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Project Zomboid
Asid:
Spooky Santa
20 December - nasKo
Hello! Merry impending Chrimble.
On Tuesday we ran a pretty successful Community Megatest using our new MP networking system that Bitbaboon Steve has concocted for us. Users generally reported a much smoother experience in overall play, and had a lot of fun with the storms, snow and admin-created blood moons.
This said, we did see a few potential issues around mega-hordes and vehicles that we need to investigate deeper – so didn’t want to inflict our Megatest settings as default ones on players over the Xmas break until we’re sure they’re the right ones.
To this end we’ll be running more Community Megatests in the near future, with different system settings – and some handy network debug tools that Steve is currently coding into the system.
We have, however, also released it into the public build today in Build 40.43[theindiestone.com] for server owners to play around with – and have already heard some positive feedback. In essence, and with a video deliberately set to explain it best, it looks a bit like this:
In this video there are the two visible circles around the MP player, and then the mini-circles which appear around the zombies. Essentially: every time a circle appears around a zombie it means it’s getting a position update over the network from the server and then wired into your game. The client’s zed placement signals are received – and then the game knows where to show the zed.
The essence of the system is that server operators can now adjust the circle of ‘close dangerous zeds’ and the circle of distant ‘no trouble zeds’ – and the update times. This will cut down on the network traffic taken up by faraway zombies on your screen, and reduce strain on servers as a whole.
[Please note that this vid is an example only and made to explain the system – we haven’t judged what the best radius for these circles are yet and will be running a series of Community Megatests to help us judge what works best.]
So… here comes the science!
In the vid the low priority (larger radius) dictates the zombies which are going to update on the update delta. So every x seconds they will get an update, and in the video you can see these as the pulses. [It’s set purposefully long on the video to highlight it].
Meanwhile the high priority zombies get updated every server frame, and it will send out the closest Y zombies within the smaller circle around the player.
• ZombieUpdateHighPriorty is the radius around the player for sending the high priority zombies.
• ZombieUpdateMaxHighPriority is a cap on the number of high detail ones to send, and it will send the closest zombies to the player up to this limit.
• ZombieUpdateRadiusLowPriority is the maximum radius to send the lower frequency updates to – at 45 this is essentially the entire screen at 1440p fully zoomed out.
• ZombieUpdateDelta is the time between sending these lower frequency larger blobs of zombies
In the Megatest the values we used were, so if you run a server give it a spin with these and see how it goes:
ZombieUpdateMaxHighPriority 6
ZombieUpdateDelta 0.7
ZombieUpdateRadiusLowPriority 45
ZombieUpdateRadiusHighPriority 20
The next Megatest, meanwhile, will use a smaller high priority radius but a larger cap – to see how it all responds to hordes. It’s all a balancing act, really, so let us know how you get on if you have a play with it yourself.
Sorry for the technical stuff! Here’s some Build 41 stuff to compensate, along with something seasonal that will be one day be stashed in a cupboard in the mall awaiting the Xmas season.
Grant and Zac have been finetuning the clothing and animation modules. Clothes are now shader-driven and individual Clothing items can have custom shaders for special fx. Animations now auto-reload when modified from the Editor, and Martin has also been hard at work adding new clothing outfits, and adding more variety to existing outfits. Here’s a quick vid.
We've been working hard on fine-tuning the Clothing and Animation modules. Clothes are now shader-driven and individual Clothing items can have custom shaders for special fx.
That’s about it for today but Russian holidays mean that Yuri and Stas will continue their 41 work over the Western Xmas on current issues with upturned vehicles and the gamepad bindings screen, respectively, while there’s plenty of other stuff bubbling under too.
There will be a Thursdoid next week, but it’ll be a brief one featuring anything people have done over the holidays, and then back properly in the New Year. Have a great one if you’re celebrating!
This week’s Walking Dead-style not belonging here from non_curo. A general list of stuff added to PZ, and vids of features being worked on, is kept here[projectzomboid.com] – so you don’t have to plough through endless dev blogs for info. The Centralized Block of Italicised Text would like to direct your attention to the PZ Wiki[pzwiki.net] should you feel like editing or amending something, and the PZ MailingList [projectzomboid.com]that can send blogs like this and patch notes direct to your mailbox. We also live on Twitter right here! Our Discord [discord.gg]is open for chat and hijinks too. Merry Xmas etc hohoho
Asid:
Zedsmoothening
10 Jan - nasKo
Hey all, quick run around the houses talking about who’s on what this week.
In anims-land for Build 41 Zac’s been looking at optimization, which we’ll be coming back to pretty routinely from this point – as we want to make sure everything is nice and smooth. Here he’s sorted out some locks in the render thread, and from the Before and After you can see a marked improvement in quality.
He’s also working on getting the shiny helmet / coats / leggings shader effect going for different clothing items, and also investigating with Mark as to why over the course of development with the animations system we’ve lost some of the earthy colours[projectzomboid.com] and harsher lighting that tended towards a slight over-saturation and bleached effect that doesn’t quite make the new character models fit the scene.
Animator Martin, meanwhile, is looking at all the different locations we’ve got on the map (and those still to come) and creating new outfits to discover in their cupboards and lockers – and likewise to find the local zeds dressed up in.
In other news:
Xeonyx, the creator of the much-loved New Denver / Slocan Lake map, is now working on Challenge Maps for the main game. These, including the Film Studio map we’ve discussed previously, will most likely be a part of Build 41. His current mission is a fictional map called Kingsmouth – a ‘paradise island’ vacation resort in the Caribbean. The map will feature vast hotels, seaside locales, a military installation and much more – but we’ll go quiet on it for now while Jamie gets on with his work. Here’s a quick screen from the map editor though.
Chris W continues his work on improving visuals within buildings – aiming for more Sims-style cutaways and the removal of the circle stencil we currently use. Here’s a quick before and after of the start of this work – the second image showing walls in the foreground cutting away to skirting height – with smooth transitions curving up to full height.
NOTE: Very much WIP and not a finished system, of course. The other room currently isn't cut but will be in the final version. This is just a sneak peak for the WIP system and showing off how the rounded corners look; the goal for the final version is improving vision, not limiting it.
Meanwhile:
• Yuri is working on improvements to the way we render the ground surfaces, especially road textures that have been rained on, to complement his recent improvements to how water appears in-game. (This said, right now, he’s shackling a hilarious car physics demon that’s sprung up on an internal server.)
• Stas just released an updated Controller Test beta[theindiestone.com] for those helping out with our gamepad improvement scheme. If you are interested in getting a free PZ code for your troubles, then join our band of testers[theindiestone.com].
• While BitbaboonMark does some TEA-side code repository movements and merging: RJ is doing some improvements to food crafting and prepping a (non-anims) forum test for his new loot table improvements, EP is doing some very exciting experimental work with a new player map system and Turbo is plotting his next move after the successful integration of his weather/shaders in Build 40. (Most likely picking up on his work on in-game devices, or maybe those seasonal sound effects we discussed before).
Community stuff:
We’d like to direct your attention to the new Hashima Island map by Woldren, a map based on an IRL location you might recognise as the place where James Bond shot a woman who had whiskey on her head in Skyfall. It’s pretty damn cool.
We’d also like to direct your attention to the Redboid server[theindiestone.com], which had a season refresh/reboot/restart yesterday and is a grand place to start your PZ MP adventures if you haven’t done so yet.
If you run a PZ server and would like a shout-out in a future blog, then please get in touch. And while you’re at it -please use these values in Bitbaboon Steve’s recent networking optimization options, as they certainly seem to be helping those currently using ’em.
ZombieUpdateMaxHighPriority=50
ZombieUpdateDelta=0.5
ZombieUpdateRadiusLowPriority=45.0
ZombieUpdateRadiusHighPriority=10.0
This week’s infested neighborhood from Dark Oracle. A general list of stuff added to PZ, and vids of features being worked on, is kept here[projectzomboid.com] –so you don’t have to plough through endless dev blogs for info. The Block of Italicised Text would like to direct your attention to the PZ Wiki[pzwiki.net] should you feel like editing or amending something, and the PZ MailingList [projectzomboid.com]that can send blogs like this and patch notes direct to your mailbox. We also live on Twitter right here! Our Discord [discord.gg]is open for chat and hijinks too.
Asid:
Spiffo’s Round-Up #5
4 Jun @ 2:43pm - nasKo
How do everyone. Back again for update #5, here’s the highlights of the last few weeks of Project Zomboid Build 41 development – compiled from the Thursday blogs that appear at http://www.projectzomboid.com/blog/ and on the PZ Steam boards.
First off, a quick vid that shows the current state of the internal test build.
We’re not going to tell you what’s changed beyond the general polish we’ve been doing, but please make sure your sound/speakers are turned up.
Read on
Asid:
Spiffo’s Round-Up #6
5 Jul @ 3:26pm - nasKo
Hi everyone, here’s the highlights of the last few weeks of Project Zomboid Build 41 development – compiled from the Thursday blogs that appear at http://www.projectzomboid.com/blog/ and on the PZ Steam boards.
First off, here’s the latest gameplay video taken from the internal test build – which shows off many of the developments we discuss in the blog below.
Read on
Asid:
Build 41 IWBUMS Beta out
Wed, 16 October 2019
The public ‘I Will Back Up My Save’ beta for the long-awaited Build 41 is now open for testing by the Project Zomboid community.
HOW?
The IWBUMS beta is accessible to anyone who plays Project Zomboid. Right click Project Zomboid in your Steam library and hit “Properties”. Then, navigate to the betas tab and select the “iwillbackupmysave” branch from the dropdown menu.
Those who test IWBUMS beta builds must be aware that what they’re playing is a work in progress.
IF YOU HAVE ANY PROBLEMS - MAKE SURE ALL MODS ARE DISABLED - then please try verifying the steam local cache within those same options. If this doesn't work, try a full uninstall and reinstall (while also deleting or renaming the installation folder as well as your user folder in C:UsersYourUsernameZomboid). Sometimes Steam updates can be buggy with big updates.
The beta is put out for public consumption for player feedback and bug reports. Please direct gameplay feedback to our forum beta release thread, and bugs to this section of our forums.
For further details on what IWBUMS testing entails, please check here.
WHAT?
Build 41 is the most fundamental and wide-ranging update that Project Zomboid has ever had. We intend it to be a stable foundation for us to build on for many years ahead. For this reason too,however, we anticipate a fairly long public beta while all the various issues presented to us by community testers are spotlit and remedied.
Some key features, primarily MP, are initially disabled in the IWBUMS beta build – and will be turned on during the testing process.
Build 41 currently contains:
• New gameplay styles: Builder, Brawler and Survivor
• More deadly ‘Survivor’ (Survival) gameplay balance – player can be dragged down by horde and feasted upon etc.
• New survivor abilities: sitting, sneaking, sprinting, jogging, racking, reloading, climbing, fence-jumping, collapsing and much much more.
• New combat, new weapons, new difficulty balance.
• New character creation – many, many different new clothing options both on spawn and discoverable in the world as loot or on zombies.
• New zombie behaviour: feasting on recent corpses, lolling against walls, falling over fences etc.
• Blood system that progressively bloodies bodies and clothing of survivors and zombies
• New injury system – movement and combat visibly hampered when injured. Lacerations now possible, an injury state that lies between bites and scratches.
• Improved gunplay: green/red aiming outline, new guns, improved racking and reloading, increased gun loot spawn.
• Zombie Death Scenes – zombies discovered in the situations in which people died. Prayer meetings, sports-viewing parties, survivor zeds wearing backpacks etc.
• Situational zombie type/clothing and inventories – cop zeds in police station, firemen zeds in burnt buildings, Chef zeds in restaurant kitchens, bride and groom zeds at a wedding ceremony in church etc.
• Clothing protection: different clothing provides different levels of protection from zombie attacks.
• Visibly ripped and damaged clothing.
• New Sims-style cutaway vision system.
• Vehicle handling improvements, resizing and appearance tweaks.
• Updated, remastered and improved Kentucky-themed soundtrack. Original music still in rotation, and also accessible through game options.
• New SFX: weaponry, zombie moans etc.
• New water visuals – including visible flow direction.
• New puddle system during heavy rain.
• Broken glass and related injuries.
• Garage doors may be opened / closed and shake when hit.
• New Challenge maps: Film Set and Kingsmouth Vacation Island
• 3D Store Mannequins – can be dressed however you like
• Working washing machines and driers
• Server-side saving: MP save system now in a server-side database. Offline SP-side, also means no more lost cars via irl power outages.
• New game cursor
• New level-up sound, and tweaked levelling system.
• Faint isometric aiming cursor that shows where you’re aiming in iso space.
• New loot balance and loot balance system: houses and stores now have loot in the containers you would expect from real life – and not in a jumble.
• Two tiers of loot priority – allowing for more realistic ‘filler’ loot amidst the more valuable gameplay items.
• Many, many general fixes including remedies for: floating cars, farming issues, inaudible house alarms, erosion shrubs blocking vehicles, desensitized survivors being panicked by crawlers and much more.
• VISIBLE BACKPACKS!
Build 41 and is the first (biggest) step in our overall plan to bring more life, variety and activity to the Knox Event. From this build onwards we will be adding in (and improving) our existing AI work layer-by-layer.
Build 42, for example, will use the power of the Build 41 animations build to introduce animals and wildlife.
We will also be releasing AnimZed, our animation tool, to the community during the IWBUMS beta process – meaning that modders will receive a huge boost in what they can create within PZ.
WHAT NEXT?
During the IWBUMS beta process for Build 41 the following features will be re-enabled and/or improved.
• Multiplayer – alongside significant MP Networking improvements
• Improved visual fidelity of survivor character and zombies
• Further optimization to improve performance on both low and high end systems.
• Sprinter Zeds
• Fire visuals
• Tutorial
• Zombie skin appearance/decay
• Ability to repair ripped clothing
WHAT ELSE?
Due to the extent of engine and gameplay changes in Build 41, existing savegames will NOT be compatible.
At the time of the full build release, for those wishing to continue playing on old saves, a Steam beta branch of the current Build 40 will be available – and will continue to be available at all times.
This will be known as ‘PZ Classic’, and will also allow people to continue to play with their favourite mods until such a time as they are updated.
Below is a sneak vision into the future beyond build 41!
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