Here is a feature complaint, which I’m calling a regression issue.
For all of 2017, now – I am not sure exactly when, but not forever for Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead, I have been downloading experimental builds to see if one single matter was changed back to how it used to be:
That matter is the fact that zombies can actually see you by observing security cameras which you are using to view them. Vexingly, they will know where you are even if you are viewing them through a remote vehicle, but a simpler, more direct test of the issue is as follows:
- Start a brand new game, e.g. with Play Now.
- Get outside and spawn a vehicle with the debug menu, something enclosed which has security cameras, where you can hide and see things from. You guessed it – an APC. You could also build something simpler, maybe a wall of boards with a camera and appropriate controls, and a power source. Ideally, like with the APC, your test vehicle should be completely enclosed. Or else it should be raining, the point being to mask your scent.
- Get to the camera controls and turn it on, and make sure it works to view the world. Such wondrous things, ahhh, cameras – such potential for delightful surveillance! Ahem, anyway. Do take note of a spot of terrain in an open area by your vehicle, between which and you are boards.
- Now turn the camera system off, observing the inky blackness for a serene moment, and don’t move. Not one step.
- Now, spawn a zombie in the inky blackness where you had memorized terrain as previously seen from through the camera. You did memorize that terrain, right?
- Wait several turns… The suspense… Did it hear you? Does it smell you? Can it detect you in any way?
- When satisfied that the zombie cannot detect you, go ahead and turn the camera system on without taking any noisy steps.
- Observe in abject horror as the zombie lumbers towards your vehicle’s boards and proceeds to smash and crash against it, trying to get to the precious cargo within, now able to see YOU through the electronic lens of the security camera! AGHH IT’S THROUGH ALREADY, LET GO OF MY ARM!! AGHHHHH!!!
I have noticed some posts here about inadvertent changes made to security cameras in 2016. “I apparently also changed the security cameras?”, etc. I suppose 2016 was when this mess all started.
Posted here under Needful Things because although I have played CDDA since 0.6 (ordinarily I report bugs through email), I can’t play anymore without this issue being dealt with. My tactics are all for naught, even the ones I used before security cameras, because of new and challenging areas where I keep saying, “I could really use a security camera – oh wait, they’re broken, that’s right! WHAT IS THAT?! OWW MY LEG!!”
Thank you, and great job on CDDA as a whole.
