Did you die or something?
You’d think so. But no, I’m definitely still alive.
Certain recent events threw a giant spanner in the works for all Zafehouse-related activity. I can’t 100% say that I’m in the clear, but at the moment it looks like I’ll be able to continue working on the game. Sorry for not being able to provide anything more conclusive than that (or sooner than today). :(
I can let you know of a few changes I did make before “the news“:
- Rewrote the event system. It’s more flexible now and uses tokens and delegates to deliver more dynamic text. Very modular and much needed given the increasing scope of the game.
- Focus is now very much on the survivors. I’ve always been quite adamant about the state of zombie games these days being about shooting and looting rather than the characters. Zafehouse 2 is very much a story about people, not the undead they slaughter. That, and a particular Flash game that reinforced my desire to move away from the “Civilization: Zombies” gameplay.
- Don’t worry, you still have to barricade and scavenge for supplies, and the systems behind these are robust. But managing the emotional and physical needs of your survivors will be just as important (if not more so).
- Time was too granular. The game now has 6 phases, with shorter, more frequent “activity blocks” during the night and longer ones during the day. For example: 6am-12pm, 12pm-6pm, 6pm-9pm, etc. The distribution / length of these phases has yet to be finalised. I wanted to bring back the feeling of dread one gets as day transitions to night. I thought it was a highlight of the first game and Zafehouse 2 wasn’t really replicating that. It also removes the oddity of “if I’d had one minute extra I’d have finished that barricade” which was extremely jarring.
- I think the Direct3D renderer might have issues on some newer mobile GFX chips, in particular Intel / GeForce configurations using Optimus. But I can’t confirm it. I guess that’s what the beta will be for!
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He lives! Nice to finally see some more news. Keep up the good work! :D
And was it weird that I knew the flash game would be rebuild before I clicked the link?
murray said this on June 25th, 2011 at 3:03 pm
YOURE BACK!!!! YAY!
Also, check out Project Zomboid, an absolutely brilliant indie zombie game, similar to yours. It’s hard to explain though.
bbad89 said this on June 28th, 2011 at 10:57 pm
@bbad89: I’ve been following Project Zomboid. I’m glad someone’s finally tackling the emotional aspects of zombie horror as well and I’m sure it will do well. Zafehouse 2 is going to take it quite a bit further though, in a way only a written narrative can.
Logan said this on June 28th, 2011 at 11:14 pm
Narrative is good !
But as an interactive fiction player, I would not be entirely objective there ;)
flap said this on July 2nd, 2011 at 5:48 am
Cool! It will be so exciting to see a new screenshots =)
Worthis said this on July 23rd, 2011 at 10:20 am
Where are you??? o_O
Worthis said this on November 7th, 2011 at 1:14 pm
Did you die again?
KONSERVATOR said this on December 2nd, 2011 at 12:24 am
Seriously would love this on android, good money making potential.
Lukensteinz said this on January 4th, 2012 at 3:22 pm