What the Hell? Is This For Real? DayZ Standalone

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Oh god this looks amazing. Must get at some point.

 

[Zhukov]

http://cheezburger.com/147717?ref=whatspopular

What did I just read? Is this actual stuff you can do in the game, or are those quotes even real. If they are, are they just bsing? If that stuff is possible, can anyone show me a clip of it happening?

I don't have a clip, but yeah, it's all technically possible.

A lot of those examples are rather unlikely though. In order to cuff someone and/or force feed them they have to submit to it. Most players would run or fight back even if they knew they had no chance of surviving.

 

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Dammit, this makes me want it... And I was trying not to spend.

I loved the mod. I would roam about with my brother, which created an interesting dynamic. He was the paranoid type and I leaned more towards being trusting(I was less experienced). It made for some funny conversations in teamspeak and for some funny sequences of events in the game.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

Sounds amazing when you here these rare stories from other players, I've been wandering around the barren wasteland with the really awkward controls implemented for K+M while trying to find any food and liquids. Unfortunately so far into Stand alone I have found next to no food or liquids which always meant death during 10-15 mins of being hungry/thirsty and the lack of any weapon let alone animals to kill really downplays the overall feelings I had for this game.

I'm well aware it's Alpha, but I'm also well aware the mod has been around since 2012 and it's now 2014 so I'm not particularly fond of awkward controls and waiting forever for the game to come to a universally accepted playable state.

In the meantime I'll most likely focus my attention to previous Zombie games as well as shift some attention to SOD since that seems like a more viable choice for my interests.

 

[SJXarg]

while trying to find any food and liquids. Unfortunately so far into Stand alone I have found next to no food or liquids which always meant death during 10-15 mins of being hungry/thirsty and the lack of any weapon

Are you searching every building? Playing on a high population server? Staying on the coast? I personally don't have issues finding food or liquid unless it's a high pop server that hasn't restarted recently, which causes the coastal cities to empty out as the fresh spawns loot them. Head inland a bit, and if you find a water well in a city, you can drink from it without needing a cup or canteen as a middleman, as thirst is much more dangerous than hunger a water well at spawn is a life-saver.

let alone animals to kill really downplays the overall feelings I had for this game.

Hunting isn't currently in, sadly, so living off the land isn't feasible yet.

I'm well aware it's Alpha, but I'm also well aware the mod has been around since 2012 and it's now 2014 so I'm not particularly fond of awkward controls and waiting forever for the game to come to a universally accepted playable state.

In the meantime I'll most likely focus my attention to previous Zombie games as well as shift some attention to SOD since that seems like a more viable choice for my interests.

Awkward controls? Not sure I follow you on that one. Game taking forever to reach universally accepted playable state? I don't know if you'd been following the devblogs and posts on reddit and twitter pre-release, but all the guns and vehicles were pulled out to be redone (if you've had an M4A1 yet, and been able to find attachments and use them, I think you'd agree pulling all the unconfigurable preconfigured Arma2 guns out to redo them like the M4 has been done is a good idea). Not sure why hunting isn't in yet, maybe they're redoing animal models or AI (I know there is a deer in the works). Finally, you knew it was alpha and were warned at least on the store page before you bought.. but!

If you're after other zombie games, No More Room in Hell and Project Zomboid are pretty awesome, check them out if you haven't already

 

[SJXarg]

I'm not sure what the question is? If you draw direct comparisons, killing vs healing, giving items vs stealing items, what are you looking for in terms of "being good", given there aren't really that many ways to also "be bad" to people?

You can meet new people to play with and make new friends, I've met some people in DayZ I now play with on a semi regular basis and talk to out of game, maybe I'm just misunderstanding the question?

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

DayZ has earned my interest time and time again for all the stories I hear coming out of it, and how players behave, but now that its standalone has gone into its alpha, and we're hearing about things like force-feeding and requests for rape and torture to be implemented, I do have a question that I haven't come across.

What "good" things can a player do? I mean, you can be a good samaritan, dropping items, or healing others, but what else besides that? For all the bandits and checkpoints and senseless murder I've heard of, I've never heard of a band of roving good samaritans in DayZ. I'm trying to word this in a way that doesn't come off wrong, but is there a way somebody can be good towards another player, not including giving them items, healing them, and just not killing them when you could have? None of those things are by any means minuscule actions, and I don't mean to minimize those actions, but it seems like the game is built in a way that regardless of whether playing as a "good" person is feasible or not, there's no real option to. Of course, this could just be me being ignorant of things that are out there that I've missed, but I haven't seen much to indicate that anything like that is coming, and I feel that by limiting the good a player or a group of players can do they're limiting off the unique experiences I hear about all the time.

Well what exactly do you mean when you say "playing as a good person?" What kind of things would make a person "good" in a game? Since you're completely discounting the dropping of items, healing, and protecting other players I'd like to know exactly what kind of mechanics or actions would make a player "good" in your eyes.

 

[SJXarg]

To further add to that, I don't really see rape at least, being implemented, I don't see anything that can be gained from it from a gameplay or authenticity perspective (other than "because you can"), and it would mean a bunch of unnecessary controversy, since in a game like DayZ that doesn't come with an on-rails storyline there wouldn't be anyway to justify rape in a way that would offset the shitstorm that including it would generate. I figure they're much more likely to implement alcohol and drug usage or forced euthanasia (already somewhat in by deliberately giving people the wrong blood type/disinfectant) or additional means of suicide, than they are to implement rape, torture or other mechanics of questionable gameplay value.

 

[Muspelheim]

Being an ArmA 2 fan but not particularly interested in DayZ has been a bit like having your club house suddenly filled with people from an entirely different club. One that is mainly interested in a particular snooker table inside the club, rather than the club as a whole. And they've been complaining about the doilies and whatnot the entire stay through.

I'm very pleased that it's gone beyond a mod, and both can get what they want. Hell, it's even starting to look very interesting on its own merits.

But then again, it seems to be a bit too much pointless cruelty at the moment. Even worse when people start suggesting even more opportunities to be cruel without consequence. I'm definately waiting until there is more incentive to work together. As it stands now and for the foreseeable future, it seems, unless I bring five friends, I'll end up being some internet psycopath's plaything for hours on end.

Something more constructive needs to be added, but I'm sure the devs know that, themselves. We've got the tribes, we've got the desperation. Now we need them to be put at work.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Well what exactly do you mean when you say "playing as a good person?" What kind of things would make a person "good" in a game? Since you're completely discounting the dropping of items, healing, and protecting other players I'd like to know exactly what kind of mechanics or actions would make a player "good" in your eyes.

Like I said, I'm not trying to discount those things or minimize their meaning, but it seems by far that people are more inclined towards gameplay strategies that are directly harmful to players. There's checkpoints and roaming death squads, people getting a jolly out of shooting anybody that roams within half a mile of them with their scoped rifle, but I don't hear much about players uniting to help other players. Additionally, gameplay aspects seem to focus much more on potential harm to other players than potential cooperation - you can have death marches and fore-feed people, but can you create a viable, self-sufficient community within the gameplay, or will that be potentially possible at some point in the future of the game?

I'm not sure what the question is? If you draw direct comparisons, killing vs healing, giving items vs stealing items, what are you looking for in terms of "being good", given there aren't really that many ways to also "be bad" to people?

You can meet new people to play with and make new friends, I've met some people in DayZ I now play with on a semi regular basis and talk to out of game, maybe I'm just misunderstanding the question?

From what I've heard about the game, force-feeding people poison, having a roaming death squad, or making people you've captured alive your slave and essentially a human shield seem to severely outnumber the good samaritans.

To both posters, I hear often about all the stories about people acting in a way that is negative towards other - lots of murder and borderline torture and so-on. I don't hear much about what good a player can do to aid others other than drop items in their inventory. That could be used for trading, but I never hear any stories about people trading with each other. It just seems like that the gameplay is built in a way that, viability of it aside, its just difficult to do good unto another player, and limiting the good a player can do for another seems like a way of unintentionally limiting the experience. Simply put, it seems Player #1, who tries to play in a way that positively affects other players, is much much more limited in their potential gameplay actions than Player #2, who plays in a way that detrimental to others is, who can do things like hunt other players, set traps, toy with their lives, etc.

You still haven't explained what you mean by saying that there should be mechanics that allow players to play in ways that positively affect others.

It's a zombie survival game, the greatest possible way to positively affect another person is to team up with them and help them to stay alive. When you hear about checkpoints, death squads, etc. that's people who have teamed up together for their mutual benefit, since a team is much more difficult to rob and kill than a lone survivor. So really, any story where you hear about a group robbing people and force-feeding them poison has two sides to it. On the one hand those people are playing in a way that's detrimental to people outside of their group, but on the other hand they're playing in a way that greatly helps the people within their group since it helps give them access to supplies while protecting them from attack by both zombies and other players.

The emergent gameplay is a gray area. There isn't really good or bad, it all depends on whether or not you're on the receiving end of the potential benefits. What you see as robbing and killing people they see as procuring supplies to extend the lives of everyone within their group. What you see as checkpoints they see as locking down an safe area for themselves where they won't get killed immediately when they spawn in.

 

[SJXarg]

There are a couple of wandering medic groups who will roam the servers looking for people to heal and can be asked for help over the forums, the forums constantly have threads from new people looking for people to join, or existing groups looking for additional people to do things with. People seek others out on the forums for ingame trades.

Right now the problem with the standalone is a lot of the stuff isn't in, like hunting, base building (long term team stuff), vehicles (short term team stuff, taxi services, creepy old men taking people out into the woods to "put out or get out" people), not enough weapons or attachments to create a viable trading economy or system, and I believe that perhaps a bit too much food spawns (water is easy if you know where a couple of taps are, and have 1+ storage containers like water bottles or canteens) so food is only a desired item for people who've just joined the game or respawned and don't have any, as people who are already setup are either finding lots in the towns that aren't in the way of the derpwave, or are taking it off people they've shot.

Alpha is alpha though, and if you were looking for positive teamwork experiences, I would go as far as to say the mods-of-the-mod actually offer a better and broader experience range at this time, the standalone game just doesn't have the systems in place yet.

 

[votemarvel]

I think the game would just irritate me.

Sounds like a great idea but you just know that high level players are going to turn griefer and attack new players in order to keep their own excitement up.

 

[SJXarg]

All of which is 1 pistol shot away from a total situational reversal... or quick couple of solid hits from a fire axe... there's already a bunch of videos on Youtube where a group of people with guns try to rob people, who just YOLOrush them with an axe and kill all of them. Even the people who sit on sniper hill with Mosin Nagants are regularly bested by a new spawn with an axe who hears them, and flanks appropriately. On some servers there are even entire subgroups of people who exist purely to murder bandits.

Check back on the game in half a year if the current state of it doesn't interest you, hopefully a lot more content (in the form of items) has been added and there will be a bunch more things to do (more crafting would be great, or tents or a bicycle or whatever). Right now the game isn't up to the content standard of the mod, and most of my playtime is wandering the map looking for environment bugs to report to the team.


Hm captcha of give or take.... give them nothing, take from them everything.

 

[Chessrook44]

Surprisingly, the main stories I remember having didn't involve any treachery or evil, from when I played the mod ages ago.

First story, I was running from a bunch of zombies. I heard gunshots, and realizing I had little choice in the matter, ran TOWARDS them. In my mind, I'd either run away from them and still be running from the zombies, run towards the shots and some of the zombies would peel off towards the shooter, the shooter would be helpful and kill the zombies, or the shooter would kill me and get the zombies on himself anyway. I ran by screaming "Zombies behind me! Run!" He ran WITH me, and led me to a dock, explaining there was a bug at the time where zombies would not actually go ONTO the dock. The two of us huddled there for a bit and talked, him revealing he was down to his last few bullets. The two of us then planned to head to one of the big cities to get some medical supplies. He led me there and taught me a few things as he did, and all honesty things went well for the time I spent with him.

Second story, I saw what looked like a tower on top of a hill. Curious, I headed up there to see what I could find. As I arrived, I heard the telltale buzzing of flies. And then I found the bodies... four or five dead survivors, all full of ammo, food, and other gear. And there were no zombie corpses around them. Or living zombies. I looked through the tower, tense out of my mind and wondering when the sniper shot would hit me. All the loot in the tower was still there. Eventually I finished searching and ran from the tower as fast as I could, terrified and thankful that I had managed to escape from nothing. Nothing Is Scarier indeed...

Third story, I had just escaped from a horde of zombies... barely. My vision was black and white and I was near death, and one of my legs was broken, but I wasn't bleeding. Desperate, I called out for help on voice... and someone heard me. I crawled towards a nearby barn or hangar... something like that, and someone game and found me. Despite the risk that he might shoot me, he actually surprised me by not only giving me something to fix my leg and giving me a blood transfusion to full health, but he also dropped a bag and said "Take everything you need".... a bag that contained a map, GPS, Compass, Night Vision Goggles, food, beverages, anything I could need. I thanked him profusely, and he simply left the bag there and logged off. An angel from heaven there.

Unfortunately I quit playing not long after, as at one point while I was kited out in all that gear, the server suddenly ported EVERYONE into an arena, stripped them of their gear, and had them fight to the death with whatever guns they could find. I ended up on the beach with nothing afterwards.

Dying to a sniper or to zombies or stupidity, yeah, fine, I can deal with that. Dealing to THAT kind of cheapness soured me on the game. Now that it's standalone, I may play it again.