21 Responses to “Zafehouse 2: Gameplay video #1”

1. i like how there is different types of shotguns and handguns! the game looks really good at the moment and i think the combat system is great! can you explain infection please? because in zafehouse 1 infection only ment that if someone died they would become a zombie when / if they died, but in this, do they lose a bit of hp for every bit of time that passes, etc? anyway, in the long run i think the game is near completion, at least on comabt, how are the other angles of the game working out?

   murray said this on October 16th, 2009 at 6:56 am

2. Well, this is more than i expected to see.
   1. Not combat related but, as i feared the lack of some kind of movement between houses system is degrading the nice map to bunch of icons. You have survivors placed in a house then one click and voila they are on the other side of the map …shame, hope you think of something to make the distances play a role.
   2. The combat seems believable. Good weapons damage and zombie toughness, overall nicely balanced.
   3. I kind of lost orientation from where the zombies are comming. (Maybe a digit representing number of zombies from the side they are comming would help, but it may be that i am not used to the interface.)
   4.You didn’t do anything between those combat rounds. Is there anything you could do? (Change weapons, try to run, move to another room, commit suicide… :) )
   5. You could add number to the survivors names in the combat log screen. Bob fires…. (which number is Bob?)
   6. I’m not sure can survivors positioned in a window attack zombies in the room and the survivors in center of room shoot zombies on the other side of barricades?
   7. I noticed that zombies attacked survivors armed with guns through barricaded windows. It’s hard for me to imagine it. I recommend to prohibit such attack or lower its chance to cause harm to minimum.

   Overall i have a great feeling from this vid!

   kulik242 said this on October 17th, 2009 at 9:41 am

3. @kulik242: Thanks for the feedback, glad you liked the vid!

   1. I’ve been thinking about outside movement since it was first suggested. I’ve warmed to the idea, but I haven’t settled on an implementation that a) I’m happy with and b) won’t be like coding an entirely new game. Movement outside introduces the need for path-finding, and path-finding has never been my strong point. I’ve tossed around a few ideas, and the better ones all involve path-finding to some degree.

   I will find a solution!

   2. It’s still undergoing development. For instance, I haven’t implemented critical hits, crippling, fear, etc. There will be a lot more to combat than two sides swapping damage.

   3. This is actually how it currently works! There might have been some confusion as the rooms were not updating properly after combat.

   4. All those options will be available, and more. I could have switched weapons, I just didn’t. :P Eventually, you’ll be able to heal wounds, take stimulants/sedatives and maybe antipyretics. You’ll be able to drink, smash bottles to create crude melee weapons, throw molotov cocktails and shoot your friends (if you’re so inclined). Survivors will get scared, go crazy, get tired or suffer other effects, which you’ll have to manage. Obviously, you’ll be able to escape (or attempt to), I’m just trying to decide how it should work. I’m also hoping to post a new feature this week regarding survivor personalities (and medium-term gameplay goals), which I think you’ll like.

   5. That’s a nice idea. Currently the survivor/zombie that is acting is highlighted, so you do know who’s who. But I can see how it might be a little hard to follow if you’re reviewing the log after a fight. In a perfect world, I’d like to have survivors represented by graphics, but I’m a one-man show and my artistic skills are limited. :P

   6. Windows aren’t implemented – everyone was shooting through doorways. Survivors in rooms can only attack zombies in the room, while survivors assigned to doors can only attack zombies coming through those doors. If a door is not barricaded, but survivors are assigned to it, they’ll act as meat barricades. If no survivors are there, then the zombies will just waltz right into the room. There’s also limits on zombie interactions through doors – only 1-5 can come through each turn, and only 2 can attack through a doorway per turn. These are all just numbers I tapped in to get combat going, so I’ll be adjusting them as time goes on.

   7. Yeah, I should have mentioned that all the entrances are doors, not windows. They started lightly barricaded, but the zombies eventually broke through and I didn’t bother to repair them. Windows haven’t been coded yet (and probably won’t be for a while).

   I plan to clean up combat assignments, so it’ll be easier to tell who’s defending what.

   @murray: Infection will be deadly. Currently, it’ll have a few effects – you’ll lose health relative to the severity of the infection; your max health will be capped; and you’ll be more susceptible to fear, exhaustion, etc. As your max health is reduced, so to will your current health, until you have none. At which point, things get fun. :) Zombies currently have 25% chance to infect. The first time a player is infected, they’ll gain a large amount of “infection”, and subsequent bites that infect will increase this number by a small amount. The number will also increase each turn.

   If 25% is too soft for you, custom scenarios will let you set the base infection chance. :)

   Logan said this on October 18th, 2009 at 4:19 pm

4. That infection thing seems realistic…. If someone is ifected can you stop the infection by cutting off infected area, meds, etc? Oh and if an infected player dies will he turn into a zed?

   murray said this on October 18th, 2009 at 10:45 pm

5. @murray: I don’t know about cutting body parts off, but you will be able to slow the effects with drugs.

   A survivor that dies while infected will come back as a zombie. The time between death and reanimation will be based on their infection level at death, plus/minus a random variance.

   Logan said this on October 18th, 2009 at 10:57 pm

6. Thx for reply,
   additional question to point 6.: If there is a survivor holding the doorway which is barricaded and the zombies will enter the room from other entrances will he fight them (more imminent danger than zombies outside) or will he defend the doorway?

   8.The option to prefer ranged weapons or melee weapons is cool, is the strategy selectable for individual persons or they affect whole group? It would be cool to set more of such strategies for instance “ammo conservation” could raise chance of critical hit but there would be some chance that the survivor wouldn’t shoot sometimes. Or opposite “spray and pray” could lower a chance of hit but survivors would have a chance to fire twice that round.

   9. One more option could be nice when positioning survivors inside the room: Assign a survivor to doorway but set that after the barricade is reduced he will fall back to the room or opposite somebody from inside the room would move to doorway when the barricades fall. That way the doorway guards could shoot through barricades and retreat to make room for melee survivors when things get personal.

   10. I think that if survivor is placed inside the room he still should be able to shoot at zombies in doorway thus help the doorway guards. Maybe the chance to pick a shot could be really slim (maybe like 25-30% that he will shoot) since he has to aim carefully to not shoot his mate, this couldn’t be done with shotguns of course. (Maybe to set this as strategy “pick risky shots” whit a chance to kill own guys.)

   11. If you manage to get the outside movement done. I suggest to make parts of the map more infested than others so it would make difference where are you going. This wouldn’t be visible to player but there would be info at the end of the round. (For instance “there is no one around” “there are couple of lone zombies” “there are small groups of zombies” “there are large stacks of zombies”…) Of course there would be a need to make the crossing from low level infestation to heavy infestation fluent so you won’t run from abandoned area into high infested area. Chance to get attacked would of course change in different infestation areas. ..more decision to make- “Stay in infested area in well barricaded building or make a run somewhere else? (As i read it now this would be really hard to code. :))

   12. I know that this game is far from done but i have a feeling that there will be not enough things to do. That’s why im suggesting additional features and strategies to choose from. Ideally the combat shouldn’t be “learnable” there shouldn’t be a ideal strategy to use, i guess this is doable since combat is too depending from stuff you find.
   As well as the noncombat should be really rich. Maybe you could implement something like option to get stealthy or stay noisy. (stealthy- lower looting chances and it would raise stress, noisy- no penalties biger chances to get attacked.) If there will be a noncombat fatigue there could be a whole system how to deal with it. (rest vs guard duty, alcohol vs stimulants)
   You see zafehouse was great, but it was learnable, if you implement enough dynamic system to gameplay its replay value will raise.

   (This is most probably biggest chunk of english text i ever wrote! ^_^)

   kulik242 said this on October 19th, 2009 at 11:38 am

7. er…. ookkaayy…. i have a question. in a custom game, what sort of thing can u change? unlimited ammo? weapons survivors have? u havnt really described custom games that much and im intrigued to know more

   murray said this on October 19th, 2009 at 12:06 pm

8. @murray: I haven’t settled on what options will be exposed, but when I do I’ll let you know!

   @kulik242: Your English is fine!

   Seeing as you can assign survivors on a turn-by-turn basis, it’s up to the player to make sure he’s defending the right doors. If the process was more automatic, like it was in Zafehouse, then I’d probably add the sort of thing you describe. There are advantages to leaving a survivor at a barricaded door – he can shoot at zombies trying to break into that door, and he won’t be munched on if there’s a survivor holding the room.

   8. I’ve already thought about attack options (“ammo conservation”, “spray and pray”). What you’re describing is aimed, auto and snap shots, which I plan to implement. Looks like we’re on the same wave-length.

   9. Part of the strategy in defending a room is deciding where your resources are needed most. If a survivor could defend a door and room in the same turn, I think it’d remove one of the “hard decisions” that Zafehouse is all about. What I can do is automate the reassignment of a survivor to the room *after* combat has ended, if there are no more zombies at the door they’re defending.

   10. Again, Zafehouse is about making hard decisions about resource allocation. I also didn’t want to make combat a “crap-shoot” – basically everyone firing everywhere. If a survivor is tangling in the middle of the room with a zombie, I don’t really see them having the opportunity to fight them off *and* taking a potshot through a doorway. I think combat assignments need to be somewhat predictable – that’s how strategy are developed. Survivors can’t do everything at once, in fact, if you assign a survivor to use heal themselves, reinforce barricades or some other time-consuming activity, they will be unavailable during the next combat round.

   Don’t worry about combat – I have a load of combat events and mechanics yet to implement. You’ll have a lot of choices to make (and unpredictability to deal with) when I’m done. :) I greatly, greatly appreciate your feedback though, it has definitely made me think about a few things.

   11. I will be implementing outside movement, it’s just going to add some time to development as it will be a game in itself, to a degree. I can’t really comment on the specifics, but I will let you know what I do as I do it. Having certain hotspots of zombie activity certainly makes sense though. :)

   12. I was afraid the gameplay video might not sell the game very well, because there’s a lot that has to be done. But I really wanted you guys to see how it was shaping up, and I think on the whole, it’s been good for me to get some feedback, and for you to understand the game. As I said, don’t worry – Zafehouse 2 will be dynamic, but I wanted to remove a lot of the randomness that was in Zafehouse. So yes, there will be certain strategies one can implement, but it will be more like Chess than say, Snakes and Ladders. :)

   12. I understand your concerns about the game becoming “learnable” or there being a dominant strategy.

   Logan said this on October 19th, 2009 at 6:32 pm

9. I loved the first game(sadly i could never keep any of them alive till the end)And i cant wait for this one but i do have a few veiws..
   1.How about makeing a age, gender, former job thing for the surviours that way you might have like..lets say Rick, 11, Male, Student..who can only help with barricades and searching for supplies but has to hide/flee during zombie attacks and maybe for like the older people stuff like joint pain, heart problems and stuff you would need medicene for?And for some women how about a pregnant staus and how far along they are..ie if there over 5 months, there in the same group as the kids and need to be checked on more often?

   2.The outside of the buildings look…well blank is there anyway you could paint some roads/sidewalks outside of the buildings so it all dont look like grass?

   3.Also..how about random events like lets say a group is near the hospital and a event could trigger like this “A woman opens a window and screams for help on the 2nd floor of (Insert hospital name here)” then give a choice of rather or not to try to save her?

   4.How about adding in a powerplant building or some buildings have genrators that need gas to run(Or for the powerplant people inside it)which will power either the building, or in the case of the powerplant sevral nearby buildings, which increase the surviours chances of better hits in combat, and there able to tell if there is zombies in a room before there in there if there’s lighting?Plus of course they could find stuff more easily

   5.Is there anyway you could make it to where some buildings are multi-floored or would that be to much work?

   Anyways idc what you say about my input, i just cant wait for the game :D

   Taylor said this on October 20th, 2009 at 2:07 am

10. What type of buildings are there in zafehouse 2? i seen a hospital in the gameplay vid and was wondering if there is any other types of buildings, and also do the different types of buildings offer and strategic advantages? for intance in a survivor is in a hospital, you get a certain ammount of meds for every hour that goes by, etc?

    murray said this on October 20th, 2009 at 11:11 am

11. Well i definitely like where zafehouse 2 is going and your replies are very reassuring.
    Good luck and keep us updated.

    kulik242 said this on October 20th, 2009 at 11:28 am

12. Well, seems like all the questions I wanted to ask have been asked and answered to my satisfaction. I just wanted to post and say that this looks like a truly epic game, and I can’t wait for it to be released!

    The Fool said this on October 21st, 2009 at 2:51 pm

13. @kulik424: Not a problem, kulik. You raise some great points and I was more than happy to address them.

    @murray: Currently, there are: Hospital, Police Station, School, Mall, Church, Warehouse, Factory, House. You won’t get any resources for holding a particular building, but each building only gives a certain type (and amount) of supplies. So you won’t find meds in the factory, for instance, but loads in the hospital.

    I’m also introducing survivor types (cop, nurse, etc), which I’ll have more info on soon.

    @Taylor: I do want to have a certain amount of simulation, but a lot of what you mention would go beyond the scope of the game. There are a lot of features I’d like in the game, and I could potentially develop it forever, but there comes a time when you just have to “freeze” the features and get the work done. Right now, I’m almost at that point. You also have to weigh up the time it would take to implement something versus the effect it would have on gameplay (time vs benefit). While I’m sure what you’ve mentioned would add to the game, I don’t believe it would add as much as say, outside travel, perks, etc. That’s not to say the ideas you mention aren’t interesting, just that I have to accept the fact I’m a one-man operation, and I have to know my limits.

    It’s funny you should mention roads/sidewalks – it’s something I would have liked to have had. Unfortunately, I’ve put too much work into the building generator as it is, and I don’t have time to implement this if I want to get the game done in a reasonable time frame. It’s a great suggestion though, and I might see if I can get it in an expansion. This goes for multi-storey buildings also. Actually, Z2 was originally to be set in one building with multiple floors, so the idea isn’t at all alien to me.

    Logan said this on October 21st, 2009 at 3:17 pm

14. Oh cool, or maybe you could like relase it and update it with the newer fetures over time?

    Taylor said this on October 22nd, 2009 at 12:46 am

15. yeah, like a beta version of the game, or how about you give a copy of the (unfinished) version of the game to people who post here to try it out and see what they think of it? and maybe tell you what need work on or that is just perfect, u pobably know that i just want to see the beta for myself lol but seriusly i would call myself a zombie expert with all the games ive played and movies ive seen lol.

    murray said this on October 22nd, 2009 at 8:09 am

16. Ace work logan it’s looking great so far, it’s shaping up to be a great game by the looks of things, the survival types thing you posted about sounds like a great idea, I think with all the suggestions flying around, there are a lot of great ideas, but whats most important that the game is well balenced, the combat looks great as well, looking forward to the next update.

    -Tom

    Tom said this on October 22nd, 2009 at 5:49 pm

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