Fortport

Another wonderful thing the devs need to consider, mhm.

Read my first, original post, please! That's exactly what I asked for, and I explained everything there.

That's a relief.. but, the sooner the better, y'know?

Unfortunately I made a similar post to this. You can see it here: http://theindiestone.com/forums/index.php/topic/11801-more-animation/

I noticed that a lot of the time, you never ever get hurt or need the medical skill if you're "lucky." I can play the whole game for days without getting any kind of injury, and it makes the medical update feel tame, underwhelming. So, let's throw in some more stuff that can hurt you, based on random chance! Maybe. Let's make it realistic though, so it's something you expect and are not infuriated by. You're a beginner at carpentry, and here you are trying to barricade windows. You've done two or three planks, and this is your first time. SUDDENLY, BAM, you smack your thumb with the hammer! It hurts a lot, and you need to take those painkillers you have, and get a bag of ice. Or, you're sawing planks when you realize you've got some really nasty blisters and sores. Preparing food when you cut your finger, due to your low cooking skill; and this is random mind you. How about hopping fences, when you're not really that nimble.. and get a tiny cut from the wire fence getting your ankle at the top. None of these things are extremely major, and you can keep going on in the middle of a chase without it killing you. But these things need to be tended to eventually, to get them to heal faster. Gives medical stuff a purpose, and a way to level up the skill. And hey, the more pain you get in? The more you learn, in that particular instance of using the skill in question. As it stands, it's so hard to be applicable that it may as well not even be there, you don't notice it or have a reason to use it. Lucky should help with these things, but they're simply uncommon as it is. Unlucky could make them worse, but still not as common.

Literally no corpses. No litter, rubble, or anything implying a catastrophy. Everything looks just fine outside, save for the zombies. It makes all the screaming you hear senseless. Heck, why not go the extra mile, and make certain places already barricaded and once inhabited by a survivor in the past? Give you just a tiny, tiny bit of loot you're looking for that survivors generally look for, that's super-rare and and hard to find elsewhere to the point of silliness. Like gas tanks for burning zombies' bodies. Ammunition. Shotguns and rifles. Not that these should be everywhere, but in some places it would add atmosphere and make you think.. "hey, someone used to live here. I wonder what happened to them." This could also lead up to stuff like diaries and etc.

Yeah, there are bath towels and stuff. When you use them to dry off from the rain, they get wet. And they never dry off, thus becoming totally useless.

That's silly. x D

I disagree with this point. I don't think that it's required for game makers to make a game as intuitive as possible. It's a good choice in many situations, but it shouldn't be a must in all. Tutorials are a staple working feature that do their job well enough. I couldn't imagine even trying to play Victoria 2 without going through the tutorials. This isn't a hack and slash easy-going game and I do think that tutorials, wiki and such are a part of it. I agree, and told my opinion wrong. What I mean to say, is that this is one of the things that should be intuitive. Everything else requiring a wiki is reasonable, but combat shouldn't be rocket science to figure out if you're charging an attack or not. And presently, it's kind of hard to guess without already knowing. It's simple, understanding it should be too.. so charging your hits, should be easy to tell. Think of it this way. You're playing an arcade game. There's punching, kicking, and blocking. Now what if kicking looked the same as punching, even though it were stronger? A newbie would just think they're punching, all the time, despite kicking every now and then. So they would think there's less moves, and therefore, less variety. Less technique and skill, more boring.

Here's my two cents. There's been my suggestion and talk about corpses, how often they wander, etc. Why not have it so that, over time, the zombies get more trained to the survivors' presence? Just a tiny bit, later on. They wake up out of their stupors faster, from the meal they're eating or the wall they're headbutting. They wake up to you faster, and are more like to investigate.

Excellent mate. Here's hoping they skim this forum, and see all these wonderful suggestions that we have in store.

These would be marvelous things for setting the mood, and also giving the zombies something to do; eat corpses! It would make you feel like you jump into an apocalypse, not a world that suddenly had all human life stripped away, and zombies thrown in. I want to walk outside, take a deep breath in.. smell the ashes, see some zombies munching on corpses, distracted.. sneak past 'em while stepping over bodies to check crashed cars for loot. Some windows could already be smashed, just a few, besides the ones NPCs break. More garbage could be littering the floors of buildings and stores, to give that looted/run down/closed look. Everything looks like it's still open and ready to go, even with erosion. Maybe over time, alongside erosion, buildings could get dirtier or start missing floor tiles. Worn out walls, etc.

All the more wonderful simulation stuff! GIMME MOAR. FEELS SO GOOD ON MAH BODEH.

Indeed. It would put the "apocalypse" back in "zombie apocalypse." I look outside, see zombies eating corpses, fighting over the scraps.. vomiting, or wrestling amongst themselves, and I'm a little more horrified. Even better if they have to stop for a second to get out of their stupor, compared to the "alert" position, like how they're currently standing. It's like they're always vigilant, when they really shouldn't be. They're unintelligent, and should be easily distracted; not standing watch 24/7.

Loving this idea. But I suggest cleaning these dirty rags with disinfectant, or bleach. I don't think water and soap would get rid of the zombie infection so easily, or.. y'know, protect you from the common cold at least. The above would make getting clean rags more difficult, and realistically acheivable, giving more purpose to bleach and medical supplies.

When I use a wet towel, and it basically becomes wet forever, never drying out.. I kinda just scratch my head and eventually throw it away for more space. Highly unrealistic and not practical.

Ideally. I'd love to have something like a kerosene heater in the game, or a alcohol stove . . . or actual wood stoves/fireplaces .etc Mhm! It adds just one more great mechanic to the game that sucks you in. Imagine coming home, shivering, to be greeted with toasty warmness and lights; all thanks to your fireplace you piled up on, inside, this afternoon. So the power goes out, and you still have the fireplace! Crackling ambience so your house doesn't feel completely lifeless and dead, as well. Wood stoves in homes, out in the country. Fireplaces for brick houses on the outskirts of an urban society. Stuff like that. Just like my sound suggestion, with buzzing lights and idle fridges. This is great.

These things are crucial! Gives zombies something to do outside, when you look out your window.. eating a corpse, or playing with their feet. A wonderful distraction, when stealth comes along.. and a great atmosphere booster.

Great suggestion! But, if we're going to add this.. why not add heaters, too? Make shelters do their job, and shelter against the temperatures.. especially if it has power and you're inhabiting it.

They won't though. Ideally, all tutorial aspects should be interactive and tell you what to do at the time you are doing it. Obviously that's not something that can happen overnight, and a lot of early access games leave that kind of stuff to last. Unfortunately, you can put the information there but a large amount of people aren't going to let a bit of text hold them up from their playing experience, and the few that do bother to look at it will probably skim it. The modern user isn't interested in game manuals and instruction text, they want to pick up and play so you need to teach them how to play while they are doing it. Absolutely. And this is why this suggestion is so important to me. You want to explain as much as you can without tutorials. If you need tutorials to explain everything, then your system isn't clear enough to normally understand, but only especially here since it's COMBAT. Which is kind of the main thing that should be simple to get, and it just isn't.

It's not that it's complex, it's that it's vague, sorry. People do not see the difference, or even know that spamming is less effective. Hence "wind-up" during that second which you wait, and all this other stuff to make it seem like it has more oomph, because most people can't tell. Apparently newbies everywhere are spam-clicking, getting frustrated, and blaming the game instead of themselves; this is bad. Things need to be clear to the player so that when they die it's their own fault or carelessness. If they die because of unclear mechanics, they will think they're playing an awful game, or that Project Zomboid's combat is terrible/underwhelming when it really isn't, at its core.. with the currently hidden charge attack. If you consider this suggestion though, and it's implemented.. the game will become that much less like an arcade beat-em-up to new players. They will understand that it "requires effort to puncture a zombie skull!" All without reading the guide, flaming on the forums, or debating with people. And that's how it should be, in my opinion.

So this whole post was basically pointless?

Yup! Great for beginners, just new meat/satisfaction for experts.

I guess this is more for after the game's finished, perhaps? Hm. Right now, it's really ambitious to attempt with what PZ has on its plate right now. And it's a big plate.

Why not both? Having more intensely violent sounds shows the player that it hurts a lot more, alongside the zombie flying away with a different animation. It's really voicing to the player what's going on without a text-box, and that's what I'm here for right now. It's what a newbie will understand, and it's what experts would love to see, in my opinion. The further we drift away from filling gauges and such, the better, since the devs obviously would've done that by now if they wanted it. Something like this might be right up their alley; just by using simple animation, you tell the player exactly what they can do without breaking them out of the game to read a pop-up. Save the pop-ups for beginner mode, right?