Ive been playing Cataclysm for a few years now (of course not constantly ^^) and recently “finished” another run after becoming more or less unkillable.
After thinking about ways to increase the difficulty (without screwing over newbies) ive had this idea:
Zombies or more accurately the blob become aware of you specifically after a while.
The blobs objective is to invade earth and probably the rest of the dimension and its very intelligent though not while it inhabits the zombies. While im not entirely sure if it possesses a hivemind it should be able to gather at least some intelligence about your exploits.
A survivor who cleared several towns and survived a hulk, the strongest “soldier” of the blob, should merit some attention at least.
So after you meet some requirements special hordes would come after you.
These would originate from a special rare laboratory. While the labs as they are now researched pretty much everything these labs were meant to research XE037 exclusively, where it was observed in conditions similar to its homeworld/plane. There the blob could assume its natural form (whatever that is) and of course be much more intelligent.
Now after the cataclysm these labs could form command centers of the blob and produce much more elite zombies (or other things). Maybe survivor zombies get herded there and implanted with a limited “blob brain” enabling them to use ranged weapons.
These “elites” would follow the player over great distances and use at least limited tactics and might even adapt.
For example if you constantly drive around in a deathmobile with tons of turrets installed they would not attack while you were near it and would try to remain unseen (or even more terrifying use a rocket launcher). They might ambush you after you looted yet another lab waiting on the top floor. If you survived an ambush composed of enemies that use electricity and took no damage from it, because you wore a faraday suit you wont get that same enemy composition for a while at least.
They could mine the roads leading to your base or install other traps at high value targets.
Maybe burn down that forest you fled into after escaping?
Perhaps even poison food at a grocery store you are likely to loot next.
And lots of other things that could surprise even hardened survivors.
Maybe warn the player beforehand (one day before) to instill paranoia like “Just before you fall asleep you hear something whisper outside.”, “You feel watched.” or when coming back to your (unsecured) base “Something feels wrong”/“You smell something rotten.”
One of the ambushers could drop a map to the special lab (perhaps left in a pocket by the previous owner of that body) and a keycard enabling the player to end the threat in that area for some time or permanently.
Earlier i mentioned survivor zombies being “upgraded” in these labs, which could mean after you finally die and start with another character you could meet your old self. Perhaps as a boss at the aforementioned lab? The difficulty and loot of such an encounter would balance itself. ^^
This should provide players a challenging endgame without making the early game harder. The requirements for attracting the attention of the blob could be set in the world options (abstracted as a number) when you start a new game.
Sorry if my english failed me somewhere (x
