Alpha 21 Dev Diary

[Matt115]

4 minutes ago, Blake_ said:

That's not the only issue. 7dtd will run ok with 16 dual channel ram, the problem are draw calls, you need a powerful CPU and fast communication between RAM and CPU to be able to handle these things. GPUs are already there, heck with a rtx 3070 you will be ok on ultra, but CPUs are not yet good enough in their main core to handle 7dtd without -30/-60fps moments. You can try and buy the 13900ks with a RTX 4090ti and it will still drop 100 fps the moment you get into a heavy entity/shadow situation. Sure, optimizations help, but it will take at least a couple of years and 8000mhz ddr5 ram+ 6ghz CPUs to make the game resilient enough to not notice drops as much. This is how much ahead of its time is this technology.

 

So a simple zd variation system will do for now.

Depend how many FPS you want to have - if you want stable 30 FPS - 3060 will be good enough. So lose 100 FPS on 4090 while you have normaly 200 FPS - is not a big problem.  it's still far from good enough 30

[meganoth]

59 minutes ago, Matt115 said:

That's why just diffrent colour is like spice. not main dish - in l4d2 if you check models you will see that number of faces is pretty low - but diffrent clothes, dirt, blood etc. solve that problem

 

more and more people have 16 GB of ram. So this allow for much more.

Guys it's not 2013 anymore 

 

"More and more people" does not matter when TFP needs or wants to support old hardware, and now also consoles where time practically stands still for years.

 

Edited April 21, 2023 by meganoth (see edit history)

[saoron666]

1 hour ago, madmole said:

I'd be ok with tint variations.

It's not that we also wouldn't want to see more zombies, it's a matter of it would delay gold even further and we're focusing on going gold.

It's one of those things that would not move the needle on sales even .01% too. New customers don't care if we add more zombies. I'm not that interested in more zombies without new behaviors. I wrote up a bunch of great zombie designs with behaviors but coders don't have time so more zombies or variations is just meh, and doesn't get us closer to gold or more sales so selling the idea is impossible, as well as we have to make room in the memory footprint for all these new bandits yet.

At best we could add a few and put them into specific biomes so that memory can handle it, and it would still be the same problem, repetitive in each biome.

Maybe we can leverage the character system to add a new zombie head to a player outfit and make some survivor zombies easily using the already in memory character outfits for some tougher armored zombies. These are more draw calls than the current zombies though and bigger textures etc and wouldn't be the best use of resources. Ideally we could start the next game from scratch using the system. I think the skeleton is different too though so animations become a problem. It's complex and like I said, it isn't moving the needle at all on sales, it just makes you veterans happy.

Maybe we can use it for the next game if planned from the beginning.

sales are important to keep the game rolling, Yes.

in that case, i promise you, you make a new version of this game with new and much more zombies and behaviors in separate areas and maybe toss a few hardcore foes with tons of HP and rare loot and put that game for sale as an addon or however you think best!

 

All your veterans will be more than happy to pay for it. that 0.1% needle will turn into Gold! 

 

i personally would pay for it with heart! if a fan as over 500 hrs of gameplay dont you think he wouldn't spend 10$,20$ etc. to get that ?

he will 100%.

 

they sell the same iphone over and over year after year and each phone is good for years right?

do you see apple stop there? no, they design new headphones, new chargers, new accessories etc.. and people pay top price for it!

 

test it and see for yourself.

me and my brother have a manufacture in Canada, and we seeling the same product for 20 years, but each year we come  up with something new as well.

and trust me people buy them for no reason or because they loe the first product.

 

if as a fan we are on your forum and still playing this game, it is because we will also support you and the company. nobody will go broke for an extra 20-30$ after how much you guys been giving for over 10 years! so you get new commers and your existing players to buy a copy.

 

its time. use it now before you also lose the existing players for the future.

 

 

 

 

 

[Mister Forgash]

First I want to say Thank you Madmole for your presence on the forum. Though we hear you're watching here, to see your input makes it real.

I understand that the point of making the game better is to drive sales and there is diminishing returns putting money into things that are not likely to make that money back.

You've already said more on the topic that I ever expected to see, and that's awesome. I agree that more zombie variation isn't a priority- I just want to pose the argument- especially as more attention is put into the other aspects of the game, the rather limited amount of variation, at least to me, doesn't feel finished. Yes, I trust bandits will change that dramatically, but even so, It just feels not-good when you have many exact replica zombies on the screen at once. [Businessman in towers, anyone?] As a know-nothing moron on everything more technical than, 'Oh, this is fun!', having a few extra outfits sounds like it wouldn't be a terrible waste of manhours chasing a goal that will always end in: We want more..  .. All this said, just the hope that this may be revisited before gold leaves me more optimistic.

1 hour ago, saoron666 said:

every POI needs its own foes.

 

every mission should have as well their own foes.

 

every biom should have their own foes.

 

i dont know how the T5 missions for nests will work but that as well will need different foes.

.. Now this sounds like a ludicrous amount of work! Biomes.. yeah, I can see why you'ld see different zombs in a desert as compared to out in the snow- but every mission, every POI? Woah!- That sounds nutty! How much time would go into POI/mission specific zombies when there are literally hundreds of POIs?

 

2 hours ago, Games'n'Grumble said:

Look what I did: -Snip-

 

That is freakin' awesome, and further gives me faith that if you can accomplish 4 additional outfits for a zombie type, the art/zombie team could produce 2-3 outfits across the spectrum.

Oh how I dream.

[Jost Amman]

I see a lot of people here focusing on one topic at a time and then hammering it to death.

Last time it was the "unacceptable" water change. Before that it was Bandits not coming in A21.

Now it's the low amount of zombie variations.

 

All this bantering is from the player perspective, so most people don't understand that @madmole is trying to make us understand that their decisions are not as straightforward as we think, and that each choice is made taking into account many levels of interest and weighing them up. Also, I'd suggest to everyone to take a step back and look at all this in perspective. We will get a great game in the end, I'm sure of it, and I can tell because, all in all, 7D2D is already a great game in alpha. 

[mstdv inc]

2 hours ago, Ricowan said:

This would also triple the amount of graphics memory required for each zombie. Fatal has already stated that they're out of room, memory-wise, for the game on certain platforms/graphics cards.

Does this mean that because of consoles, the main version of the game on the PC will be cut?Why the problem of insufficient console memory does not remain a console problem.The way the game is cut there, not on the PC.

1 hour ago, Blake_ said:

but CPUs are not yet good enough in their main core

Or does Unity not work well with threading?6 cores of 12 threads have long been the norm, but the game does not fully use the processor.Most people will not have processors with good performance per core because i7/i9 and R7/R9 have it, while most use i3/i5 and R3/R5 where there are 8 or more threads.We have CPU performance, but the game doesn't use it.

[HB_H4wk]

The Fun Pimps don't want players with good taste, they want players that taste good.

[mstdv inc]

This game belongs to TFP, and it's up to them to decide how it will work.If they say there won't be any more kinds of zombies, I won't be too upset because zombies - not the only thing that attracts in this game.In addition to zombies, we have a completely destructible world, research, construction, crafting, quests, communication with the merchant.We are waiting for a storyline and bandits.After the bandits appear, the value of zombies for me will become even lower.From the main enemy, they will turn into one of the enemies.Despite the fact that the game is called 7 days to die, this implies a horde meeting every 7 days.But I'm glad that the game has become much more than just fighting hordes of zombies.
Ignoring the opinions of evil "veterans" of the game is a good tactic.If I get tired of this game, I'll just stop playing it.I'm not going to come to the forum and ask to do as I want, because I've already played enough and I'm bored.This game is not only made for me, I understand that.

[Crypted]

When it comes to the memory card, I'm sure they can get a bigger one so TFP can do a lot more. But I'm not 100% sure on how it all works. 

Edited April 21, 2023 by Crypted (see edit history)

[Roland]

They should make it so that all the zombies you ever see are the burnt zombie model--except rarely you'll get one of the other models. So in a horde of 30 zombies 28 burnt zombies, a boe, and a tom clark.

 

[Crypted]

Just now, Roland said:

They should make it so that all the zombies you ever see are the burnt zombie model--except rarely you'll get one of the other models. So in a horde of 30 zombies 28 burnt zombies, a boe, and a tom clark.

 

In my opinion what purpose does that serve?

[Roland]

5 minutes ago, Crypted said:

In my opinion what purpose does that serve?

 

In my opinion what do you think?

[Jugginator]

2 hours ago, Matt115 said:

more and more people have 16 GB of ram. So this allow for much more.

 

Vram is the problem, not system ram, for that case

 

2 hours ago, Laz Man said:

 

Everyone has their level of immersion / standards.  For me, If I saw 5 boe's with different clothing on running at me, at first it would feel like different zombies until you eventually realize its the same zombie and makes you wish for different faces.....then different body sizes......then.....different zombies all together.  😅

 

So instead of wasting time with half measures, go all in with 100% unique zombies with awesome characteristics. 😎

 

Yep, this precisely. Some people would like repeated skins with slightly different things on them others will be like "oh boy a zombie boe with a yellow shirt... and one with a black shirt.. oh hey that one has more dirt on his face... again..."

 

Repetitive is repetitive, unless we have a few thousand zombie models the same people would always complain about repeating zombies.

[Crypted]

6 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

In my opinion what do you think?

In my opinion what do you think? 

[saoron666]

1 hour ago, Jost Amman said:

I see a lot of people here focusing on one topic at a time and then hammering it to death.

Last time it was the "unacceptable" water change. Before that it was Bandits not coming in A21.

Now it's the low amount of zombie variations.

 

All this bantering is from the player perspective, so most people don't understand that @madmole is trying to make us understand that their decisions are not as straightforward as we think, and that each choice is made taking into account many levels of interest and weighing them up. Also, I'd suggest to everyone to take a step back and look at all this in perspective. We will get a great game in the end, I'm sure of it, and I can tell because, all in all, 7D2D is already a great game in alpha. 

If you step back and look at all the complaints and demands you will understand that Yes, there is something missing!

all the improvements and touchups doesnt change the fact that we are looking for something new! something different..

people do not want water change, what will that do to my gameplay? in first hour or another few hundred hours?

 

you do not encounter water in every mission or POI, but you do encounter zombies..

 

[RipClaw]

19 minutes ago, Roland said:

They should make it so that all the zombies you ever see are the burnt zombie model--except rarely you'll get one of the other models. So in a horde of 30 zombies 28 burnt zombies, a boe, and a tom clark.

Wasn't there once the idea that the horde zombies should be very uniform completely covered with mud and blood ?

[saoron666]

10 minutes ago, Jugginator said:

 

Vram is the problem, not system ram, for that case

 

 

Yep, this precisely. Some people would like repeated skins with slightly different things on them others will be like "oh boy a zombie boe with a yellow shirt... and one with a black shirt.. oh hey that one has more dirt on his face... again..."

 

Repetitive is repetitive, unless we have a few thousand zombie models the same people would always complain about repeating zombies.

a slight modification in every zombie will make a change by the time they make new zombies and behaviors .

you repaint your room and see what difference it makes to your eyes!

 

move your desk and your bed and remodel your room with same furniture's and see the difference and new perspective to your senses!

 

 

[Roland]

2 minutes ago, RipClaw said:

Wasn't there once the idea that the horde zombies should be very uniform completely covered with mud and blood ?

 

Yes. But it never went past the idea phase.  I really like the burnt zombie model for an undead zombie model and wouldn't mind replacing most of the models in the game with that model and having the rest be rare sightings as if the nukes burnt everyone to a crisp but didn't kill them but making them look basically the same. But then there would be some exceptions that were perhaps more recently turned people. Seems like that would be a pretty easy modlet to make...maybe.

[saoron666]

25 minutes ago, Roland said:

They should make it so that all the zombies you ever see are the burnt zombie model--except rarely you'll get one of the other models. So in a horde of 30 zombies 28 burnt zombies, a boe, and a tom clark.

 

 

i wouldn't imagine burnt zombies in snow area..

 

a few slight changes to the current zombies(color, textures, skin tone , idk some easy touchups) would do just fine until 1 day they add new zombies and behaviors.

like i mentioned before on another post, change the color of the same bedroom you sitting in without rearranging your decor or removing or adding anything and see the difference its makes to your eyes and senses..

 

 

[Crypted]

4 minutes ago, Roland said:

Yes. But it never went past the idea phase.  I really like the burnt zombie model for an undead zombie model and wouldn't mind replacing most of the models in the game with that model and having the rest be rare sightings as if the nukes burnt everyone to a crisp but didn't kill them but making them look basically the same. But then there would be some exceptions that were perhaps more recently turned people. Seems like that would be a pretty easy modlet to make...maybe.

The burnt zombie model only makes sense in the burnt forest biome, so what about the other biomes. 

[Roland]

Just now, Crypted said:

The burnt zombie model only makes sense in the burnt forest biome, so what about the other biomes. 

 

4 minutes ago, saoron666 said:

i wouldn't imagine burnt zombies in snow area..

 

Why? You can't be burnt to a crisp by a nuclear blast if you are standing in snow? If you get burnt to a crisp and become a zombie and then it snows where you are would you feel compelled to get out of there because it doesn't fit?

 

I say burnt zombie because it is generic and has recognizable features destroyed. I'd be just as happy with a mud covered deteriorated model that could serve as the main zombie model for 90% of sightings. Then all the current models could be special infected with various abilities and only sighted rarely so you hopefully wouldn't get two of the same within a single horde.

 

Just goes to show that different people have different sensibilities.

[saoron666]

4 minutes ago, Roland said:

 

 

Why? You can't be burnt to a crisp by a nuclear blast if you are standing in snow? If you get burnt to a crisp and become a zombie and then it snows where you are would you feel compelled to get out of there because it doesn't fit?

 

I say burnt zombie because it is generic and has recognizable features destroyed. I'd be just as happy with a mud covered deteriorated model that could serve as the main zombie model for 90% of sightings. Then all the current models could be special infected with various abilities and only sighted rarely so you hopefully wouldn't get two of the same within a single horde.

 

Just goes to show that different people have different sensibilities.

what i meant from i wouldn't imagine it in the snow area, meaning that the snow area has to also look like it got hit by a nuke!

not a beautiful sunny day in the snowy area with everything intact and burnt zombies all over the place..

 

the zombies or the area must balance each other as well.

 

but yes, your idea is good

 

[Fanatical_Meat]

45 minutes ago, Jugginator said:

 

Vram is the problem, not system ram, for that case

 

 

Yep, this precisely. Some people would like repeated skins with slightly different things on them others will be like "oh boy a zombie boe with a yellow shirt... and one with a black shirt.. oh hey that one has more dirt on his face... again..."

 

Repetitive is repetitive, unless we have a few thousand zombie models the same people would always complain about repeating zombies.

Okay let’s trim the game down to one zombie model, one bandit model and one player model.

[Blitz0309]

2 hours ago, saoron666 said:

if a fan as over 500 hrs of gameplay dont you think he wouldn't spend 10$,20$ etc. to get that ?

he will 100%.

500 hours?  Those are rookie numbers 😛 (currently at 2600+... ).

 

Granted my whole cycle is to play the new alpha... then when the mods get caught up run through various ones (preferably without reading about them).  Big fan of Darkness falls, though currently playing Crystal Hell.  Some of the tweaks/changes the mods make bring life into the game... for instance in Crystal hell... buildings can burn.

 

@madmole Another idea to alter zombie diversity could also be size scaling.  If you made the zombies come in differing scales as well as different clothing it would make a horde look a lot more unique and in theory not require a lot of effort.  I know you guys don't want to do zombie children, just make zombies spawn between 60%-110% normal scale, it would make a group walking look a bit more random. (Totally not a suggestion stolen from Crystal Hell or anything >.> <.< -.-;;)

 

The amount some mods do with this game is amazing... goofy, and sometimes awful.  But each mod is a different person's take on what they want the game to be.  We're not going to all agree, we just have to trust that the pimps take pride in this game and are doing their best work.  And from playing for close to a decade or so.. i have faith they will continue to make a great game.

[HB_H4wk]

There are a few working Mods that add different zombies to satisfy the want for different or new zombies, while The Fun Pimps work on the game. Simply add the mod and BAM!

Edited April 21, 2023 by HB_H4wk
sorry for the picture spamming (see edit history)