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Project Zomboid's biggest problem


Brex

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Let me preface this by saying that I love Project Zomboid, and I want to see it succeed. However, there's a major problem with the game that has been bothering me for a while, and I thought I'd address it in case nobody has already. It's not about the slow development time, or lack of NPCs or other features. 

 

It's about the endgame. 

 

Every video game needs some sort of objective. Rescue the princess, reach the end of the dungeon, fight the final boss. This encourages the player to keep going with the game and gives them a sense of accomplishment when they finally reach the end and finish the objective. 

 

Survival games have always suffered when it comes to the endgame. Some have objectives built around a story, some have certain challenges and milestones to unlock. But the main problem with these games is that most often, the only objective is to "survive". Failure to survive results in death. Okay, so at first that seems like a challenge. You gotta gather supplies, fight enemies, establish a base, etc. 

 

But what happens after that? When the map is exhausted of resources, when you've got an entirely self-sufficient base, when you've discovered every nook and cranny of the map and killed thousands of monsters/enemies? Do you just...stop? 

 

Project Zomboid suffers from this, but it goes a step further. It flat out tells you at the start of the game that you're going to die no matter what. So..what's the point of playing? The idea behind survival games is to, well, survive. There's no point in trying if we're just gonna die eventually. As stated above, when you've got your base up and running and have plenty of resources and nowhere left to explore, gameplay in PZ grinds to a halt. 

 

I don't like games that make me feel like all my effort was for nothing. That's why, for example, I like Fallout 3 more than New Vegas. In the former, I actually felt like I had accomplished something and made a difference in the world, whereas in the latter all my hard work and effort was negated by the fact that the wasteland would be inevitably destroyed shortly after the events of the game. But it's one thing to make your game experience meaningless; it's another thing entirely to flat-out tell you at the beginning of the game that everything you do isn't going to save you. 

 

So what happens is you literally start waiting to die. You've got your base, your crops, your water. You're safe. Now all you have to do is...what? Stand around? Take a walk in the woods? Die? 

 

There need to be two major improvements to the game in the future. One, your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind, to actually have made a difference in the hellish wasteland your world has become, like Rick Grimes or the Vault Dweller. Two, there needs to be more to do after the initial scavenge-and-fortify phase of gameplay. NPCs and quests would alleviate this for sure, but I think it can go a step further by adding secrets to the map (like scavengeable bunkers), easter eggs, or challenges that reward XP or other prizes. The ability to form factions and communities, as well as interact with other communities to form storylines, would also be great. 

 

All I'm looking for is a purpose to keep going in Project Zomboid. I hope the devs can get behind that idea. 

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I am totally on the same page, and I know that a lot of people here feel the same way. A while ago I made a thread that had the similar sentiments that sparked a small discussion on ways the developers could go about doing this. These things are very well received, so I would imagine they get more focus later on in the drawing board.

 

https://theindiestone.com/forums/index.php?/topic/15937-getting-serious-about-late-game-concerns-something-to-consider/

 

My arguments around this were more geared to giving players something larger to build by giving the players the means to prolong/create some of the finite things players will lose in the beginning of the game. I too would much like the ability to contribute to the world, and even something as simple as planting a tree or getting the power back on would help give players the agency to feel like they are rebuilding something. Regardless of how bleak you make the survival mode, you will never kill the player's ability to reach the endgame. This is definitely a concern as it's inevitable regardless of difficulty.

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As you said you're not supposed to survive a very long time in PZ, that's why if you do you should make a new game but harder. Make it so hard that each day passed is an accomplishment

 

PZ is a game about challenge, if you survive easily for months then you're not playing it how it is intended, at least that's how I see it.

In the settings I'm playing with right now there is no endgame, or there is one but I'm not good enough to achieve it. (sandbox preset down there) Zombies are so powerful, so many and the conditions so hard you can't even feel bored for one second. You constantly need to get rid off zombies, make your safehouse stronger, find food etc I even almost died of thirst because I couldn't get next to a building or a river to get water after leaving the area where I was established, because it was ovetaken by zombies. I had to live in this cabin for some days to recover from the last attack.

 

But yeah I understand that some people would find that more frustrating than fun and would want other objectives than just survive

 

Edit: I also attach to my comment my modified spawnpoints.lua file for Wespoint and fireofficer, to have the best experience of it, if it interests someone. It spawns you in some houses of the south east corner of the map

extreme.cfg

spawnpoints.lua

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10 hours ago, Brex said:

It's not about the slow development time, or lack of NPCs or other features. 

It's about the endgame. 

 

As far as i am concern, those are mutually exclusive, NPCs are probably going to be the end game itself, you have a base with crops, your farm and some survivors and overall feel pretty good about things, NPCs can come and raid you or you can have in-group drama or one of your NPCs plotting against you, all of this could leave you at the edge of your seat because you know shit could hit the fan any moment even if you stand around doing nothing.

 

10 hours ago, Brex said:

One, your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind.

 

Like i said, NPCs are your legacy, if everything they said is true about NPCs, then you could in theory die and leave your NPC community as a legacy (since after you died you can load up your world and enter it as a new character) and see what happens to your community and how they adapt. Also i do remember reading waaaay back then in the pre-alpha page that you could influence the outside world somehow but you would still be trapped inside the city, it would be interesting to see what the take is on that.

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9 hours ago, Axezombie said:

As you said you're not supposed to survive a very long time in PZ, that's why if you do you should make a new game but harder. Make it so hard that each day passed is an accomplishment

 

PZ is a game about challenge, if you survive easily for months then you're not playing it how it is intended, at least that's how I see it.

In the settings I'm playing with right now there is no endgame, or there is one but I'm not good enough to achieve it. (sandbox preset down there) Zombies are so powerful, so many and the conditions so hard you can't even feel bored for one second. You constantly need to get rid off zombies, make your safehouse stronger, find food etc I even almost died of thirst because I couldn't get next to a building or a river to get water after leaving the area where I was established, because it was ovetaken by zombies. I had to live in this cabin for some days to recover from the last attack.

 

But yeah I understand that some people would find that more frustrating than fun and would want other objectives than just survive

 

Edit: I also attach to my comment my modified spawnpoints.lua file for Wespoint and fireofficer, to have the best experience of it, if it interests someone. It spawns you in some houses of the south east corner of the map

extreme.cfg

spawnpoints.lua

This is certainly an interesting argument. Here are my 2 cents:

 

Frankly, a lot of people don't play Project Zomboid for a non-stop fight and would prefer to work towards a long game. Personally, I don't think PZ is a game about dying, or even a game about dying in style because it took longer. PZ is a game about surviving. For me, there has to be something bigger to work towards, even if it means having slightly more to do with your free time. You're right about some people finding this frustrating. But if I'm just dropping everything and running from place to place, how long does that take me before it becomes monotonous for gameplay? Some people like that kind of non-stop last-stand survival, but it's nothing PZ's current development track goes out of it's way to support since they keep adding more stuff to do during the down time.

 

I have the same conversation with my TRPG group about this all the time. Games are a lot more fun when there is something you can work on that isn't just going to get taken away from you. This is why taking away items is a deliberate track of game design that you don't see a lot of developers screw with unless there are ample means to rebuild and improve. 

 

I totally see and respect your opinion and I understand why there is a need to keep action, but abandoning the late-game is just not fair for those looking forward to a long-game to run out of replayability or rewards because of that. The inevitable siege can only occur so many times before a player just shuts down the game and doesn't boot it up again out of boredom through repetition, which this thread does a great job at explaining.

 

Content and extended playability are one of PZ's hard draws no matter how hard anyone believes the goal of the game is to die. The whole "this is how you died" thing is definitely ominous and takes player's egos down a notch when starting the game, but apart from that, it doesn't differ much from other games that both do what PZ does by having something to survive and rewards them by giving them options to work towards. As much as it's apples and oranges, Minecraft is a great example here for proof of concept. Keep giving your players reasons to continue what they are doing, and they will enjoy and continue doing it. But they have to want to do it. And I hate to say it, but if it was just the survival mode (and not multiplayer/ group play or sandbox) I would have probably left PZ collecting dust in my library a long time ago. And thank god (or the devs) that that isn't the case.

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4 minutes ago, Kim Jong Un said:

This is certainly an interesting argument. Here are my 2 cents:

 

Frankly, a lot of people don't play Project Zomboid for a non-stop fight and would prefer to work towards a long game. Personally, I don't think PZ is a game about dying, or even a game about dying in style because it took longer. PZ is a game about surviving. For me, there has to be something bigger to work towards, even if it means having slightly more to do with your free time. You're right about some people finding this frustrating. But if I'm just dropping everything and running from place to place, how long does that take me before it becomes monotonous for gameplay? Some people like that kind of non-stop last-stand survival, but it's nothing PZ's current development track goes out of it's way to support since they keep adding more stuff to do during the down time.

 

 

I think like that because I play PZ since the beginning, when it was impossible to survive forever because the map was very small (not even the half of March Ridge) and farming wasn't a thing so you had to survive with food you found in buildings, so the quote "This is how you died" was very accurate, but now you're right it's more about surviving/living, there is more content added for long term surviving.

 

To go back to the main subject, I think it's not only PZ's problem, this problem is in every survival sandbox games, if you don't create your own objectives then yes it'll be boring

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20 hours ago, Brex said:

There's no point in trying if we're just gonna die eventually.

 

Could say the same about real life. Whats the point in any of this since we're all going to die at the end? Using that logic, I might as well dig a hole, jump in, cover myself in dirt and wait for death's loving embrace. No, life is what you make it.

 

In any zombie scenario book, film, TV show etc, what else do survivors do apart from gather supplies, fight enemies, establish a base and bitch amongst themselves? We can already do the first 3 in PZ and I suspect the latter will be possible to some degree once NPCs are in. Some scenarios have the search for a cure but TIS have decided not to include that in their world. Perhaps they could add a quest to search for a cure that eventually turns out to be bogus. Some scenarios include an attempt to escape and perhaps if a story mode is introduced, that could be the end game, but for me, after you've escaped once, why bother replaying the game? The whole idea of open world games is exploration and that the player dictates the experience.

 

20 hours ago, Brex said:

your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind, to actually have made a difference in the hellish wasteland your world has become, like Rick Grimes

 

There are 2 types of story in video games, the designer's story i.e the plot, narrative, lore, that can't be changed by the player. Then there's the player's story, created through their actions, unique to each player and each play-through. This is what gaming is all about and is something PZ excels in. One player telling another about how their character went out like a badass or perhaps unfortunately, like a bitch. You ARE just another schmuck trying to outlive the apocalypse and ultimately, its the player's choices that lead to their demise. For example. I don't want some arbitrary horde rolling into town and screwing me over, like others have suggested in the past. When I die, I want it to be my fault and mine alone. I'm not against hordes, I just don't want them to be a consequence of RNG. They should form as naturally as possible, due to the actions taking place in the game world (either my own or NPCs once they are in).

 

I find your example of Rick Grimes building a legacy a bit daft as well. What has he actually done apart from repeatedly attempt to build a self-sufficient base for him and other survivors to live in? The same thing you're complaining about above.

 

You also mention adding secret scavengeable bunkers as a solution for something to do after the initial scavenge-and-fortify phase. That's not solving anything though, that's just prolonging the scavenging phase and adding extra nooks and crannys to find. Whether its a bunker or a Butlins, what you're describing is a map extension which we all know is on its way.

 

I wholeheartedly agree more needs to be added to stave off boredom but don't think what you've suggested is the answer, apart from Easter eggs and challenges that reward XP/prizes, but those things I presume are added into games once the core/main feature development is over and will more than likely be included in due course.  What the game needs is more lore. Things to read, people to speak to (I know they are coming), scripted events to stumble upon, things to keep you interested in the world and wanting to explore everywhere and leave no stone unturned. I have faith all this will come after NPCs are in and TIS can focus on other areas. (Creative mode FTW  ;-) ) 

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15 hours ago, Blasted_Taco said:

 

...

 

 

Like i said, NPCs are your legacy, if everything they said is true about NPCs, then you could in theory die and leave your NPC community as a legacy (since after you died you can load up your world and enter it as a new character) and see what happens to your community and how they adapt. Also i do remember reading waaaay back then in the pre-alpha page that you could influence the outside world somehow but you would still be trapped inside the city, it would be interesting to see what the take is on that.

 

Now this would be awesome!

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Putting aside the fact that this game is in early-access and "Story-mode" isn't complete as of yet, I have to drop my two cents here:

I believe, wholeheartedly ever since the multiplayer aspect was added in, that this game is "Sandbox Zombie Apocalypse" in the truest sense of the word. Let me explain:

Out there on the market you have various games with no clear "story" or "end goal" that find an immense success still. I'm, of course, talking about games like Minecraft and Garry's mod. The community *is* the one entity that creates a satisfying "end game". Even with the added Story Mode, most of the players won't be as interested to finish the main story, as much as they'd be interested in ability to create their own. Think about it:

How many of us have dreamt of that "Perfect TWD experience" that no other games so far have achieved? How many of us dreamed of playing a "28 days later" game that faithfully recreates majority of the aspects shown in the movie? Where else can you get a game so customizeable and dynamically tailored to *your* specific needs?

Minecraft lacked an end goal for years on end after official release, yet people, for some reason, still were satisfied with it, and had fun for hours on end. They all had their own small achievements in mind, be it building their own house, their town, or coming up with some complex-redstone powered factories that did something automatically.

This game, as far as I believe, is being built to last for generations with all the modding and community support the developers are known for. A game that, by itself, may grow boring at some point, but community content would keep it alive and kicking for years on end, until literally every possible zombie-outbreak scenario is discovered and played around to death.

EDIT 1: Another game that came to mind with the similar idea behind the game-mechanics is "Tabletop Simulator". Sure, in purest sense, it's a game, and it can be played by yourself or with friends. However, it also lacks an end game or anything that players have a craving to achieve. 

One of them is a game developed with a multiplayer/coop in mind, aimed to deliver as much tools to the community as humanly possible to provide endless hours of entertainment beyond discovering everything that the base game has to offer, and the other game is Tabletop Simulator.

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The biggest problem is the lack of threat throughout. The cars have completely demolished any challenge the game could possibly have had. The horde is too sensible to sounds of any kind and following them perfectly.

 

A horde is not a horde if it comes in basically single file as they are blocking themselves.

 

Everything other than the zeds is simply not a threat either. Foraging is insanely efficient with mushrooms easily dishing out 100+ soups/stirs/roasted, water being easily infinite and infections/sickness being of basically no concern.

 

2x2 cabbage literally shitting out tons of cabbages.

 

No matter where you look in this game you can tell, that balance is simply not cared for in any way and will be done "at the end" instead of balancing as they go properly.

 

Axe: Infinitely availible without much trouble, you can demolish hundreds of zeds in no time flat once you have the skills to go for it

Electrical: Infinite via zeds

Bandages: Infinite via zeds

Water: Easy infinite with a couple of barrels

Food: Mushrooms being completely bonkers, most grown food not even worth the dirt they are plotted on. Tons of non perishable food available aswell frog/rosehip etc etc. Areas refill insanely quick, but even if they did not the map is so huge that you will always be able to survive without any worries in the woods. Trapping rabbits can be basically mass produced with a small cabbage patch so ultimately you have so much food you don't even know what to do with.

Gas: Infinite via gas stations

Guns: Inefficient and only pistol ammo is infinite which isn't that great of a weapon compared to the axe.

Runspeed: Way too fast the zeds are literally helpless against your top speed.

Stamina: Sprinting/fighting all day no sweat.

Cars: Easily obtainable, impossible to keep in shape anyhow, fuel for them infinite and they are like tanks allowing you to kill 4000+ zeds without letting go of the gas in the thickest of hordes possible. Additionally those with siren allow you to easily clean out a whole city in one go without being bothersome by having to honk over and over.

Pharmacy: There is so much stuff, that there is basically no chance to be scratched so often that you could somehow run out. Shouldnt even be able to clean the bandages and make scratched way more common, but nullify the zombification chance on them. First aid largely doesn't exist in the game, because if you sincerely need it there is a high chance your character is already doomed. Why waste it away like that.

 

Safe building: The map is insanely vast + easy staircase abuses if you are into that. There is absolutely no trouble making something safe, the only thing insanely hard is to make something legit safe without insane upkeep because of how the walls work. It is a logistical nightmare, metalworking is so weak that it might aswell not even exist (those saying that the metal walls don't burn are wrong btw)

 

So when the game asks you to survive and there is no challenge whatsoever involved, then yeah you need endgame cause clearly it isn't a problem basically building a city during an apocalypse event.

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On 2/20/2019 at 7:44 PM, Brex said:

So what happens is you literally start waiting to die. You've got your base, your crops, your water. You're safe. Now all you have to do is...what? Stand around? Take a walk in the woods? Die? 

 

There need to be two major improvements to the game in the future. One, your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind, to actually have made a difference in the hellish wasteland your world has become, like Rick Grimes or the Vault Dweller. Two, there needs to be more to do after the initial scavenge-and-fortify phase of gameplay. NPCs and quests would alleviate this for sure, but I think it can go a step further by adding secrets to the map (like scavengeable bunkers), easter eggs, or challenges that reward XP or other prizes. The ability to form factions and communities, as well as interact with other communities to form storylines, would also be great. 

 

All I'm looking for is a purpose to keep going in Project Zomboid. I hope the devs can get behind that idea. 

 

First of all, i agree with your "there needs to be more to do after the initial scavenge-and-fortify phase of gameplay" statement. Because it's just true. Nowadays, after you pass that step, you basically have nothing to do ; exploration is pointless. Such a pity for a so huge map...

 

"One, your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind, to actually have made a difference in the hellish wasteland your world has become, like Rick Grimes or the Vault Dweller." Seems you want to be a hero or something in a game where you are just that : another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse. :PI think the mood of PZ stated in introduction is"There's no hope", as in pretty true real zeds apocalypses settings, not like emoteen or residentevilesque action bullshit of the Genre nowadays.

 

I'm pretty sure NPC won't alleviate the "no-end-game" feeling (but we'll have to "wait & see" for the release to be sure). On the bright side, they will certainly postpone it by offering an interesting way and probably add some more "in-deep" feelings : but create/manage a community of survivors is just a variant in making your own solo base imo.

 

About the Quest thing, 7D2D (to stay in zombie game genre) tries something like that, but it feels very/horribly like MMORPGesque repeatable quests (settled in a Zed apcalypse). The new "Dungeons" POI feels more appealing in term of temprorary/short-term objective : plus, you don't need some freaksih NPC told/ask you to go there to do something ; you can just go it by yourself, explore and create your own story. You've mentionned FO3. Imo, a "side-quests" system tied to some places (like the Tree-mutant in the north, the Dunwich mansion, all about Tenpenny tower, etc.) with their own stories and feelings seems more indicated for PZ, than an overall plot. You don't need NPC for that ; but you need some storytelling tied to the place and (probably) some scripts and such to create a "local event". Then, you have new reasons to go here & there. Storytelling is probably one of the reason why MP servers with active managements & events stuffs works well (beside the various level of "challenge" they offer)...

 

To completely avoid the "no-end feeling", the game need an actual end (plot, scenario, victory or deadline condition, you name it) : thks Cpt Obvious... Well, in a Zed Apocalypse, what could it be ? Find a cure (a big NO for TiS Team...) ; survive till the zeds themselves disappears (at some point, they'll decay to skeleton bones states... So why not ?) ; find a way out of the containment zone (according to TV/radio emissions, the Knox Event become pandemic, so, it's not really a good ending, but well...) ; wait until some team from out of containment zone come to rescue you (the chopper didn't agree at all)...

 

I don't think the TiS team want to implement any of that (doesn't see/read anything like that since 2014 ; maybe i'm wrong). So, i guess we have to live with it and consider the "boredom in the end" is just another way for PZ to tell you "how you died".

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Once we have NPCs, we can have proper succession games, where when you die you can take over as another NPC in your camp.

 

This allows for waaaay more endgame content, depending on how well the NPC AI is coded. There are other games where large numbers of NPCs can be managed in colony-mode, although that may be beyond the scope of Zomboid. I'm thinking Dwarf Fortress and Rimworld here, but this creates a lot of extra layers of NPC behavior and management beyond what would be required for "collect survivors into a camp", which that one mod does for Zomboid.

 

My hope is TIS would go that route, of course, and implement at least a skeletal structure for more colony management, effectively creating a second game within the first. Then you get the joy of building up your own colony, plus diplomacy/fights with other colonies, mergers, attracting immigrants and refugee groups, and generally rebuilding society from scratch, all while fending off zombie hordes. Also there's intra-colony factional struggles to manage. Say you die, you take over as your next-in-command, but maybe they don't have the same influence in the colony and end up being subjugated to an AI-led colony, where the RNG personal characteristics of a new leader take it in a whole new direction, and you have to work to build up your own faction and influence to take over again. You can go so many ways with this it's crazy. Get all CKII up in it.

 

I'd call it Rimzoid, but that's why I'm not in advertising.

 

They could always release it as DLC/expansion, I'd buy the s--- out of that to support them for the added features. My hope would be that TIS would split off into "next game" staff and "add lots of new AI/NPC stuff via DLC to Zomboid" staff. Steady income stream for a couple coders. I mean, we, the fanbase, are pretty used to waiting a long time for content now, so no rush. I'll wait a few years and buy a "colony simulator" expansion to Zomboid no probs.

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By end game do you mean win condition?  If so, I think win conditions are limiting.  They're necessary for narrative games, because the story has an end.  For sandbox games though, winning is no different than dying.  They both just stop your game after a set of conditions are met.

 

If you mean end game as in content for late game play, ya I agree.  Right now it's kind of too easy to get a somewhat permanent shelter going.  I think NPCs will help with this, orchestrating large scale attacks that penetrate hard defenses, letting in zombies and causing you to flee and start new elsewhere.

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  • 2 weeks later...

My groupe and me are facing the same problem everytime we start a new round. We typically start a round after every bigger update, but everytime we get rather quickly to the point where we have everything and the challenge is gone, so we stop playing again.

The tip with adjusting the difficulty to higher zombie values is not feasible for us because of the lag and strain on the host. We have the numbers pretty high already, going even higher is reducing the performance of the game to an almost halt and introduces stutter across the clients.

 

We too hope, that the NPCs will spice some things up in the long haul, but in short a proper reason to specialise even more would prolong the game. Pretty much all the jobs are useless and reducing the XP-gain simply introduces more grind for the skills.

Everything medic-related is not even worth using, fishing and farming levels damn fast and you get way to much food from it. Same goes for foraging.

 

I already thought aboug creating a mod that lowers the XP gain for certain skills if you are having another skill (so to mitigate a char that can do anything), but I think that this won't really solve the problem with the classes.

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On 2/20/2019 at 1:44 PM, Brex said:

Let me preface this by saying that I love Project Zomboid, and I want to see it succeed. However, there's a major problem with the game that has been bothering me for a while, and I thought I'd address it in case nobody has already. It's not about the slow development time, or lack of NPCs or other features. 

 

It's about the endgame. 

 

Every video game needs some sort of objective. Rescue the princess, reach the end of the dungeon, fight the final boss. This encourages the player to keep going with the game and gives them a sense of accomplishment when they finally reach the end and finish the objective. 

 

Survival games have always suffered when it comes to the endgame. Some have objectives built around a story, some have certain challenges and milestones to unlock. But the main problem with these games is that most often, the only objective is to "survive". Failure to survive results in death. Okay, so at first that seems like a challenge. You gotta gather supplies, fight enemies, establish a base, etc. 

 

But what happens after that? When the map is exhausted of resources, when you've got an entirely self-sufficient base, when you've discovered every nook and cranny of the map and killed thousands of monsters/enemies? Do you just...stop? 

 

Project Zomboid suffers from this, but it goes a step further. It flat out tells you at the start of the game that you're going to die no matter what. So..what's the point of playing? The idea behind survival games is to, well, survive. There's no point in trying if we're just gonna die eventually. As stated above, when you've got your base up and running and have plenty of resources and nowhere left to explore, gameplay in PZ grinds to a halt. 

 

I don't like games that make me feel like all my effort was for nothing. That's why, for example, I like Fallout 3 more than New Vegas. In the former, I actually felt like I had accomplished something and made a difference in the world, whereas in the latter all my hard work and effort was negated by the fact that the wasteland would be inevitably destroyed shortly after the events of the game. But it's one thing to make your game experience meaningless; it's another thing entirely to flat-out tell you at the beginning of the game that everything you do isn't going to save you. 

 

So what happens is you literally start waiting to die. You've got your base, your crops, your water. You're safe. Now all you have to do is...what? Stand around? Take a walk in the woods? Die? 

 

There need to be two major improvements to the game in the future. One, your time put into your character has to mean something. You don't just wanna be another schmuck trying his best to live out the apocalypse, you wanna have a legacy to leave behind, to actually have made a difference in the hellish wasteland your world has become, like Rick Grimes or the Vault Dweller. Two, there needs to be more to do after the initial scavenge-and-fortify phase of gameplay. NPCs and quests would alleviate this for sure, but I think it can go a step further by adding secrets to the map (like scavengeable bunkers), easter eggs, or challenges that reward XP or other prizes. The ability to form factions and communities, as well as interact with other communities to form storylines, would also be great. 

 

All I'm looking for is a purpose to keep going in Project Zomboid. I hope the devs can get behind that idea. 

The game is dismal for a reason. I think in many ways the game imitates reality. I’d be more than happy if the game never left development. Keep adding more small activities for leisure, gameplay enhancements, meta events (helicopter/military fire on zombies/players, anyone?), etc. to keep players intrigued, but the end game absolutely should remain as death. This is how you died is the only way for the game to end.

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On 2/22/2019 at 1:13 PM, Pappus said:

The biggest problem is the lack of threat throughout. The cars have completely demolished any challenge the game could possibly have had. The horde is too sensible to sounds of any kind and following them perfectly.

 

A horde is not a horde if it comes in basically single file as they are blocking themselves.

 

Everything other than the zeds is simply not a threat either. Foraging is insanely efficient with mushrooms easily dishing out 100+ soups/stirs/roasted, water being easily infinite and infections/sickness being of basically no concern.

 

2x2 cabbage literally shitting out tons of cabbages.

 

No matter where you look in this game you can tell, that balance is simply not cared for in any way and will be done "at the end" instead of balancing as they go properly.

 

Axe: Infinitely availible without much trouble, you can demolish hundreds of zeds in no time flat once you have the skills to go for it

Electrical: Infinite via zeds

Bandages: Infinite via zeds

Water: Easy infinite with a couple of barrels

Food: Mushrooms being completely bonkers, most grown food not even worth the dirt they are plotted on. Tons of non perishable food available aswell frog/rosehip etc etc. Areas refill insanely quick, but even if they did not the map is so huge that you will always be able to survive without any worries in the woods. Trapping rabbits can be basically mass produced with a small cabbage patch so ultimately you have so much food you don't even know what to do with.

Gas: Infinite via gas stations

Guns: Inefficient and only pistol ammo is infinite which isn't that great of a weapon compared to the axe.

Runspeed: Way too fast the zeds are literally helpless against your top speed.

Stamina: Sprinting/fighting all day no sweat.

Cars: Easily obtainable, impossible to keep in shape anyhow, fuel for them infinite and they are like tanks allowing you to kill 4000+ zeds without letting go of the gas in the thickest of hordes possible. Additionally those with siren allow you to easily clean out a whole city in one go without being bothersome by having to honk over and over.

Pharmacy: There is so much stuff, that there is basically no chance to be scratched so often that you could somehow run out. Shouldnt even be able to clean the bandages and make scratched way more common, but nullify the zombification chance on them. First aid largely doesn't exist in the game, because if you sincerely need it there is a high chance your character is already doomed. Why waste it away like that.

 

Safe building: The map is insanely vast + easy staircase abuses if you are into that. There is absolutely no trouble making something safe, the only thing insanely hard is to make something legit safe without insane upkeep because of how the walls work. It is a logistical nightmare, metalworking is so weak that it might aswell not even exist (those saying that the metal walls don't burn are wrong btw)

 

So when the game asks you to survive and there is no challenge whatsoever involved, then yeah you need endgame cause clearly it isn't a problem basically building a city during an apocalypse event.

Most of the things you are mentioning can be adjusted in settings. Try ‘host game’ and mess around with them sometime. If you still don’t like the game after adjusting it for your preferences I suggest you play a different game.

 

I strongly feel that a story ending would certainly have killed the longevity of the game (particularly multiplayer) and again the way the game plays out is a large part of the intrigue for people deciding to play the game (ie it’s a post apocalyptic zombie survival sim where delaying inevitable death for as long as possible is the only object of the game). 

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I think the objective of this game should be to break out of the quarantine. You could attempt to do so at any time in the game. However, it would be very hard in the beginning because the people manning the quarantine (i.e. the military) would be mostly alive. Later on, though, you could essentially walk out of the quarantine because all the military died.

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On 2/22/2019 at 1:13 PM, Pappus said:

The biggest problem is the lack of threat throughout. The cars have completely demolished any challenge the game could possibly have had. The horde is too sensible to sounds of any kind and following them perfectly.

 

A horde is not a horde if it comes in basically single file as they are blocking themselves.

 

Everything other than the zeds is simply not a threat either. Foraging is insanely efficient with mushrooms easily dishing out 100+ soups/stirs/roasted, water being easily infinite and infections/sickness being of basically no concern.

 

2x2 cabbage literally shitting out tons of cabbages.

 

No matter where you look in this game you can tell, that balance is simply not cared for in any way and will be done "at the end" instead of balancing as they go properly.

 

Axe: Infinitely availible without much trouble, you can demolish hundreds of zeds in no time flat once you have the skills to go for it

Electrical: Infinite via zeds

Bandages: Infinite via zeds

Water: Easy infinite with a couple of barrels

Food: Mushrooms being completely bonkers, most grown food not even worth the dirt they are plotted on. Tons of non perishable food available aswell frog/rosehip etc etc. Areas refill insanely quick, but even if they did not the map is so huge that you will always be able to survive without any worries in the woods. Trapping rabbits can be basically mass produced with a small cabbage patch so ultimately you have so much food you don't even know what to do with.

Gas: Infinite via gas stations

Guns: Inefficient and only pistol ammo is infinite which isn't that great of a weapon compared to the axe.

Runspeed: Way too fast the zeds are literally helpless against your top speed.

Stamina: Sprinting/fighting all day no sweat.

Cars: Easily obtainable, impossible to keep in shape anyhow, fuel for them infinite and they are like tanks allowing you to kill 4000+ zeds without letting go of the gas in the thickest of hordes possible. Additionally those with siren allow you to easily clean out a whole city in one go without being bothersome by having to honk over and over.

Pharmacy: There is so much stuff, that there is basically no chance to be scratched so often that you could somehow run out. Shouldnt even be able to clean the bandages and make scratched way more common, but nullify the zombification chance on them. First aid largely doesn't exist in the game, because if you sincerely need it there is a high chance your character is already doomed. Why waste it away like that.

 

Safe building: The map is insanely vast + easy staircase abuses if you are into that. There is absolutely no trouble making something safe, the only thing insanely hard is to make something legit safe without insane upkeep because of how the walls work. It is a logistical nightmare, metalworking is so weak that it might aswell not even exist (those saying that the metal walls don't burn are wrong btw)

 

So when the game asks you to survive and there is no challenge whatsoever involved, then yeah you need endgame cause clearly it isn't a problem basically building a city during an apocalypse event.

 

Well, almost all of that is dependent on your own difficulty settings, and there are plenty of people out there who think survival mode is far too unforgiving and challenging as-is, so I think the idea that there is "no challenge whatsoever involved" is probably on you for what your settings are and is fairly easy to debunk within the general playerbase. 

 

There are a couple points here that aren't true, being that you can keep cars in good shape, but doing so involves not using them as tanks and actually maintaining them - which can be challenging if you don't just write off maintenance and let them go to waste because it's too hard. And giving up when you get hurt because "first aid is nonexistent since you'll probably die from your injuries anyway" - what? That's not a discussion of game balance, that's nihilism, since you can fix your broken legs and patch up your scratches you get from crawling through glass - scratches only have a 25% infection chance give or take what traits you have. You said yourself that there is a lot of stuff there, so your entire point makes no sense to me. So yeah, if you just scrap characters and cars on the regular, all these systems to maintain them don't exist. Feeding your child is a non-existent mechanic if they are just going to die anyways. Taking a shower is a non-existent mechanic if you are just going to get dirty again anyways. The entire point of that is maintenance, which makes these things a challenge. This is why I think your post is just "don't do the challenging things" and not an actual case for there being no challenge in the game.

 

It's also common game design to make your basics and sources for content infinite. It makes sense for water to be infinite because weather still exists and water is a natural resource. It makes sense for zed drops to be sources of non-natural resources since the player needs to acquire these items somehow.  The only thing on that list that I agree with is food, which is something I don't think should be outright adjusted since the depletion of your food supply multiplies depending on whether or not you are playing with other people (and more importantly, if you are savvy enough to master all of the "ultimate methods" which plenty of players simply aren't due to the fact this is still by all standards a very complicated game). Just because you can look at everything objectively doesn't mean that your playstyle is the most satisfying one, and plenty of people alter the various settings the game gives you to change for reasons that are basically your entire post. And you should be able to make a safe base. It's not like you don't work for it. Because you do. 

 

I agree with your overall point, but there is plenty of holes in there because your points can just be summarized as "yeah, if you don't do any of the challenging stuff, it's not a challenge." And there definitely does need to be more stuff you can work on in your downtime. It doesn't need to detract from the rest of the gameplay by making basic needs become annoying because normal difficulty isn't enough for some people. There's settings for that, with my points above.

 

Anyways, that's my 2c of the USD. You have yourself a wonderful day! :)

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On 2/20/2019 at 7:44 PM, Brex said:

That's why, for example, I like Fallout 3 more than New Vegas. In the former, I actually felt like I had accomplished something and made a difference in the world, whereas in the latter all my hard work and effort was negated by the fact that the wasteland would be inevitably destroyed shortly after the events of the game.

 

Did we play the same New Vegas? If at all, Fallout 3 should be your point here, as no matter what you do, the endgames outcome is always the same while New Vegas has a shitton of permutations and different (faction) endings.

 

About the folks saying that NPCs will fix Zomboids endgame... I do not believe this at all. It's just another gameplay feature that you can game and at some point it just won't pose a threat anymore.

 

14 hours ago, Kim Jong Un said:

Well, almost all of that is dependent on your own difficulty settings,

 

My problem with the difficutly is that it's very hard to get the right settings... For me it's always either too easy or too hard. In my last game I drastically increased the Z amount, which resulted in me having to kill hordes of zombies *exactly* every 3 ingame days. It was so unfun... it still wasn't impossible hard, just tedious AND I noticed the pattern in Z spawning and how their ai works. It made me realize even more how pointless it all is. And yes, I had a Van in perfect condition and all the other fancy stuff.

 

In worst case, you can always do roof camping with a bit farming and you're good to go until you get bored or accidentally fall off the roof and break a bone or two.

 

What I personally want is a better balanced difficulty... independent of your difficulty settings. Give me hordes of zombies for a while and then let it rest some time. Throw a few here and there around my base maybe, but nothing serious. Then at some point give me a truly apocalyptic horde event or something. But again, even that is pointless if you can just roof-camp it out... Makes me think that zombies should have the ability to clutter up on a wall and use each other as stairs to reach higher ground... But then you just have to roof camp on second elevation buildings. Ugh.

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