Needful things (simple additions to improve the game)

Game Talk The Drawing Board
41

[quote=“Wuzzy, post:40, topic:5570”]Let the safe mode also kick in when the player takes damage.

This could prevent situations like this: players walks to the west, holding down the key, walks on land mine (not dead yet), continues walking, walks on another land mine and dies. The first land mine may be bad luck, but the second land mine could have been avoided, because the player simply did not react fast enough. I am sure there are other uses of this tweak as well.[/quote]

This would sound pretty annoying actually, what about normal melee combat? How would it handle it? Only triggering it with traps?

I don’t know, it doesn’t seem like it would actually make you less unlikely to die from the trap either, you could always backtrack into another one by accident.

42

You don’t understand. If you are in normal melee combat and safe mode is on, you could not fight anyways, since you are seeing a hostile enemy. So if you are in a melee fight already, you would have turned off safe mode anyways, so the safe mode does not apply if you take damage in that melee fight.

And of course it does not make you less likely to walk into a trap. Safe mode is only there to protect the player to unintentionally walk too far, like walking directly into a zombie horde. Safe mode does not protect the player from bad luck or stupidity. ;-). My suggestion is really just the same thing with the safe mode you know already, there is just one more event which triggers it. Wheather and when safe mode is used is still up to the player.

43

[quote=“GlyphGryph, post:39, topic:5570”]Wait, did sewing machines get taken out at some point?

Hmm.[/quote]
I’ve never known sewing machines existing since I joined the project, so if they were taken out it’s been almost a year since they were in the game.

44

I agree about late game difficulty, I’ve never seen sewing machines and I think adding traps to safemode is a good idea.

45

Zombies should never be a ranged opponent. When more NPCs are in, I don’t think this will be an issue, since you’ll naturally have raiders, cannibals, rapists, ex-politicians and so on. I also think thats not a simple addition.

What might be cool though… I’ve never seen a river turn into a lake in game. We have tons of lakes in the NE. Heck, go a couple hundred miles east and you’ll hit an ocean. Might be a nice option to be able to turn on lakes in mapgen. Or even have an option where the map is normal north/south, but turns to desert in the loooooooooooong west, and ends in ocean in the east. Dunno, I guess its stupid, but some overall stuff like that would be cool.

At the very least, for a game set where I live, water should be more of a fact of life. You can’t walk a mile around here without hitting a stream. I can’t imagine dying for lack of thirst. You’d have to be a moron - and lakes are just -everywhere-. Lakes, boats, and so on - they really should be more present as a geographical feature, even if you don’t deal with the whole ocean thing.

I mean, heck, even if you ignore all the waterways around here…just look at the old coal mines. You’ll get more subsidence due to those then you’d -ever- get in a wetland, simply because you have whole areas underneath entire cities peppered with 2-4 hundred year old coal mines. They subside enough now (you hear about it on occasion) - I can just imagine what they’d be like after the sewers let out and flooding set in. Plenty of old flooded mines dot the area already. Supposedly there’s usually good fishing in them, but I wouldn’t know, you wouldn’t catch me dead doing something as stupid as that.

I guess I’m just saying that some more northeastern features in general would be nice, as the area feels more ‘generic suburban/suburban-rural US’ right now.

46

Hmm, things present in the NE-US that we don’t have in game. Some of these may have been said in here already, others are definitely mentioned in other threads we’ve had.

Car Dealerships? Would need balance so they’re not just free vehicles obviously. Either they’d be all stolen by people who freaked out and tried to “get away” or badly damaged for some reason.

Strip Malls. Just a big rectangle of storefronts with a big parking lot out front. Then make it choose, at random off a list, to spawn mini versions of normal stores inside each of the store-fronts that spawn. So a small clothing store, or pharmacy, or sporting goods store, etc. Good place to stick small “take-out” style restaurants too.

Speaking of restaurants, do we have them broken up into various styles yet? Pizza Place / Asian Food / etc? If not, would be fun and add variety to things now that we have such an expansive food list.

Orchards. Big honking patches of equally spaced apple trees, etc. Being the NE-US, this exists so would make perfect sense in game.

Summer-Camps. Bunch of bunk houses in the middle of nowhere, maybe spawn with their own lake or pond. Add some horrible stuff to them for that 80s horror movie vibe if you want. Dead campers & zombie children, etc. Bonus points if you make one with all “fat zombie” spawns as a nod to “fat camps”. :stuck_out_tongue:

Toy Stores. Good place to find random plastic crap to break down?

“As Seen on TV Store”. Store full of completely useless crap that probably doesn’t work. These exist and are awesome to wander through and laugh at. (Google them if you don’t know what I mean for a better example.) Would be fun to put a bunch of random useless junk in there with descriptions that are purposefully vague and confusing. “A … Chop-o-Salad-204X? This year’s newest version of an unwanted and ill designed tool for the purposes of only chopping salad. It replaces, basically, a kitchen knife but costs more and is made of cheap materials that are probably not even safe for use on food.” Disassemble the random stuff for actual useful things (taking apart the salad chopper gives you plastic chunks and, say, a sharp blade you can use to craft something actually useful with or butcher/slice things up).

Government Buildings. Post Office was mentioned. What about ‘agent’ style buildings & zombies… like, FBI/CIA style offices and sites. This could include ‘Black Sites’ where more secret things go on. These would probably benefit from multiple Z-levels when implemented.

Train station.

Bus station.

Junk Yard.

Warehouses.

2 Likes
47

Construction sites…?

1 Like
48

Driving Tutorial.

A start with nothing, as far as the eye can see, and instructions on driving, and infinite gas.

Driving is -damn near impossible-. I’ve been playing with it for an hour, and am no closer to it making sense. I’m on a freaking unicycle, and I cheated myself a driving skill of 10, and it takes an -entire road- to turn about 30 degrees. Its insane. Its by far the strangest driving system I have ever seen. I mean, the rest of the game is great, but I have no idea why so many people on these forums talk about using cars. -nothing turns-.

1 Like
49

SkateBoards: A simple transport that you could throw in a backpack. It could act similar to a sleeping bag, you activate it and place it down then you could use it as a regular vehicle, and when your down you deactivate it as an item and put it up.
And to balance it out, it would take up a large amount of space, you would need to high or average dexterity to not fall off of it.

50

Hey, friendly reminder: we’re trying to get specific things that folks can nail out fairly quickly and without significantly restructuring the code. New small buildings are one such thing; new hostiles need a bit more work but can be managed. “Increase late-game difficulty” is way too vague.

Thanks for helping us help you.

51

I like the skateboard idea.

52

Not sue if this’d be easy, but…

Mass graves and ‘mounds’ of bodies.

There has been, after all, some resistancce and fighting and military actions. The bodies of destroyed zombies and murdered civilians have to be tossed somewhere. Imagine walking into a city and passing by a veritable /pile/ of bodies all tossed atop each other in front of some store front, or outside a lab. This may not have much of an impact on gameplay, but I’d argue it’d certainly add to the environment and feel.

2 Likes
53

That’s a good idea.

54

[quote=“Goombah, post:52, topic:5570”]Not sue if this’d be easy, but…

Mass graves and ‘mounds’ of bodies.

There has been, after all, some resistancce and fighting and military actions. The bodies of destroyed zombies and murdered civilians have to be tossed somewhere. Imagine walking into a city and passing by a veritable /pile/ of bodies all tossed atop each other in front of some store front, or outside a lab. This may not have much of an impact on gameplay, but I’d argue it’d certainly add to the environment and feel.[/quote]

Fema camps have mass graves.

55

[quote=“jimboblordofeskimos, post:54, topic:5570”][quote=“Goombah, post:52, topic:5570”]Not sue if this’d be easy, but…

Mass graves and ‘mounds’ of bodies.

There has been, after all, some resistancce and fighting and military actions. The bodies of destroyed zombies and murdered civilians have to be tossed somewhere. Imagine walking into a city and passing by a veritable /pile/ of bodies all tossed atop each other in front of some store front, or outside a lab. This may not have much of an impact on gameplay, but I’d argue it’d certainly add to the environment and feel.[/quote]

Fema camps have mass graves.[/quote]

I almost never go to those so I’ve never seen it. That said, I mean in the cities themselves, or in the woods… things that just make you go ‘whoa, what the heck happened HERE?’ add to the story.

56

Corpses. Considering that soldiers, scientists, and drug dealers can die without always turning into zombies, you’d expect that other people might have just died without becoming zombies either. Sometimes, however, some of these corpses could actually be ‘traps’ that turn into zombies when you get close. In turn, you should also be able to (s)mash corpses with bullets from a distance. This will make the world feel both more lived in, and add tension to the game.

Appliances and computers. Seems strange that most houses go without microwaves, coffee makers, laundry machines, laptops, etc.

Driveways and garages. This is a big one, in my opinion. There is far too little parking for how many cars are strewn about. Not all of them have to be occupied, but it would at least give residential buildings some extra space. Metro buses would also be a good add.

2 Likes
57

Microwave ovens would be nice, yeah. In fact, if you power one, you could let you regain the hot bonus for a ‘hot meal’ from previously prepared food.

Oh, and I’d also considering adding a ‘Crazed Survivor’ monster in some houses, basements, and LMOE shelters. Not quite an NPC. But a /completely/ crazy survivor who immediately throws himself at you and tries to kill you, shouting things like, “NOT ONE OF THEM! NOT ONE OF THEM!” and potentially raising a racket and drawing zombies to your location.

58

Yeah. I always enjoy hunting for human corpses with their great stuff. I’m actually kinda surprised they arn’t piled up as high as buildings in some places, though.

Regarding microwaves - brilliant! And the magnetrons inside of them should TOTALLY be a deconstructable item useful in some sort of plasma or energy based weapon.

I mean, hell, you can do all sorts of deadly tinkering with them - and people do so now, IRL. Just watch youtube!

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59

It’d be great if the inventory screen highlighted the last item you picked up.

It gets a bit “wall of texty” a times.

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60

sorting options in the craft menu would be nice and maybe a counter to say how many of each recipe you can make. a counter for ingredients number would be nice, too.