Future of this game?

[Roland]

On 6/29/2022 at 3:05 PM, Apocalyptical Survivor said:

My wife and I just recently started playing 7 Days to Die, and we're really enjoying it. We're now up to Day 77, just got through a rough horde night, but base survived easily and we made it through the other side. 

 

This game is not only early access, it's in "alpha" stage. And yet it's one of the most complete, well-polished early access games I've ever played. I've encountered almost no bugs, everything I've used to date works perfectly, and there is so much to do, so much I've yet to see (we just discovered a desert biome), it's astonishing how much this game has to offer, and how fun it is.

 

So why is it still in "alpha"? What else is coming? I can see that there needs to be some compelling endgame content, always the biggest challenge in any game with this much structured progression. Is there  a development roadmap somewhere I can consult to see what's coming? 

 

All I can say is, if this game truly is in alpha stage and there's that much more to come, I'm deliriously excited for its future. But part of me thinks that this could be that the developers are just wary of making a "game complete" commitment and everything that brings with it. Reviews, critiques, warranties, etc., when they can just instead sit back and just keep adding stuff whenever they feel like it, without pressure (since it appears their early access is selling well as is).

 

What's actually going on, anyone know?

 

 

One huge piece of advice I feel I should mention is to treat everything about the game as potentially temporary and subject to change. Don’t get too attached to how things are right now in A20. If you assume that some of the things you like about the game right now might be changed in the next update then instead of being devastated to the point of raging and possibly shelving the game, you’ll adapt and while you might feel some disappointment and loss over that changed feature, some part of will have expected it and after trying the new way you may even find you like and prefer and understand the change. 
 

There will be some who treat A20 as if it is the final version and they may become quite angry when A21 comes out— heck, some of them are already angry just reading about them. 

[pApA^LeGBa]

3 hours ago, Matt115 said:

Well this is not good idea - 20 FPS is good enough to play. You can't show "FPS" on screen while you can show buildings on steam right? Well another option is just increase min requirements to be sure that there will be 20 FPS 

 

I have seen people with good PC´s complaining about performance when downtown. If you can´t make it run smooth on a good new system, it might be better to just rework it. And it´s not like you said in just one spot as in lotr war, as you go to downtown pretty often usually. 

 

But it´s a quite new feature so there is hope. Now we all can only wish that there is also hope for having way more enemies. Wich is the most lacking part of the game that is about a zombie apocalypse. Especially downtown with things like subway stations and office buildings we should be flooded with zombies. Wich we can´t have right now without serious lags.

[Rotor]

To the zombie population point, as a side note, it does appear quite desolate at times.  However, based on the beginning "story" is does not appear that we are the beginning of the apocalypse.  I guess depending on years passed, maybe the population has been thinned out? :).  I did watch  few play movies on Proj Zboid and man is like ants to a drop of honey when those hordes come out for you hehe.

[pApA^LeGBa]

Yeah, Project Zomboid does flood you with zombies. Basically everywhere you go. Sadly it´s too harsh for many people to play, and none of my friends really wanna play it anymore. But we can´t expect that many zombies ever in 7 days, that´s not gonna happen. But a bit more would be nice.

 

And ofc you can explain the lack of enemies with a story. That doesn´t change that the game feels empty though. Even with a story reason behind it, it still feels it´s lacking a crucial part.

Edited July 1, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Rotor]

19 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Yeah, Project Zomboid does flood you with zombies. Basically everywhere you go. Sadly it´s too harsh for many people to play, and none of my friends really wanna play it anymore. But we can´t expect that many zombies ever in 7 days, that´s not gonna happen. But a bit more would be nice.

 

And ofc you can explain the lack of enemies with a story. That doesn´t change that the game feels empty though. Even with a story reason behind it, it still feels it´s lacking a crucial part.

 

But, but...you are all alone and Jen doesnt want to put out so the prospects of procreation are slim.  

 

You are right, at least in Fallout 1 and 2 there was the prospect of expanding the human race :).

[Matt115]

1 hour ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

I have seen people with good PC´s complaining about performance when downtown. If you can´t make it run smooth on a good new system, it might be better to just rework it. And it´s not like you said in just one spot as in lotr war, as you go to downtown pretty often usually. 

 

But it´s a quite new feature so there is hope. Now we all can only wish that there is also hope for having way more enemies. Wich is the most lacking part of the game that is about a zombie apocalypse. Especially downtown with things like subway stations and office buildings we should be flooded with zombies. Wich we can´t have right now without serious lags.

This was 90% of map -  only exist and boss arena don't have this issue. Well  i think it cannot be rework because if you will have just small number of POi it will be hard to called this downtown or if number of POI will be low by this. I agree about zombie number - well i think that they just focus too much on everything else that zombies. number of zombie models is low, number of zombie is small. I think this should be piority from begining and then everything else should be "under" . Because we have tons of mechanics POI's etc but in zombie game there is lack of zombies.

52 minutes ago, Rotor said:

To the zombie population point, as a side note, it does appear quite desolate at times.  However, based on the beginning "story" is does not appear that we are the beginning of the apocalypse.  I guess depending on years passed, maybe the population has been thinned out? :).  I did watch  few play movies on Proj Zboid and man is like ants to a drop of honey when those hordes come out for you hehe.

So this would be done in NMRIH2 style - fresh zombie, normal zombie and decyed zombie - so you could have a lot zombie but weak  ones - this could let to make much more zombie without making game more difficulty. And hm.. zombie population depends on time - probably we are 10-15 years after zombie outbreak so number number should be probably still very big. 

44 minutes ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

Yeah, Project Zomboid does flood you with zombies. Basically everywhere you go. Sadly it´s too harsh for many people to play, and none of my friends really wanna play it anymore. But we can´t expect that many zombies ever in 7 days, that´s not gonna happen. But a bit more would be nice.

 

And ofc you can explain the lack of enemies with a story. That doesn´t change that the game feels empty though. Even with a story reason behind it, it still feels it´s lacking a crucial part.

If i good remember there is now option to choose how many zombie should be on map in PZ. 

 

Still lack of zombie should be "fulfied" with big number of zombie corpses everywhere. But this that's why i'm so frustrated about 7dtd - because this is game about everything except zombies-  there is 11 normal zombie models  , 8 tought , 8 special and 3 animal zombies  - 30 zombie types - this could be good in AA cheap game in 2005  but now?  Ark  +-250  creature types + diffrent eq of them , conan +-150 , contagion probably have 30 zombie variants, NMRIH1 +- 40 etc so i''m shocked that people don't complain about that

 

24 minutes ago, Rotor said:

 

But, but...you are all alone and Jen doesnt want to put out so the prospects of procreation are slim.  

 

You are right, at least in Fallout 1 and 2 there was the prospect of expanding the human race :).

Well - horizon zero dawn instead robots zombies but with 7dtd gameplay could be very fun. But people would complain about zombie teenagers😜

[pApA^LeGBa]

If downtown stays like it is, i rather don´t have a downtown area at all. It´s not even the FPS drops, it´s that it is a stuttering lag wich makes it so bad. If they can´t fix that i hope they rework towns again. Releasing it with a stuttering lag like this is a no go tbh. I do like the downtown area, it´s really looking good and feels like a real city compared to what we had before, but i don´t want it in the game if it behaves like it does now @Matt115

 

I don´t even mind that we have just a few zombie types. Sure more would be nice, but i really care more about the overall number of enemies. Right now we have 8 per chunk. we need at least 16 per chunk.

 

And yeah, you can choose how many zombies you have on the map in PZ, but the lowest setting is still really a lot of them.

Edited July 1, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Laz Man]

Zombie numbers in games is always an interesting discussion point.  How much is enough?  How much is too much?  What gameplay and/or technical sacrifices /costs are made with increasing count by x?

 

I have played all sorts of modes/mods that change zombie counts, and I feel there is a very fine line between too little and too much which will also vary from player to player.

 

Too many zombies can easily turn into combat fatigue and tedium. 

 

Keep in mind, newer players will probably appreciate the lulls between POIs and blood moons to rest, focus on skill review / loot / crafting / building.

 

I would be interested to hear what those who want more zombies think of the new feral sense mode and why.

[pApA^LeGBa]

41 minutes ago, Laz Man said:

Zombie numbers in games is always an interesting discussion point.  How much is enough?  How much is too much?  What gameplay and/or technical sacrifices /costs are made with increasing count by x?

 

I have played all sorts of modes/mods that change zombie counts, and I feel there is a very fine line between too little and too much which will also vary from player to player.

 

Too many zombies can easily turn into combat fatigue and tedium. 

 

Keep in mind, newer players will probably appreciate the lulls between POIs and blood moons to rest, focus on skill review / loot / crafting / building.

 

I would be interested to hear what those who want more zombies think of the new feral sense mode and why.

 

Feral sense isn´t an alternative to more zombies. I ofc tried it once it was available, but it´s not really helping. In fact it´s actually immersion breaking sometimes when they can sense you no matter what.

 

Ofc it differs from player to player, how many zombies are enough zombies. That´s why we need the slider back to adjust how many zombies will spawn. I sadly forgot who from the mod or dev team said it, but when it was removed and i complained about the removal,  i was told that it is for balancing purposes and will make a comeback at some point. 

 

Surely enough the balance on default right now can make things very spicy with more zombies on higher difficulties. But looking at the romero mod with 5x spawn, all of them walking no matter what and headshot only, i do prefer that very much over an empty world. It get´s spiced up with bigger more frequent wandering hordes aswell. Just the no bloodmoon isn´t my cup of tea but that is easily fixed. It´s harder than vanilla even with no fast zombies at all, at least for me.

 

In vanilla i would say it would be good to be able to adjust up to 3x spawn, i think that was the limit back then aswell. Maybe also reintroduce the option to lower the zombie count. Not sure if that would be used by people or not.

Edited July 1, 2022 by pApA^LeGBa (see edit history)

[Matt115]

2 hours ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

If downtown stays like it is, i rather don´t have a downtown area at all. It´s not even the FPS drops, it´s that it is a stuttering lag wich makes it so bad. If they can´t fix that i hope they rework towns again. Releasing it with a stuttering lag like this is a no go tbh. I do like the downtown area, it´s really looking good and feels like a real city compared to what we had before, but i don´t want it in the game if it behaves like it does now @Matt115

 

I don´t even mind that we have just a few zombie types. Sure more would be nice, but i really care more about the overall number of enemies. Right now we have 8 per chunk. we need at least 16 per chunk.

 

And yeah, you can choose how many zombies you have on the map in PZ, but the lowest setting is still really a lot of them.

Well i was thinking it just lose halve of fps - for me 20 fps is good enought to play but this is just old habit.  Well i hope it will be fixed. 

 

Honestly... i'm tired about zombie variants that's why i can't play in 7DTD anymore - when i see this same departed woman each other i feel done and empty.

Well more zombie would be good but if number of variants will be this same it will hurt even more.

 

1 hour ago, Laz Man said:

Zombie numbers in games is always an interesting discussion point.  How much is enough?  How much is too much?  What gameplay and/or technical sacrifices /costs are made with increasing count by x?

 

I have played all sorts of modes/mods that change zombie counts, and I feel there is a very fine line between too little and too much which will also vary from player to player.

 

Too many zombies can easily turn into combat fatigue and tedium. 

 

Keep in mind, newer players will probably appreciate the lulls between POIs and blood moons to rest, focus on skill review / loot / crafting / building.

 

I would be interested to hear what those who want more zombies think of the new feral sense mode and why.

Yes that's true about number of them but i think nobody will complain about more zombie variants.  If you make more zombie let say 2X  more you can reduce their HP for halve right? this will be similiar difficulty just diffrent experience. So even for newer players it could be easier to kill 10 "weak" zombie that kill 5 toughter.

 

So Feral mode is not solution in this situation. This is more asestetic that gameplay stuff.

 @Laz Man  For example - There is is evac center - probably there died a lot of people during outbreak. If there will be 10 feral zombies or 20 normal zombie diffuclty will be similiar but .... 10 zombie for such building is so small number right? Not only types of enemy count but number and how they looks like is important to.  If you see small lab you expect 3 docs and maybe 10 soldiers and maybe 20 civilian zombie and corpses. But when you get there you see 2 docs 3 soldiers and 3 civilians zombie. And models mean a lot - departed woman or infected survivor have this same thats but just model make big diffrence - suit guys zombie in office ,  zombie hobo on street ,  car mechanicin in workshop etc mean a lot at least for me.

 

 i'm tired about seeing this same zombie over and over - okay in diffrent games you can see this same enemy few times but

1. there is good explanation about that - ghost, demon, clones, bugs, mutants etc

2. variants are so high that even if you  find this same variant you will never notice this. 

 

So i wish i could comfortable play in 7dtd but i can't anymore. i know nobody will add more variants for 1 person only.  So maybe new cars mods are fun, maybe LBL can be soo fun but.... if i see this same zombie in this same house after just 10-15 minutes of playing i have just blockade.

 

So if you watch for pure gameplay point of view. - feral sense is good option to change gameplay. From aestetic point of view - this don't help too much

 

1 hour ago, pApA^LeGBa said:

 

Feral sense isn´t an alternative to more zombies. I ofc tried it once it was available, but it´s not really helping. In fact it´s actually immersion breaking sometimes when they can sense you no matter what.

 

Ofc it differs from player to player, how many zombies are enough zombies. That´s why we need the slider back to adjust how many zombies will spawn. I sadly forgot who from the mod or dev team said it, but when it was removed and i complained about the removal,  i was told that it is for balancing purposes and will make a comeback at some point. 

 

Surely enough the balance on default right now can make things very spicy with more zombies on higher difficulties. But looking at the romero mod with 5x spawn, all of them walking no matter what and headshot only, i do prefer that very much over an empty world. It get´s spiced up with bigger more frequent wandering hordes aswell. Just the no bloodmoon isn´t my cup of tea but that is easily fixed. It´s harder than vanilla even with no fast zombies at all, at least for me.

 

In vanilla i would say it would be good to be able to adjust up to 3x spawn, i think that was the limit back then aswell. Maybe also reintroduce the option to lower the zombie count. Not sure if that would be used by people or not.

Yep i agree. Well number of zombie in my opinion depends on location ( i mean by this wild and POI)- in forest 2 - 3 zombie for long time is good enough in small house 4 zombie is just perfect but for military base - 40 zombie should be optimal. So in some places number of zombie is too high - road but in cites too low. 

 

[JCrook1028]

15 hours ago, Matt115 said:

for me 20 fps is good enought to play

You're one of a VERY VERY small crowd on that thought

[Matt115]

7 minutes ago, JCrook1028 said:

You're one of a VERY VERY small crowd on that thought

Probably - i rly don't see diffrence between 30 and 60 FPS but but quality textures can be painful for me

[enkephalin07]

I think an endgame is overrated. I've played Dwarf Fortress (which remains perpetually in beta,) and there's no endgame planned, for Fortress or Adventurer modes, except what the player decides. Conan Exiles has an endgame that isn't satisfying, rewarding, or necessary.

 

That said, I would like a shot at this 'Duke' supposedly running the place. He hasn't come for his chips yet, but I want to be ready.

[Matt115]

5 minutes ago, enkephalin07 said:

I think an endgame is overrated. I've played Dwarf Fortress (which remains perpetually in beta,) and there's no endgame planned, for Fortress or Adventurer modes, except what the player decides. Conan Exiles has an endgame that isn't satisfying, rewarding, or necessary.

 

That said, I would like a shot at this 'Duke' supposedly running the place. He hasn't come for his chips yet, but I want to be ready.

Well this even shoudn't be endgame in 7dtd because well just survive is endless "mission"

[Apocalyptical Survivor]

Ok, a lot of great information in this thread, whether you consider it "roadmap" or "feature list". I just started this game at A20.5 (b) so I don't know any of the history, but I do know that A20 was a big drop. Did it require wiping old save files, or was there a conversion process and, more importantly, has there been any indication of whether A21 will require something similar? I honestly don't mind restarting, for me the journey is the reward, but I'd like to know just the same. Thanks.

 

I haven't enjoyed a game this much in a LONG time, I hope the future of this game is as fun as it's been so far.

[Rotor]

A20 is my first also.  The way I understand it all big numbers require a wipe.  So don't get to attached to that level 300 character :).

[JCrook1028]

21 hours ago, Apocalyptical Survivor said:

Ok, a lot of great information in this thread, whether you consider it "roadmap" or "feature list". I just started this game at A20.5 (b) so I don't know any of the history, but I do know that A20 was a big drop. Did it require wiping old save files, or was there a conversion process and, more importantly, has there been any indication of whether A21 will require something similar? I honestly don't mind restarting, for me the journey is the reward, but I'd like to know just the same. Thanks.

 

I haven't enjoyed a game this much in a LONG time, I hope the future of this game is as fun as it's been so far.

Yes. A21 will absolutely require a new game.

[Roland]

You would want to start over with A21 even if it were compatible so you could experience the new crafting feature. If you could import your high level character or just continue your save you would already be past most of the new gameplay that is coming. Plus you would already be more powerful than the bandits and so miss out on that struggle as well. 
 

Moot point though as A20 will not be compatible at all with A21. 

[Evil_Geoff]

11 minutes ago, Roland said:

You would want to start over with A21 even if it were compatible so you could experience the new crafting feature.

 💯👆

With 5K plus hours, I've had a new game and map every new (whole numbered) Alpha release.  A16 to A17,  A19 to A20, ooohhhhhh yeah.  New games.
Most of the .XX revisions don't require a new game, but some have.  On the servers I manage, though?  I tend to update or replace the map with every game revision.

 

[Apocalyptical Survivor]

That's fine, I look forward to starting a new map. Even with all the significant changes coming to crafting and skilling up, I will still have amassed enough information about gameplay that it will be fun to start anew with all the acquired knowledge. 

 

If they put a gun to your head and forced you to guess the most likely timeframe for the A21 drop, what would your answer be? 

[JCrook1028]

16 minutes ago, Apocalyptical Survivor said:

That's fine, I look forward to starting a new map. Even with all the significant changes coming to crafting and skilling up, I will still have amassed enough information about gameplay that it will be fun to start anew with all the acquired knowledge. 

 

If they put a gun to your head and forced you to guess the most likely timeframe for the A21 drop, what would your answer be? 

In time for the Christmas sale would be my guess.

[Syphon583]

4 hours ago, Apocalyptical Survivor said:

If they put a gun to your head and forced you to guess the most likely timeframe for the A21 drop, what would your answer be? 

They've been pretty open about their hope to drop A21 before the end of the year. That being said, delays can and will happen. A20 was supposed to drop in Oct 2021, but it wasn't until early December that it was released. Too many knuckleheads made a stink about it that TFP are hesitant to put target dates or even a target month.

 

A21 is shaping up to be another fairly large update, but they've also said they're willing to push features to a later release in order to get A21 out the door sooner rather than later.