DayZ SA: Steam Community Chat Questionnaires

[TIC 1050]

Confirmed Items and Questionnaires --- Steam Chat (Formatted/Organized: Finished)

 
 

 

Brian Hicks (Hicks_206; DayZ Producer)
 
(opening this will be a wall of text; be advised)

 

 Chat Context

 

MOD RELATED: Hicks has discussed during the mod days, how he became a hero and had his own video channel. You can watch here if you wish: http://www.twitch.tv/hicks_206
 
 
Hicks_206: DayZ makes DayZ Mod feel like the difference between watching a cartoon from the 80s, and then watching the live action series on bluray.
 
 
Hicks_206: I look forward to getting my group back together, and forcing them to help me help fresh spawns
Hicks_206: (They hated it)
Hicks_206: They were all about the action, and viewed every fresh spawn as a potential risk.
Ridders!: even after release
Hicks_206: Now, with unarmed melee - that is DEFINITELY the case.
Hicks_206: Moreso than before, with the mod
 
 
Hicks_206: I leave(*Love) talking about unannounced features to Dean.
 
 
Rossums: Baseball bat. 
Rossums: Pfft.
Rossums: Glorious hatchet for all! 
Conductor of the Poop Train: Speaking of which... can I use random logs of firewood as melee weapons?
Hicks_206: Or, in Rossums case - an axe.
 
 
Hicks_206: My advice to everyone here - while the game is downloading, read the manual. You'll want to know the controls so you can survive.
 
 
Hicks_206: I'm insanely lucky to be able to have an impact on a franchise that I'd otherwise be playing on every free moment if I was still at my previous studio.
 
 
Hicks_206: Yeah, the hype train is a machine of its own.
Hicks_206: The discovery of the group after I uploaded a new header image is proof of that in itself.
Hicks_206: This group is like a year old, all I did was upload a new header.
Hicks_206: And the clincher is, its not even the final header - its place holder for now. Hah
 
 
 

 

 

Q&A's

 
Q: Hicks, speaking of melee weapons, something I've been wondering is how common melee weapons will be compared to guns?

• In short, I look forward to the hectic frenzy of trying to decide who is legitimately innocent, and who is not. It'll be like Ultima Online 1997 all over again. Well, think of how more common they would be in real life. 

Q: Go out in backyard, huge branch, melee weapon?

• Much easier to find a baseball bat, then a rifle.

Q: How many melee weapons are there?

• A wide array, with many more to come in the future. Melee is *definitely* a core pillar of the game now.

 

 

 

Q: You at the office with Rocket?

• No, I went home around 9 PM. Had a late night on Monday

 

Q: Is it releasing tonight?

 

• No, I would not be in bed if it was releasing.

 

 

 

 

Q: Will the server only be run by you guys at first and dedicated servers after?

• Only time will tell. There will be a large quantity of servers at launch. Hopefully, large enough  ;)

 

 

✓Q: Did the controls drastically change compared to the mod?

• The game has its own unique controls like any other title, of course some controls carry between titles linked to Arma - but again, I highly recommend reading the manual beforehand.

 

 

✓Q: Can you customise facial features or is it done the same way ARMA 2/3 in that you just pick a present skin?

• As character creation is literally being finalized as we speak by Dean, I'd prefer not to comment, as it might change at any time. But the design is to allow a good array of customization to aid in a wide variety of survivor types, rather then the same white guy in a baseball cap 

 

 

Q: Personal Question: How proud are you of DayZ SA, on a scale of 1 - 10?

• Of the potential we have ahead of us, with the way the title is releasing and steam allows us to update? 10.

 

 

Q: Where did you work before?

• Microsoft Studios.

Q: Doing?

• First Party Publishing, a wonderful experience.

Q: How long have you worked there?

• Approximately 5 years.

Q: Do you prefer working there or with the BI?

• I am originally from the east side of Seattle, so we had all three of those companies, plus Nintendo, Bungie, Suckerpunch, etc all in the same city effectively. In the end, at Microsoft I found myself feeling the most alive when I was working with technology or projects on the bleeding edge, outside of the established process. DayZ is that and more, plus something I already obsess over - so, BI.

 

 

Q: How much did the development of the Standalone change your lives? Turned into night owls? Got you addicted to caffine? Etc?

• I moved to the other side of the world, left my family, friends, and a very well paying job to work on this project. I'd say it had a huge impact on myself. And *especially* Dean

 

 

Q: How is living in Czech Republic?

• Prague is beautiful, its definitely different from the States, but I like experiencing new things.

 

 

Q: How is launch night going to be? do you think you will have server problems like the big companies do?

• Listen, when it comes to launch - I expect issues. I've been #2 on the escalation chart for online only projects for other, very influental companies before and even -they- couldn't stop the inevitable. You can't ever truly prepare for what the users will do. The best you can do is prepare for the worst, and make sure you have a clear escalation chart, and a big red emergency phone to the data centers for when shit hits the fan. You can be certain, when the game launches - Dean will be staring at the feedback tracker with his eyes peeled back, and I'll be on a bridge call with the server host.

 

 

Q: What would you classify as "shit hitting the fan"?

• Well, an example would be a multi million dollar title releasing, skyrocketing concurrent active users faster in the first two hours than Call of Duty or Halo on XBL, and then seeing one of the backend dependencies hard crashing with no one picking up the phone on the other end  ;) That morning even Phil Spencer was knocking on my door demanding to know what the hell was going on. Never a good feeling.

 

 

Q: Will zombies spawn in other areas now rather than the cities/towns? An example; in the woods.

• There is nothing preventing us from doing that, thats about all I can say  ;)

Q: That reminds me. Dean once tweeted about using poop as chemical weaponry. Is that... a thing?

• The way DayZ is designed allows to maximum flexibility, and experimentation. So, its been discussed. I used to upload gameplay from DayZ to youtube. Mostly for my own amusement.

 

 

Q: Can you talk about the price of the Alpha release? If yes but nothing specific, what would you want it priced at?

• Can't speak to price. That discussion is still active.

 

 

Q: My favorite color is orange, can you confirm orange underwear in the SA?

• Underwear, at least for right now - is an offwhite-ish color.

 

 

Q: Who is usually last to leave the office? Dean?

• Usually me, about 5 minutes after Dean.

 

 

Q: Can we dream of a release this week?

• You are free to dream my friend.

 

 

Q: Speaking of which. Servers will be hosted en masse by you guys. Can we host our own stuff day 1?

• We're still addressing our approach to this, however at launch there will be large quanities of game servers.

 

 

Q: Can you talk about performance? I mean the average FPS you get in cities and plains?

• Client side? I've found the game to be genuinely much smoother experience, and lower demand than the mod.

 

 

Q: Do you guys think you will ever have steady 60 FPS?

• It's definitely a goal.

 

 

Q: Occulus Rift support?

• I know Dean(Rocket) is in love with this device.

 

 

Q: Didn't you get tied up during one of the tests?

• No, I did handcuff a tester that was AFK outside Vybor, I found him, handcuffed him -and then proceeded to dress him. He came back, and was fully kitted out. I was standing over him with a nagant - and I just said over direct. "I dressed you up purdy, boy"

 

 

Q: Dayz in general what is your usual loot run?

• I don't have real loot runs any more. Mostly because about 95 to 98% of the structures are enterable along with very few structures being non-enterable.

 

 

Q: I go to bed thinking about the Standalone every night and wake up with the SA being my first thought. Clinical or clinical? I am inclined to say clinical.

• Sometimes, I have nightmares that the game launched - and there are weird, obscure problems. I had a nightmare that the game launched, and for some reason twitch was attributing all the streamers. I think its because I played Worms before bed.

 

 

Q: Speaking of, will there be satchels in SA?

• Time will tell.

^{*Ending Questionnaire*} Hicks_206: Alright, its bed for me. Going to watch the post mortem for Maniac Mansion on Youtube and drift off. All good points, I think I'll leave the chat closed at the least until lunchtime tomorrow. Later.
 
Hicks_206 left chat.

 
Dean 'Rocket' Hall (Rocket2Guns; DayZ Project Lead)
 
(opening this will be a wall of text; be advised)

 

 

Chat Context

 

a SKOLLIE: ive been toying with the idea of some sort of stamina system for your weapons, the longer you keep your weapon raised the more tired you grow; which will force people to keep their weapons lowered until they expect some sort of gunfight.
Rocket2guns: we plan to redo the existing stamina system at some point, same time as we look at weight
 

 

 

Q&A's

 
Q:  If permissions were given, or is there to much legality in doing so?

• Not much legality involved. its possible. but im super fussy

 

 

Q: Hows the onPlayerConnecting bug going?

• The optimizations got reverted and are in their own branch being fixed now. will be merged back once done

 

 

✓Q: If someone were to produce a good quality model that includes all it's counter-parts, would you add it?

• Rigged models would be hard to do, you need a very specific layout and mesgh. We actually have only one artist doing most of the rigged stuff.

 

 

Q:  Have you ever considered giving us a bit more update on whats going on as often as possible as far as bugs / optimization goes. While I understand youre trying to keep quiet i think it would shut a lot of people up with just a bit of an update on how things are going.

• Again, I'd just be happy with it not crashing and good server FPS

 

 

Q: Progress on Ragdoll physics?

• Ragdoll is in active development, but no idea when it comes through into alpha

 

 

Q: When are you testing with 50+ persons on server?

• Once we get the optimization merged back in. We'll test with more players.

 

 

Q: Whats you're favorite part of Cheranus thats been changed so far?

• I probably like the swamps best. The new swamps are awesome

 

 

Q: Are you playing DayZ now or working with it?

• Working with it. Trying to get Character Creation to work properly.

 

 

Q: What are you doing exactly on the character screen?

• Besides making it work, review past characters, set a default one, that sort of thing. 

 

 

Q: How many characters will you be even be able to create, rocket?

• One character at a time, but you can see past ones.

 

 

Q: When does the Alpha release?

• Once performance is acceptable we'll release the alpha.

(END)

 
Note: I did not include off-topic chats (IE: a person in the chat asking what type of food he would be eating tonight.) This can be viewed on your free will on the chat source.
 
★DayZ Steam Community Group Chat (Pastebin from 11/12)

 
 
★ DayZ Steam Community Group Page(Currently available to the public)

*as this page is official, the banner isn't final.

Edited November 5, 2014 by TIC321

[Inception. 9443]

What a mess of a chat.

[TIC 1050]

What a mess of a chat.

 

You mean from the listed sources on the topic?

[Inception. 9443]

You mean from the listed sources on the topic?

 

I speak of the text in the pastebin: There are completely irrelevant comments flying everywhere, lol. A bunch of silly ducks.

[TIC 1050]

I speak of the text in the pastebin: There are completely irrelevant comments flying everywhere, lol. A bunch of silly ducks.

 

That's the first thing I thought when I read it then decided to clean it up for others to not have to deal with the hassles like that.

[mzltv 2281]

Nothing tempts me less than to enter that Steam chat.

 

It's probably got the ludacrous logic and incessant posting of these forums and Reddit combined.

[dgeesio 1034]

I speak of the text in the pastebin: There are completely irrelevant comments flying everywhere, lol. A bunch of silly ducks.

usual and how they often go

 

join game chat with devs , people join chat basically first few lines oh look its (insert dev) from everyone then someone silly joins hi its me lord lucan ive come to collect my bag of badger eggs yada yada.

 

people talk about random shit dev says a couple of things then leaves. :P

[Guest]

This is confusing....

[Gwraspe 318]

"about 95 to 98% of the structures are enterable along with very few structures being non-enterable."

 

choo choo motherfuckers, choo choo.

[Wayze 549]

Q: Can you customise facial features or is it done the same way ARMA 2/3 in that you just pick a present skin?

• The game has its own unique controls like any other title, of course some controls carry between titles linked to Arma - but again, I highly recommend reading the manual beforehand.

Own unique controls like any other titles? Any other titles? Skyrim? What is he talking about.

Controls are linked to Arma? So I guess no custimization at all. And what is the manuel beforehand?

 

A simple answere "yes" or "no", would have been way better in my opinion. Still not sure what he meant.

[Dr. Goner 661]

Own unique controls like any other titles? Any other titles? Skyrim? What is he talking about.

Controls are linked to Arma? So I guess no custimization at all. And what is the manuel beforehand?

 

A simple answere "yes" or "no", would have been way better in my opinion. Still not sure what he meant.

 

He means yes, you will be able to customize your character in greater detail than in the mod, but he doesn't speak to specifics. I think when he mentions other titles he's just referring to the vast array of character customization that exists in the world of gaming and that DayZ's will be unique in the same regard.

 

I know there are a multitude of races and genders available. From the images we've seen, I don't think body type is that varied, but I think there are several hair colors. It seems like your character will slowly become customized due to the great variety of clothing that can be found in game as well.

[CapricornOne (DayZ) 379]

Own unique controls like any other titles? Any other titles? Skyrim? What is he talking about.

Controls are linked to Arma? So I guess no custimization at all. And what is the manuel beforehand?

 

A simple answere "yes" or "no", would have been way better in my opinion. Still not sure what he meant.

 

As in DayZ will have it's own set of controls, with it's roots being that of the Arma/DayZ mod layout.

 

The controls won't be exactly the same as the mod/Arma 2.

 

*I think the Qs and As got mixed up. The answer given seems like it was taken from a control layout question. Possible mistake by OP during formatting? 

I noticed the same issue with a few of the other Qs.

Edited November 13, 2013 by CapricornOne

[Wayze 549]

As in DayZ will have it's own set of controls, with it's roots being that of the Arma/DayZ mod layout.

 

The controls won't be exactly the same as the mod/Arma 2.

 

*I think the Qs and As got mixed up. The answer given seems like it was taken from a control layout question. Possible mistake by OP during formatting? 

I noticed the same issue with a few of the other Qs.

Makes sense. xD

[TIC 1050]

I'll be working on those issues, thanks for pointing those out. Pastebin is just an incredible mess. Only good thing was that this was recorded after the impersonators were banned.  :)

 

 

Finished updates on the topic:

 

• Fixed questions will have the ✓ Symbol, please point out other issues as I will be reviewing. This is just a safeguard in case I missed some.
• Reviewing includes; Searching for missing context/questions, typo errors and such.
• Added images on sources for better referencing, clickable images brings you to direct source.

Edited November 13, 2013 by TIC321

[kichilron 8550]

I see someone has read the spoiler-topic.

 

 

Not really much new to read there, sadly. Yet again it's proven that we will have to wait and one day it's just going to be there. Most likely released while I'm sleeping. So I won't have a copy.

[DropBearChick 1216]

thx for this

[TIC 1050]

You're welcome :) Hope you enjoy the read a lot better than the original.