Project Zomboid

[Alienman]

Is Codex running a server?

 

[throwaway69420]

I don't see how you can make long term progress in the game unless you turn off infection, mod in a way to cure infection, or dump a shit ton of time into playing early game over and over until you get top tier game sense, are good enough to never get hit ever, and a crazy lucky world seed. Basically, the game will go from being impossible to totally trivial. Terrible difficulty curve. Having every hit from a zombie be a delayed instant-kill diceroll isn't good game design and it isn't fun for a game that demands massive time investment to do anything. And I mean MASSIVE. Maybe it's okay if you alternatively increase xp rates by 50x or more, and/or greatly increase resource spawn rates.

I don't like the idea of playing with mods as a baseline for a game to be enjoyable but so many games these days make progress so INCREDIBLY MOTHERFUCKING SLOW it's just not worth playing the game at that point. A working car seems to be the first step towards mid-term progress in Zomboid and if you don't luck out with an unlocked, pristine car with a gas can nearby, you're just fucked for many, many hours until you grind enough skill to hotwire if you avoid getting one hit killed by a trash mob. This is unpaid, boring work that is not cultivating any real life skills at that point, not having fun playing a videogame. A total waste of time, and it pisses me the fuck off that anyone thinks this is acceptable in a videogame, especially developers.

I guess you could argue the devs said it's supposed to be a sim, but that's clearly a joke when they have a cartoon raccoon mascot as the face of their game. If I made a life sim where you need to spend 80+ years in real life to complete a playthrough, what value would there be in that? Wasting the audiences time and disrespecting them through that waste only works if you have some sort of moral or philosophical high ground and can teach them something from the experience, but Zomboid just wastes your time for no reason.

Maybe they should add a "game" mode on top of the default "simulator" mode where you can make progress in a reasonable time, which would make infection being a mechanic less aggregious. Improving your character as-is is totally miserable. 30000 xp needed to level your two core mechanics from 5/10 to 6/10 when most actions give a quarter of a single XP lmao fucking faggot devs. Latest update is great as far as features go the game itself is just not good as a VIDEOGAME, which is what it is first and foremost.

 

[Hace El Oso]

I won’t pick apart everything untrue or that I disagree with (you seem very frustrated or like the game just isn’t to your taste), but I will say that I regularly accumulate maybe a half dozen scratches from zombies in a game month and usually beat the odds.

Spoiler

20% infection chance with scratches I believe

I even survived a bite to the testicles once, but I believe that’s been patched out since.

Stealth and patience are the name of the game if you want to be long lived. If not, you could just stock up on XP-giving VHS tapes to run through after you get your previous character killed.

 

[Perkel]

Just increase amount of zombies + make them faster + switch off zombification from scratches/bites + enable option take down + disable multihit + extreamy rare everything. I guarantee you will be shiting bricks non stop and amount of mileage you will get will be depending on your skills.

Imho zombification from scratches/bites simply doesn't fit to type of game it tries to be. Moreover with it you can't experience fully health system as just stupid scratch will be death for you, so you will never break a leg, you will never have lacerations and so on that require better aid.

On other hand when you make new character for same game you are playing on same map, you can reuse your base if you had one.

Zombification, works great in multiplayer in bigger groups as there is skill redundancy but for it to work great you really need to crank up zombies amount.

 

[Yosharian]

Guys this game is absolutely amazing and I have made some builds for it

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2691971477

That is all.

 

[Yosharian]

Also stop fucking whining about infection mechanics, if you don't like them just turn them off

 

[Theodora]

How are people finding Louisville to their expectations?

Is generally great to see more people stumbling across PZ, and people like Klean giving it lots of attention; I can't help think it was a real mistake leaving the release branch on build 40 for so long, for the visual improvements alone if nothing else. The old screenshots advertising it on Steam looked so dated, build 41 almost seems like a sequel in comparison! (Nevermind all the QoL improvements.)

 

[Yosharian]

Yeah I remember looking at the older game and thinking it looked really bad, the graphics have a real charm to them right now IMO. Not that graphics are everything though, the gameplay is what's keeping me hooked

 

[Hace El Oso]

The graphics are indeed very charming, the perfect fit for it. It's funny how strongly it reminds me of The Sims, though:

 

[cretin]

Some friends and I have been playing this recently. I'm always finding an excuse to alt-tab or fuck off while they autistically doll house simulator for men. Which is what this game devolves into frequently. These guys spent the past few days turning a property into a fortress and stocking it up with crates, refrigerators and a walk in armory.

It bores the shit out of me. Every time we play zomboid its the same thing: spawn, get essentials which are everywhere, then go raid a gunstore or police station or military checkpoint. Load it all up into cars for several trips. Now you're armed and armored to the teeth and there's nothing left to do but play house.

Yet, I can't stop thinking about this game. Or rather, what this game could be.

The best moments in this game come from unexpected encounters that quickly spiral out of control - you're searching a building and you open a door and a mass of zombies spills forth, your friend trips over a body, you barricade yourselves in a room for respite but are literally trapped, and so on. Such moments are few and far between in practice because you're always building some autistic retard's dream apocalypse house. And of course, there's no actual reason beyond LARPing to go most places and put yourself in such situations.

I implored my friend to try ramping things up and eventually got him to concede to changing the zombies from shamblers to "random" which includes sprinters. Big surprise, despite his reluctance to do so, it immediately improved the game for all involved, things were suddenly much more dangerous and chaotic. I really fucking hate zombie lore fags, there's nothing scary or foreboding about cunts who move like a geriatric that you can literally walk around. Ohhh y-you just d-dont get it, its about the inevitability! It's inevitable I'll shit myself out of boredom.

Then that got me thinking, what really sucks about this game is how tame it is. Zombies are lame. My vision of zomboid is closer to Cataclysm DDA, or STALKER; It should be as weird and chaotic as possible. The environment should be as considerable a threat as the geeks are. Instead of zombies you should have semi-intelligent (half retarded?) vampires that scream "Come out, Neville!", there should be vicious packs of dogs, flying demons, giant spiders.

There's a great basis for the action and survival gameplay, yet I'm not aware of - any - efforts towards this direction in the modding community, everything is towards stardew valley with guns. The most popular mods aim towards increasing the complexity of the most mind numbingly boring aspects of the game.

 

[Yosharian]

Uhhh have you visited the city? You're not going to get 'bored' I assure you, it's a fucking hellhole

 

[cretin]

Uhhh have you visited the city? You're not going to get 'bored' I assure you, it's a fucking hellhole

There's no organic gameplay reason to. As I said, you have to force yourself to do such things or you invent LARPs to do so.

 

[Yosharian]

Uhhh have you visited the city? You're not going to get 'bored' I assure you, it's a fucking hellhole

There's no organic gameplay reason to. As I said, you have to force yourself to do such things or you invent LARPs to do so.

Well ok I guess

 

[Üstad]

First time playing but I'm annoyed because UI feels clunky. I click the loot tab, but it doesnt go away. I click to loot all nothing happens. I can't even do the bareminimum. And so far didnt find a guide or thread adress these retardo newbie problems I'm having.

 

[Alienman]

Hmmm, you should have two inventories open. One for you, and one for the area near you. Then you drag items from one to the next, depending on if you wanna throw stuff away or pick up things.

 

[Üstad]

The game is too quiet except for the jumpscare effects, weird. Also got a card during my first day with my new char. Got lots of food, idk what to do, where to go. I don't know what am I doing and acting without a plan.

 

[JamesDixon]

I'm revising my opinion on this. The game is pretty good, especially with mods. The tank controls need to be gotten used to at first.

 

[Üstad]

Any way to make loot respawn only once in a year? Max settings for loot respawn is once every 2 month.

 

[typical user]

Bought it recently to play with a friend and he cockblocked me by taking a break from playing games for the past week.

So I tried solo runs. Died a lot.

My first embarassing death which I won't forget was when I managed to learn how to hot-wire cars. I had to escape the town of Riverside due to helicopter so I took a scenic route west. Found a fishing accessories shop, broke inside tripping an alarm. Was thinking there were not a lot of zombies in sticks so I began looting for fishing rods and other stuff. Building got swarmed and zombies began pouring in through the window I broke and smashing every other. So I made a galaxy-brain move to try and punch zombie trying to get in through one of back windows and try to jump outside. Got stuck for a moment and bitten either by him or those which got to me from inside. The Megamind strat here wasn't just trying to force myself through a window but ignoring stairs almost adjecent to the window. Y'know, run on 2nd floor, open a window there, jump outside - easy peasy. If it was a gunstore then at least it would sound somewhat logical and epic to die but I got myself killed over a fishing bait, all things considered.

Second time wasn't any better, I attracted 10 zombies and was already tired so I dashed for a school in Riverside to have some rest - and it is also where I parked the van as I was in the middle of relocating my base. In the chase I got a brilliant thought to grab a hammer from my old house as i was running by it and ignored the threat. Again, I tried pushing through a zombie in a doorframe which followed me in instead of using kitchen door outside. Got bit in an arm. Over a fucking hammer, not even sledge but regular nail hammer. And i probably got a spare too, and was followed by probably 3 zombies tops.

Still much better than hopping right into Multiplayer, starting in Muldraugh, running outside to meet with my friend only to get eaten alive by one zombie in front of my house within first 5 ingame minutes.

My current characters are a lot more cautious and successful so far. One of my greatest success was burning down half of main street of Muldraugh with one molotov and shooting stragglers with pump shotgun in between smoking cigarrettes. Managed to clear the path to VHS store, police station, bookstore and gas station. Unfortunately I did not burn down the woods as I expected, the zombies which I lured there barely lit couple of trees before perishing to dust. But the aftermath of hundreds of burned or shotgunned corpses is a magnificent view. Or you could say this was another day in Kentucky.

My endgame goal is to get to Louisville and claim one of the 6-floor apartment buildings across Knox Bank downtown and settling on top floor. I am kinda worried about zombie spawns from Apocalypse settings, it already is annoying to have constant firemen spawns in front of fire depot in Rosewood after clearing the perimiter at least five times. I am worried zombies will spawn on multiple floors even when I destroy stairs and fully clear the building. But maybe my characters will die, if so then I will hop in sandbox and disable respawns.

So far this game is a blast and I haven't even managed to survive one month yet.

 

[Yosharian]

Bought it recently to play with a friend and he cockblocked me by taking a break from playing games for the past week.

So I tried solo runs. Died a lot.

My first embarassing death which I won't forget was when I managed to learn how to hot-wire cars. I had to escape the town of Riverside due to helicopter so I took a scenic route west. Found a fishing accessories shop, broke inside tripping an alarm. Was thinking there were not a lot of zombies in sticks so I began looting for fishing rods and other stuff. Building got swarmed and zombies began pouring in through the window I broke and smashing every other. So I made a galaxy-brain move to try and punch zombie trying to get in through one of back windows and try to jump outside. Got stuck for a moment and bitten either by him or those which got to me from inside. The Megamind strat here wasn't just trying to force myself through a window but ignoring stairs almost adjecent to the window. Y'know, run on 2nd floor, open a window there, jump outside - easy peasy. If it was a gunstore then at least it would sound somewhat logical and epic to die but I got myself killed over a fishing bait, all things considered.

Second time wasn't any better, I attracted 10 zombies and was already tired so I dashed for a school in Riverside to have some rest - and it is also where I parked the van as I was in the middle of relocating my base. In the chase I got a brilliant thought to grab a hammer from my old house as i was running by it and ignored the threat. Again, I tried pushing through a zombie in a doorframe which followed me in instead of using kitchen door outside. Got bit in an arm. Over a fucking hammer, not even sledge but regular nail hammer. And i probably got a spare too, and was followed by probably 3 zombies tops.

Still much better than hopping right into Multiplayer, starting in Muldraugh, running outside to meet with my friend only to get eaten alive by one zombie in front of my house within first 5 ingame minutes.

My current characters are a lot more cautious and successful so far. One of my greatest success was burning down half of main street of Muldraugh with one molotov and shooting stragglers with pump shotgun in between smoking cigarrettes. Managed to clear the path to VHS store, police station, bookstore and gas station. Unfortunately I did not burn down the woods as I expected, the zombies which I lured there barely lit couple of trees before perishing to dust. But the aftermath of hundreds of burned or shotgunned corpses is a magnificent view. Or you could say this was another day in Kentucky.

My endgame goal is to get to Louisville and claim one of the 6-floor apartment buildings across Knox Bank downtown and settling on top floor. I am kinda worried about zombie spawns from Apocalypse settings, it already is annoying to have constant firemen spawns in front of fire depot in Rosewood after clearing the perimiter at least five times. I am worried zombies will spawn on multiple floors even when I destroy stairs and fully clear the building. But maybe my characters will die, if so then I will hop in sandbox and disable respawns.

So far this game is a blast and I haven't even managed to survive one month yet.

Not that I'm tooting my own horn or anything, but I have some builds in my sig which you might find useful

 

[thesecret1]

The biggest issue in this game for me is that after you secure your safehouse and stock it with supplies, there's not much to do. No objective to strive towards.

 

[ItsChon]

I've recently been hearing more and more about this game out of thin air it seems. Can I get some quality Codexer insight on the game's overall quality? A rough description about what to expect? How is the multiplayer aspect to the game?

 

[thesecret1]

I've recently been hearing more and more about this game out of thin air it seems. Can I get some quality Codexer insight on the game's overall quality? A rough description about what to expect? How is the multiplayer aspect to the game?

It's really good. Especially in MP (SP gets stale quick, imo). Really detailed and fun. Expect to die over and over as you figure out the game, and to tour lots of interesting places filled with zombies. Sadly, once you learn the game and manage to survive comfortably, you'll find the game getting boring fast, as there's not much of a difficulty curve (there's some, such as electricity and water shutting off, but it's still too little), nor is there anything to strive towards. I'm hoping the introduction of NPCs will change that, though that's still a couple years away.

Worth the money though.

 

[Theodora]

My endgame goal is to get to Louisville and claim one of the 6-floor apartment buildings across Knox Bank downtown and settling on top floor. I am kinda worried about zombie spawns from Apocalypse settings, it already is annoying to have constant firemen spawns in front of fire depot in Rosewood after clearing the perimiter at least five times. I am worried zombies will spawn on multiple floors even when I destroy stairs and fully clear the building. But maybe my characters will die, if so then I will hop in sandbox and disable respawns.

So far this game is a blast and I haven't even managed to survive one month yet.

Quite a lot of people play with the apocalypse preset but reduce the respawn settings -- particularly in recently visited cells, so you don't randomly get zeds continuing to pop up out of nowhere in what should be your 'safe zone' outside your immediate base. (That doesn't mean you can't get herds roaming in, but that you don't find buildings being repopulated in that area.)

This is also independent from the initial increase in z-pop over the first month or so in-game, so turning down one shouldn't impact the other.

Welcome to PZ!

The biggest issue in this game for me is that after you secure your safehouse and stock it with supplies, there's not much to do. No objective to strive towards.

It's worth trying the harder scenarios if you haven't already, and there's some genuinely amazing community maps. I'm not normally one to go nuts on mods, but the community here is pretty special in that regard. Eerie Country and Cherbourg are two you should definitely check out if you haven't already, the former being a big extension to Knox, and the latter being set in France and thus being entirely novel in its assets and architecture. IIRC its creator actually got hired by the indie stone -- they do this quite a lot actually, more than I've seen with any other commercial game. His work is in no small part responsible for the big facelift a lot of areas have got in recent areas, though that does come with the downside of Cherbourg getting updated much less.

Though I originally wanted to reply to ask if you'd followed the team's blog at all. They're a small team and not exactly fast at pushing out major updates, but they are very transparent about their work. https://projectzomboid.com/blog/news/

A lot of their current work revolves around improving the late game, with the next major build meant to introduce animal NPCs, hunting and animal husbandry, and a massive crafting rework that'll include a lot of 'late game' production and specialisations. I'm not exactly passionate about DIY plumbing, but the systems they're adding look set to add whole new aspects to the game, both early and late.

How is the multiplayer aspect to the game?

If you have friends who'd be willing to play it with you, absolutely go for it.

Fwiw though, I suspect it'd be easier to learn by yourself -- assuming the same settings -- since you don't have the clock ticking on while you're away (perishable foods spoiling, the power going out, things like that).

 

[Tweed]

Is this a game yet? I've owned it since way back when you had to buy one of the shitty "complete" games in order to get it because regulations at the time didn't let them sell incomplete games.