zombies behaviors Scream and Fight!

[GG Cannon]

There are 2 types of zombies I believe could be extremely interesting to appear in the game, specially later in the game as more survivors started to be turned, specially those that originally could have some degree of natural resistance to slow down the progression of the infection.

Both of which conform to zombie types within the Romero zombies.

 

All the things I will mention in this post can be found in "Romero Zombies" in the Zombiepedia

 

While earlier works could show zombies devoid of both thought and memory and most instances that are inspired in the Romero zombies follow only that, later works of Romero have shown zombies capable of learning through a process of trial and error AND recalling memories of their past lives and performing familiar tasks or even communicating, which is to say that their brain still has significant capabilities. 
 

 

1- Louder

 

The first of the two types is very simple and most recent zombie games have at least one iteration of it in their own capacity. It is a more recent zombie trope that still also perfectly fits in the spirit of PZ and the current scenario of the world and within all the descriptors and capabilities of the Romero zombies.
The "SCREAMER!"
   

While I'm using the word "type" a better term would be "variant" since you can have a "screamer" variant of almost any type of zombie currently present in the game.

It should simply be a zombie that, once it notices you, before it starts shambling, crawling or running towards you, they would... well... scream. Loud. Very loud. Calling zombies from a certain distance away towards their location.

 

They should be somewhat rare and with a few small details, such as:

-If the zombie is a crawler or "can't move", they should scream non-stop until they "forgot why they were screaming for".
-If the screamer is following towards an alarm or event such as the helicopter, they should not scream until they see a player or NPC.

-The screamer shout should cause a considerable amount of panic on the player's character and NPCs.
-The second the screamer loses sight of the player or NPC, they should scream once again.
-If a second screamer hears the shout of another screamer from far away, they should also scream before moving towards the location of the first screamer.

 

This should be a very rare zombie variant ever since the start of the game that, with time, could become slightly more common.

 

There should also be random events of screamers shouting, similar to how you can hear a woman shouting, wolves or a gunshot suddenly.

It would be terrifying to suddenly hear a screamer near your base and then hear more screamers in the distance during the night.

 

 

2- More Lethal

 

The second variant should be even more rare at the start of the game but become more and more common as the game progresses, which is zombies capable of using melee weapons.
The "Fighter".
 

As I mentioned in the beginning, this is something that has been verified multiple times in Romero movies and can be seen since as early as Night of the Living Dead.
I don't believe they should operate firearms at all, to stay closer to the common zombie we know of, but grabbing a pipe to hit you or using an axe with the extremely faint memories of their past lives as a firefighter or a wood cutter is definitely fitting and reasonable.

 

One detail I would add is that every player character that dies and becomes a zombie should have at least 25% chance of being a Fighter zombie.
If they had the "Resilient" trait, it should be 50%.
Later in the game, those values should double for 50% the normal player character and 100% for a resilient character.
For the NPC update, survivor NPCs that die should also have a higher probability of becoming a Fighter. Starting at 10% and growing to 20% at later stages.
This would make their existence even more interesting and threatening, since in an MP server, for example, one player that died may immediately become a Fighter zombie wielding a Katana or a Machete that they had while living.
 
 

Important Questions
 

• Does it fit with the spirit of PZ?
  Yes it does. As I mentioned, both variants are still perfectly within the current style of the game.
   

• Would it make the game too easy?
  No, quite the opposite. It would add a new degree of threat to the game, since if you have bad luck, even a single zombie that shouts at a bad moment could bring your end or a zombie with an axe or a bat within a small group could make just a few 3 or 4 zombies to already be a serious battle for survival.
   

• Would it require rewriting the entire game (like changing the camera view, for instance)
  No. It would only require to program the variant behavior, add it among the list of possible zombie variants, add the toggle configurations to sandbox mode and server creation and I believe that is it.
   

• Would it add enough to the gameplay that it would be worth taking the time to add?
  Yes, very much so. Even though it is only 2 variants of zombies, since they can be recombined with other variants, like both Screamer and Crawler, or a Sprinter and Fighter. Imagine if a crawler that happened to be a fighter with a knife cuts your leg or feet right it the middle of combat from somewhere you didn't see it coming.
   
• For zombies: Does it fit at least somewhat into Romero/Brooks zombie lore (the basis for 'proper' zombies)?
  As I mentioned before, yes, perfectly so. It is perfectly within the lore of the Romero zombies.
  The zombie from the lore itself, the zombie brain is still more than capable of wielding weapons, be it by "learning" the behavior out of trial and error or from faint remaining memories of their previous lives, while screaming would be even more simple, but the act of screaming reactively as they see someone should still be somewhat rare or uncommon at least.

Edited October 15, 2022 by GG Cannon

[Diegooo]

On 10/15/2022 at 12:14 PM, GG Cannon said:

There are 2 types of zombies I believe could be extremely interesting to appear in the game, specially later in the game as more survivors started to be turned, specially those that originally could have some degree of natural resistance to slow down the progression of the infection.

Both of which conform to zombie types within the Romero zombies.

 

All the things I will mention in this post can be found in "Romero Zombies" in the Zombiepedia

 

While earlier works could show zombies devoid of both thought and memory and most instances that are inspired in the Romero zombies follow only that, later works of Romero have shown zombies capable of learning through a process of trial and error AND recalling memories of their past lives and performing familiar tasks or even communicating, which is to say that their brain still has significant capabilities. 
 

 

1- Louder

 

The first of the two types is very simple and most recent zombie games have at least one iteration of it in their own capacity. It is a more recent zombie trope that still also perfectly fits in the spirit of PZ and the current scenario of the world and within all the descriptors and capabilities of the Romero zombies.
The "SCREAMER!"
   

While I'm using the word "type" a better term would be "variant" since you can have a "screamer" variant of almost any type of zombie currently present in the game.

It should simply be a zombie that, once it notices you, before it starts shambling, crawling or running towards you, they would... well... scream. Loud. Very loud. Calling zombies from a certain distance away towards their location.

 

They should be somewhat rare and with a few small details, such as:

-If the zombie is a crawler or "can't move", they should scream non-stop until they "forgot why they were screaming for".
-If the screamer is following towards an alarm or event such as the helicopter, they should not scream until they see a player or NPC.

-The screamer shout should cause a considerable amount of panic on the player's character and NPCs.
-The second the screamer loses sight of the player or NPC, they should scream once again.
-If a second screamer hears the shout of another screamer from far away, they should also scream before moving towards the location of the first screamer.

 

This should be a very rare zombie variant ever since the start of the game that, with time, could become slightly more common.

 

There should also be random events of screamers shouting, similar to how you can hear a woman shouting, wolves or a gunshot suddenly.

It would be terrifying to suddenly hear a screamer near your base and then hear more screamers in the distance during the night.

 

 

2- More Lethal

 

The second variant should be even more rare at the start of the game but become more and more common as the game progresses, which is zombies capable of using melee weapons.
The "Fighter".
 

As I mentioned in the beginning, this is something that has been verified multiple times in Romero movies and can be seen since as early as Night of the Living Dead.
I don't believe they should operate firearms at all, to stay closer to the common zombie we know of, but grabbing a pipe to hit you or using an axe with the extremely faint memories of their past lives as a firefighter or a wood cutter is definitely fitting and reasonable.

 

One detail I would add is that every player character that dies and becomes a zombie should have at least 25% chance of being a Fighter zombie.
If they had the "Resilient" trait, it should be 50%.
Later in the game, those values should double for 50% the normal player character and 100% for a resilient character.
For the NPC update, survivor NPCs that die should also have a higher probability of becoming a Fighter. Starting at 10% and growing to 20% at later stages.
This would make their existence even more interesting and threatening, since in an MP server, for example, one player that died may immediately become a Fighter zombie wielding a Katana or a Machete that they had while living.
 
 

Important Questions
 

• Does it fit with the spirit of PZ?
  Yes it does. As I mentioned, both variants are still perfectly within the current style of the game.
   

• Would it make the game too easy?
  No, quite the opposite. It would add a new degree of threat to the game, since if you have bad luck, even a single zombie that shouts at a bad moment could bring your end or a zombie with an axe or a bat within a small group could make just a few 3 or 4 zombies to already be a serious battle for survival.
   

• Would it require rewriting the entire game (like changing the camera view, for instance)
  No. It would only require to program the variant behavior, add it among the list of possible zombie variants, add the toggle configurations to sandbox mode and server creation and I believe that is it.
   

• Would it add enough to the gameplay that it would be worth taking the time to add?
  Yes, very much so. Even though it is only 2 variants of zombies, since they can be recombined with other variants, like both Screamer and Crawler, or a Sprinter and Fighter. Imagine if a crawler that happened to be a fighter with a knife cuts your leg or feet right it the middle of combat from somewhere you didn't see it coming.
   
• For zombies: Does it fit at least somewhat into Romero/Brooks zombie lore (the basis for 'proper' zombies)?
  As I mentioned before, yes, perfectly so. It is perfectly within the lore of the Romero zombies.
  The zombie from the lore itself, the zombie brain is still more than capable of wielding weapons, be it by "learning" the behavior out of trial and error or from faint remaining memories of their previous lives, while screaming would be even more simple, but the act of screaming reactively as they see someone should still be somewhat rare or uncommon at least.

I really like this suggestion, i think this can lead to a sort of new situations very interesting for the game, one of the devs Big No's are Special Zombies, but they didn't say nothing about variants, this can be like the Sprinter variant. I am totally sure this will spice the game so much, and really fit with PZ style of zombies.

[GG Cannon]

1 hour ago, Diegooo said:

one of the devs Big No's are Special Zombies, but they didn't say nothing about variants

That is very much the point in this suggestion as well.
They aren't really special zombies, just normal zombies with divergent behaviors, with both behaviors fitting with the Romero/Bricks proper zombies the devs want and both adding a lot of interesting elements and situations to the game.