Before the beginning of the game there was chaos and disorder of old world. All the useful items were found by someone and used before the player gets the town. So there should be less items and hi-tech things should be really rare.
It will give more extemporization.
Also there are lot of items like lighter(100). Dont you guys think that they should drop with not full “charge” (esp. from zombies and everywhere except stores, but in stores they should be rare). They should be found like matchbook(4), gasoline lantern (off) (394), flashlight (off) (66).
Some things ought to be more common, and others rarer, but remember this is the future, so ‘high-tech’ is relative.
The world hasn’t been ended for all that long, and you already have to do a good deal of scavenging, universally decreasing loot drops would make the game more tedious, rather than more fun.
I definitely agree that a bunch of the future-tech is a bit too common, though.
When it comes to things with charges, that should probably wait until we have containers or a better inventory system, because otherwise you’ll be carrying around a dozen lighters with different charges that no longer stack, cluttering up your inventory and taking up extra keys.
Zombification critical mass was 5 days prior to game start. I’d say that if people looted everything, it ought to show up in car trunks, etc. As for consumables…well, my character can’t eat a whole Meat Pizza without either barfing it back up or taking 4-5 hours, minimum. (By comparison, I–personally–can account for 2 servings in one sitting, easily.) Where would the loot-eaters stick it all?
“Hey, there’s too much food here for us to eat and carry with us, but let’s just smush the rest of it. Wouldn’t want some other survivor to come by later and have it available, hmm?”
“Yeah! great idea!”