What if the Zombification virus behaved differently?

[Bioradical]

This game is about how you die, there is no uncertainty that it's going to happen sooner or later.

 

This post is not about a cure, or a way to prevent zombification. But this would be an interesting feature to keep players pushing forward even though they're infected.

 

Instead of being a 100% fatal acute infection, if players can stave off the fever for 4-7 days the virus will go into incubation. This would put to use all of the supplies people generally accumulate and make the whole infection process a bit more interesting. After 2-4 weeks, the latent infection will reactivate and the player will be forced to try to survive the reoccuring subsiquent infections (vitamins, pain-killers, and sleeping pill cocktail time).

 

Basically think of chronic hepatitus or HIV, players can still push to stay alive a bit longer and won't be encouraged to drink bleach at the first signs of zombification this way.

 

What say you guys?

[syfy]

we don't even know if it is a virus, part of the mystery of the game is not knowing just what caused this outbreak to happen.

[thiosk]

Not a bad concept at all. 

 

However: I present to you this idea. Through mods, this should be readily possible. In a moddable game like PZ, we can already add a cure and various other modifications to the zombie outbreak, so it should be readily addable through a direct install-able and toggleable mod. 

 

Hell, I want werewolves prowling the forests and howling at night. Theres no way that gels with the game as envisioned. If the devs give us an inch in adding our own "custom zombies," theres no reason vampires, werewolves, thriller dancing zombies, and modifiable zombifection parameters couldn't be added.

 

The devs have their own priorities for what they're looking for, and "not declaring the reason for the zombification" is central to that. Sure, maybe its a virus, but maybe its magic too. Who knows? All we can do is try to eek out a living in this hell. But through modding-- add your own vision!

[Bioradical]

It's not like anyone needs to specify the source of infection. It could be that the Jamaican needed a nap after performing voodoo for 4 days straight.

[ExcentriCreation]

This topic has actually been raised before (it was a couple of months ago & I cant be bothered digging through the archive to find the discussion)

Essentially, as you've already seen, people are of 2 minds about what defining the zombie "virus" means.... Personally I think ANY information is TOO MUCH information.

For arguments sake, lets say that scurvy was a symptom of zombification & therefore vitamin C would hold off the symptom, keeping you alive for longer. Although this is only one symptom of the proposed infection, you have still begun the process of coding & categorizing what it is that is re-animating the dead.... The argument, that it could be a Haitian voodoo curse that is cause of the "infection" & in turn the vitamin deficiency, is irrelevant....

Aside from this I think the issue of people quitting the moment they become "infected" needs to be addressed & I think the best way to do this is to simply hide the fact that they are infected. If they could make it so a person isn't certain that they are infected until they are, literally, about to die then.... congratulations.... you just convinced someone to play a full game instead of rage quitting the moment they get scratched

[thiosk]

Hypochondriac trait was great.

Got sick and anxious. Agonizing pain.

I ate a lot of food and smoked and drank tea. Ate a bottle of painkillers. health started dropping precipitously. Got to 30%, boom. Sick noodle went away.

It was great.

[OnewiththeGun]

I think that the dead have been reanimated because an irradiated satellite has passed too close to Earth. The second best explanation is that there is simply no more room in Hell.

[KingNoodle]

When my last character got infected I was pretty annoyed cos he had been my longest survivor so far. Bleeding and cursing he made his way back to the fort he had been constructing all summer. He dumped his travel bag on the floor, thinking it wasnt even worth putting away the meagre scaps he had been collecting before that bastard had come lurching out of the closet to take a bite out of him. Having made his mind up, he then fortified his courage with some betas swallowed down with whiskey and had a final cigarette before grabbing his old worn down nail bat and headed out to kill as many zombies as he possibly could before death inevitably came to claim him.

 

It was glorious.

 

In any case, I am curious about multiplayer though. I assume that when you die from an infection your character still becomes a zombie, even in MP, right? So if you got scratched/bit/whatever whilst in a group of others. Would you tell them? Is there any way for the others to see you being sick? Would you be like 'oh kill me now' or like the dastadly troll that you are, would you just wait until you succumbed to the infection and then cackle as you picture your reanimated corpse come back to life to turn on those around you?

[Bioradical]

Aside from this I think the issue of people quitting the moment they become "infected" needs to be addressed & I think the best way to do this is to simply hide the fact that they are infected. If they could make it so a person isn't certain that they are infected until they are, literally, about to die then.... congratulations.... you just convinced someone to play a full game instead of rage quitting the moment they get scratched

 

It would work, but I believe people still want the symptoms so they can have enough time to get their affairs in order. Store their backpack and belongings somewhere and play out their suicide fantasies. I just think having some ways to extend your life while you still have a decent character would be appreciated by many, even though it would be crippling and eventually kill you. Heck, that might add to the immersion of the game. Struggling along valiantly even though you're doomed to die.

 

It's either this, or give an option on sandbox mode for transmission to occur through bites only... or allow clothes to protect against scratches breaking the skin. Such as this one time I got a scratch on my foot even though I had shoes on, died by zombification 7 days later with no other injuries. I kept myself barely alive through a self induced coma during the last few days. I was honestly a little irked, as there should be some way clothing can play into protecting oneself.

[ExcentriCreation]

It would work, but I believe people still want the symptoms so they can have enough time to get their affairs in order. Store their backpack and belongings somewhere and play out their suicide fantasies. I just think having some ways to extend your life while you still have a decent character would be appreciated by many, even though it would be crippling and eventually kill you. Heck, that might add to the immersion of the game. Struggling along valiantly even though you're doomed to die.

 

It's either this, or give an option on sandbox mode for transmission to occur through bites only... or allow clothes to protect against scratches breaking the skin. Such as this one time I got a scratch on my foot even though I had shoes on, died by zombification 7 days later with no other injuries. I kept myself barely alive through a self induced coma during the last few days. I was honestly a little irked, as there should be some way clothing can play into protecting oneself.

 

I don't mean, absolutely no symptoms.... The "fever" is pretty much consistent through all zombie movies & explanations (other than 28 days/months later which in my opinion aren't zombie movies)

Having the fever hit, after a scratch or bite, weather your infected or not & removing the "Zombified" status from the health screen would have the same effect....

 

If your interested, the topic was in PZ Suggestions & I think it was called "Delaying the Inevitable" or something like that.... I cant remember & that's half the reason why I don't want to go digging

 

EDIT:

Thought of a keyword that Rathlord used in it that topic that was unlikely to be used anywhere else

Keeping of the infection temporary

[psykikk]

intentional maiming comes to mind. get scratched / bit in the lg and go all out Hershel on the guy.

makes way more sense in MP though to preserve much needed skills...

 

maybe we will see medical and engineering skills in the future so that players have to specialize more.

so losing the one doctor the group has just because he was bitten in the leg is simply not an option....

[PintLasher]

I would love to see all zpmbie animations replaced with thriller versions terrifying in its own way. Kind of like the Thomas the Tank Engine mod for Skyrim lol

[Narnobie111]

I would love to see all zpmbie animations replaced with thriller versions terrifying in its own way. Kind of like the Thomas the Tank Engine mod for Skyrim lol

The Thomas mod is horrifying! I'd like to zombies replaced with giant bags of doritos

[bruvvy]

I think that the dead have been reanimated because an irradiated satellite has passed too close to Earth. The second best explanation is that there is simply no more room in hell.

 

HOW DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT SATELLITE AND HOW DID YOU KNOW THERES NO MORE ROOM IN HELL!

[Shivster]

I quit playing survival it was to easy. So i have infection set to instant. If i get infected i die on the spot. That and turning the numbers, strength, Hearing, Smell, Sight, And to rare loot. IMO makes the game a challenge.

 

I would turn off cure if it was in the vanilla game but i wouldn't be opposed to it as long as its a option in sandbox and is not in survival.

[Tranceswe]

Hello, new to the community here, been playing for a couple of weeks, mainly because of reading some awesome stories around here and getting inspired enough to buy the game.

 

In regards to zombie infection, you should really be able to temporalirly stave it off, this game is about surviving for as long as possible, and every minute, hour and day counts towards that end. Being able to use medicines/combinations of pills to temporarily reduce the health reduction rate would be good. This would mean that constant pill-munching, food intake and sleep would marginally delay the onset of maximum "health reudction" following infection would mean you could go on for a few days longer than if you didn't. This would also give some incentive to not suicide immediately upon first signs of infection.

 

This is a sandbox game, and it's perfectly in line with PZ vision. Some would go out and whack as many zombies as possible before dying, some would immediately kill themselves, and some would try to delay death through already existing means and pill munching (NSAIDS, antivirals/biotics + even sleep inducement or vitamins etc). We're not talking extended times, we're talking days.

 

Immersion and freedom of decisionmaking is important to the game. Contrary to what was written in that old thread, this would actually introduce another option to an already existing binary situation - suicide or killing as many zombies as possible (also being suicide oftenly).