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[jester]

Id like to see alot longer term thinking than cataclysm, more base building and getting set up properly than the running about hoping to survive past day 3 that cataclysm is.  Stuff like scavenging/jury rigging a generator to do basic manufacturing/other stuff you need power for, say a freezer (waterpumps, well digging gear, a cow, 50 sheets of glass to make a hot house, cement mixers).  Snagging a forklift and armoring it up so you can then do a run to grab a metal lathe.  Seeing those big ticket items but really having to put work and planning into actually getting them back to the base rather than focusing on the small stuff like cataclysm, though ive gotta admit I have no idea how you add the survival part to the base building.

  Also adding the random character creation like LCS, Id like my team to be a combination of swat assault troops and crossbow toting survivalists, instead ive managed to drag a taxi driver, 2 crackheads, an 80 year old and a nicotine addicted circus monkey named pete out of the wreckage of society and will have to make the best of it

[Fniff]

In my opinion, the two biggest problems with Cataclysm are these:

1. There are zombies EVERYWHERE. I know it's an apocalypse, but there should be an AI director style where sometimes you are given a chance at least. The Left 4 Dead style is annoying with hunger and boredom. I want a few quiet moments to contrast with the "FIRE FIRE THROW A MOLOTOV RUUUUUN!"
2. World seems flat. Nothing seems like it's looted if you didn't loot it already, there is no civvie corpses and there isn't even any fires. Even if there was an evacuation, there should be more signs of battle. I would be perfectly happy with just a few preset things, but it would be even cooler with randomly generated placements of corpses and barricades. Even the Alpha of this game at this point feels a bit more apocalyptic.

If you can fix these problems if you wanna take some notes from Cataclysm, that'd be great.

[mainiac]

This has probably been answered before but I've forgotten by now.  Will this game have LCS style management between raids?

[Jonathan S. Fox]

This has probably been answered before but I've forgotten by now.  Will this game have LCS style management between raids?

For awhile, that was the plan. Right now, I'm planning to make it a continuous single-character game, eventually adding recruiting other survivors after the initial release and moving toward more LCS-style features. I am planning to have some kind of management like that -- including an interface overlay, scrollable world map, some resource management -- but raids may just be implicit when you decide to leave the safehouse with other survivors in tow, not a once-per-day change in game mode. My thoughts in this area have changed over time, so these things may change when the game is further along.

[mainiac]

I think the once-a-day raids should be in.  With zombie games it's very important to have a sense of climax and downtime.  That would work very well if every raid is it's own unique entity. You move into the zombie infested area and things are low key at much, the zombies are thinly spread and not very alert.  But as you move towards your objective more zombies arrive and they become more aggressive.  You get/do what you came for and then it's time to escape as the hordes arrive and overwhelm the location.  Once your escape is complete you return to your hideout to lick your wounds and decide where to go next.

[Jonathan S. Fox]

I think the once-a-day raids should be in.  With zombie games it's very important to have a sense of climax and downtime.  That would work very well if every raid is it's own unique entity. You move into the zombie infested area and things are low key at much, the zombies are thinly spread and not very alert.  But as you move towards your objective more zombies arrive and they become more aggressive.  You get/do what you came for and then it's time to escape as the hordes arrive and overwhelm the location.  Once your escape is complete you return to your hideout to lick your wounds and decide where to go next.

I agree insofar as that's a really cool design and would work very well. I can see a much more LCS-loyal design than what I ended up waffling toward that uses a tile-based overmap and dispatches to local maps. The strategic game would be a hybrid between LCS and Rebuild, and the "massive conservative response" would be replaced by packs of zombies shuffling into the area in response to gunshots.

The decision to move toward a roguelike design rather than doing this was a direct result of deciding to focus on making the core combat as interesting as possible and set the grander strategic aspects aside for later. That really shunted a lot of LCS features off the immediate design table, replacing them with sandbox stuff. I think that if I were to approach this project again from scratch, with the same goals I had from the beginning, I would be far less ambitious about the combat system, and aim to make fights just a dramatized version of what LCS does. It would save me a lot of time and end up with a very different game than what my choice to use a more action-based combat system led me toward.

Ultimately, although I'm not doing this, I think it's a good idea. It's just that I can only do one thing at a time, and I think I need to push ahead with the current concept -- which has its own merits -- before going back to the drawing board. If I do get done with this project and decide it didn't achieve my initially established goals of creating a game that captures the gameplay of LCS, I won't rule out approaching the subject again, with or without this theme.

[MaximumZero]

And now I'm wondering why I just came upon this. Awesome work, as always, Fox!

[Jonathan S. Fox]

And now I'm wondering why I just came upon this. Awesome work, as always, Fox!

Thank you!

Also, while I haven't yet gone through and really thought through the suggestions in depth yet, I want to add a thank you to Aqizzar, jester, and Fniff, for your responses about Cataclysm and what you'd like to see in a game like this. I really value your input, and I don't want my lack of response to come across as not caring. I've just been distracted by other things recently (consulting job interview + personal relationship stuff + upcoming LCS release), and I want to revisit your posts when I'm able to give 100% focus to this game.

[Flying Dice]

I am also rather shocked to have just now noticed this thread. This project is looking rather good, and I'm looking forward to a stable release! 


Regarding Cataclysm and this: In many ways, it isn't even a >zombie< game, more of a game which happens to have zombies in it. As other people have said, you should probably steer more towards a paced, cyclical feel to attacks, rather than the somewhat over-the-top constant, frantic action that is most of Cataclysm.


((Unrelated to this, but related to some of the comments: it is perfectly possible to last for weeks in Cataclysm, provided you put most of your effort into surviving while you set up 3 or 4 rings of spike pits around your shelter, and keep your main supply stash at least 1/4 of a map block away from your sleeping shelter, to protect against lightning strikes. Yeah, if you just rush about a city shooting off guns, you will die very quickly.))

[Fniff]

Instead of idle speculation, I decided to knuckle down and make some more short-term, probably not great ideas.

I decided to turn off my flashlight and see how long it took me to get noticed. I wouldn't mind this becoming an actual mechanic, since it combines both stealth and the utter fear that these undead just standing around will rip you apart if you make the slightest move in the wrong direction. However, unless they are previously alerted to your presence, they just stand around. Even if you get really close and attack them. They just consider you non-existent without the flashlight. So, there is no disadvantage to sneaking about without the flashlight. Here is a few ideas I had on this.

When the flashlight is off, your view should be more limited, even out on the street. Like, 4x4 (You can add more or less) with the player in the center without the flashlight.

Zombies react to sound by investigating the noise. This could mean a door opening, a window breaking, etc. If they find a fellow zombie, then they ignore it. If they find you with the flashlight on, it tries to kill you. If you didn't have your flashlight on, they go closer. If the player doesn't go away, then the zombie will sniff you out and try to kill you, along with all the other zombies in the area.

If you get too close to an undead, they'll peg you aren't a zombie and kill you. If you escape the area, they will try to hunt you down for a while, then forget about you and wander off. If you come back, they notice you. Yeah, it is kinda meant to be like Amnesia.

Just a few additions to make sure that a certain way of playing isn't foolproof.

[mainiac]

Bump?

[nenjin]

Shhhhh, he's working

[Jonathan S. Fox]

Pressed pause to work on another side project -- a boss rush shmup. Making games as a job is nice, but I don't have the starting capital to work on an extended project without pausing to actually make money part way through.

[Fniff]

How is this going right now? Might be a bit early, but patience... smaytience?

[Jonathan S. Fox]

How is this going right now? Might be a bit early, but patience... smaytience?

I think it's coming along well, but the later stages involve a lot of polishing and revising, so it's hard to say what the timeline will look like. I'll post when we have some stuff we're ready to show off.