Hey guys, sup author-dude. Just dropping by with some remarks, critiques, and what have you.
First off, this game is fun. I really like where it's going, and I've enjoyed it for hours and hours already, but there's a problem. I'm the goddamn Juggernaut. The only thing that can kill me, it seems, is a crafty Black-Ops man with an army rifle. In my current game I've survived more than fifty days, have stockpiled an additional twenty or so days worth of food, I've raided one C.H.A.R. office already (with the help of zombies anyway) and I have army rifle ammo and medical supplies coming out of my ears. I can do this with some routine, and after you overcome the learning curve it seems pretty easy to make it this long even without followers. So, believe it or not... I think the game is actually too easy. Maybe I'm missing something. I tend to scour the districts I'm in and play cautiously, but the enemies and what have you don't seem terribly aggressive, and grizzled 57-day World-War-Z veteran Bob McGready is finally getting bored with smashing zombie skulls with a huge hammer. If you can ever become bored with such a thing.
So, I'll admit that my play hasn't been terribly exhaustive, but after looking at the game assets I can say that I've uncovered most of what the game has to offer. Some of the harder enemies have yet to appear in large numbers, but even Disciples are easy pickings. I remain enthusiastic that I'll discover and be mauled by new and terrifying foes (that don't use guns) as I continue my quest to survive for a whole year straight, but my interest is beginning to shift toward every gamer's favorite meta-game: plugging the developer with countless banal suggestions!
1. Zombies are supposed to be dumb, sure, but these guys are way dumb. Ol' Bob McGready can hide out in his boarded up apartment for weeks without a zombie incursion. I recommend using a cellular automaton to govern the presence of scents in the game. The longer you linger in one space, the further your scent spreads until it reaches equilibrium with the rate of scent decay. Here's a diagram.
If scents decay slowly, staying in one spot will quickly produce a lingering cloud of 'you' around wherever you're hiding, especially if scent decay effects from rain only affect the outdoors. Due to the small size of the grid's data (you'd probably be working with a 2-D array of lists or something containing each actor's UID and how much of their stench is present) it shouldn't bog down the game too awfully bad. If a zombie steps into a tile that has scents, they should begin their usual tracking behavior, and try and track their prey through barricades. The result is that hiding in one spot is likely to attract zombies, eventually. Staying still in a fortified location should still work (and work well if you know what you're doing) but the increased likelihood of being detected would make things much more exciting.
2. An option to build free standing barricades could be nice, but it should require more wood than barricading a door or window. (Fully barricading a door requires about three pieces of wood. A free standing barricade should take at least six to finish.) This would allow you to replace doorways in the absence of furniture or to erect choke points in the streets, but it would be an expensive process.
3. One exceptionally reliable method I have found for disposing of zombies in a risk-free manner is to wait until they come within melee range, hit them, and step backward. They can't attack me, usually. While zombies can't and shouldn't run, short lunges (if the zombie actors have a stamina meter, they could wear out within a couple turns) would make this nearly game-breaking strategy impossible. Maybe you could just reserve it for fresh zombies that are still a little limber.
4. This is a more technical complaint. The game should employ an icon for items that are in your inventory or on the ground which is separate from the decorations used by the actors. (If this is already true and I've just missed it, I'm sorry.) I was working on a sweet ZX Spectrum style graphical overhaul when I realized it might make the actors look all kinds of stupid.
I read in the development notes that more extensive modding is going to be supported in the future, so I'm not too antsy about this. It'd just be nice if it were easier to tell the difference between items laying on the ground. If piles of items either had a corner icon indicating that there's a pile there or blinked between the various items laying on the same tile, that'd be fantastic too. Right now it takes a trained (and strained) eye to make out a few of the various bits and pieces. (For blinking tiles, they could blink over pieces of furniture they're stored on as well.)
5. I haven't noticed any of the zombified soldiers wearing their old gear. That should change. Armored zombies that take more hits would be a real treat. (Of course, when they mutate they should shed their armor in the process. That could get a little ridiculous.)
6. Lastly, sneaking! Zombies supposedly don't breathe, usually don't move too fast, and what about those crafty special agents that keep blowing my brains out? (And what about those of us who would rather avoid them?) Being able to sneak around and avoid spot-checks by other actors would make surviving certain encounters which are decidedly not weighted in the player's favor (Black-Ops tend to kill me instantly upon revealing them) more possible, and also make ambushes from the undead rank and file possible, especially in the dark. (Since zombies are guided by smell, sneaking around should have no effect on them!)
I'd also like to second the suggestions of unloading guns (Doom RL does this nicely) and maybe adding a little bit more variety to the items found in-game. And I'd love to pick your brain some time, this is a delightful project that many people have clearly been waiting a long time for.
Oh and, by the way... Why don't burning cars ever go out?
