider?

 

Beakers almost fall into this same pit; 500-ish dukes for a beaker is an absolute steal. Again, doubling the price of the item in question might create better balance, although this is just one person's take.

[wolfbain5]

ok, slight topic change. In the editor, we can update imposter. for those who dont know I believe the imposter is what we see in the LOD. so we can destroy the building, but go far away and still see it. how resource intensive would it be for the game to upon reloading, update the imposters. not on a timer, just upon shut down or restart of the game server