phil bottle

It's a blast, better with friends but I've had a few drunken shenanigans trolling the fuck out of randoms

Sweet, I need to add you to my PSN too and I'll sort out this evening!

Oh me oh my, I sent you an invite cutie pie Rich has just got the game and I've sent invites to a few folk who seem to have had it at some point. If I'm not your friend 'yet' on PS4 and you want in, gimme a shout. I answer to: "oi!"

It could be that a few of us are going to be playing a bit of GTA online. James and I set up clan when we were playing on PC and it's still active for PS4....so if you fancy it let me know and I'll send an invite. Clan name: FG4Q

^ Me also, though one is promised to Ryan if he doesn't get his key.

And well done Oxford

Awesome FA Cup weekend, 2 non-league teams in the last 16 is incredible. Don't know why they keep saying no non-league team has reached a final, pretty Spurs were not in the football league when we first lifted the trophy.

Music to my ears, thanks man, I think I'll pick it up sooner than I intended

Waiting for you review of this James. hope it's as good as it seems!

If you ever need some twatness I'm on call 25 hours a day

I dunno, he failed the test so.... Dids is in Oz at the moment so better trying Lee

Really enjoyed the demo but simply don't have time to dedicate to this...I agree it seems to be the atmospheric and shit your pants experience we all want from RE. I'll get it at some point though

That is incredible

Great game, I put it on the backburner for a while simply due to the sheer volume of games that came out since October. I know I'll be playing all year. A big patch is due which will balance a few things though I've not found anything game breaking, it was a relatively good launch. I don't really get the 'too realistic' thing, it's a video game. Real life is what makes me sad these days, this is an escape from that.

You put your left foot in Your left foot out In Out, In Out Shake it all about Do the hokey cokey and turn around That's what it's all about. Oi! Anyways, I think you know most folk round here don't hold grudges, except me, but my goldfish memory means they never last. Welcome back sir

Completely agree on the 1st person ADS, hopefully it feels natural switching between views.

From what I've seen - which isn't a lot - it looks like a mix between the Division and Metal Gear Solid V. I signed up to the test a while ago so the proof will be in the pudding.

A whole slew of YouTuber's have now made vids on the progress of this game. Funnily enough, the one with reputedly the least integrity - PSI Syndicate - was the only one to voice any doubts about this game. Funnily enough he also referred to the WarZ. The developers haven't bothered to respond to my email yet either.

I love music and have some eclectic tastes. It's an important part of my life. Not dictated by fashion or the shit that gets served up these days in the mainstream. So while I can say the first two Nephilim albums are awesome I can also say Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys is also awesome. For different reasons of course.. Punk rocker at heart though

Prompt attention on a Saturday morning, good stuff sir

So...you're a cross between PWEI and Fields of the Nephilim. Interesting mix but that's all good from where I'm standing. Welcome aboard sir.

As it's Nvidia now entering the console market with their GPUs with the Nintendo Switch I'm definitely keeping an eye on it.

I was thinking of getting this game. It's PC and is still in development. I've been watching it for a good while now. Was going to post some info and videos of the alpha version. Then I went to the website where they are selling the game. The price it quotes for the game is incorrect. It advertises a price that when you go to pay suddenly remembers that there's tax to pay plus a payment fee. In other words: it's £25 more than advertised. I won't be buying it for that reason. A shame as it looks awesome. Even the WarZ wasn't that sneaky with its money grabbing. I sent them an email discussing things like integrity in gaming. Not expecting a reply. Anyways..just thought I'd share

Dev Update/Hicks Greetings Survivors, For those that weren't aware - we pushed 0.61.136770 to Steam stable branch yesterday. While there are still some issues we want to address (VOIP Volume, Supersonic cracks, Container contents desync, Infected footsteps volume, status modifiers stuck, and more) we looked at the experience the tests over the weekend provided, compared to what was going to be available to those on Stable branch over the holiday break and decided to go ahead and make the move. This allows us to ensure that users on Steam stable over the holiday season will be able to enjoy a stable DayZ 0.61 experience, while we continue to address the issues the team is concerned about on Exp/Unstable branch, and pending build health potentially push these over to Stable on our regularly scheduled Wednesday maintenance. Lets take a look at the milestone goals for 0.61 Stable, and then we'll cover what is currently on Exp/Unstable branch - as well as what is pending a new Exp/Unstable update. 0.61 Milestone Goals: Server Login Queue Merge of New Audio Technology from Arma 3 Eden Update. Update of Weapon Sounds for New Audio Technology. Dynamic Spawning of Infected. Predators (Wolves) Dynamic Shadows Network Synchronization Improvements New Server Browser While we're happy to say that we've hit all of these milestone goals for 0.61, there are still issues that need to be addressed. Currently on Exp/Unstable we have build 0.61.136796 which is focused on the following changes: Fix for issues with container contents desync Fix to address supersonic cracks Adjustments of animal SFX levels Adjustments of infected footsteps levels Adjustment to Infected swing SFX In addition to the build currently in test on Exp/Unstable we are focused on more Exp/Unstable updates to address: Status Modifier Updates Adjustments to Dynamic Lights VOIP Volume too quiet Issues with Hand Slots on corpses Some clients experiencing FPS drops And lastly, as promised - future 0.61 Exp/Unstable builds will also be pushed (more than likely after the holiday break) with changes to test network sync on vehicles in DayZ. These builds likely will have vehicles set up to spawn ready to drive, but don't expect that change to follow through to Stable branch! We're all enjoying watching, reading, and hearing about your adventures in the latest change to Stable branch DayZ and we hope you all have a safe and enjoyable holiday break. This will be our last Status Report until January 10th, so see you all in the new year! - Brian Hicks / Creative Director Dev Update/Peter Don't get attached to your gear. This well known DayZ rule is there with us from very beginning. But then what is it, that you should be attached to? In short, it's your character, a survivor in post apocalyptic world full of infected and other threats, where every choice matters and has its consequences. It's easy to say that, but currently the only attachments your character has is his/her gear, his/her location within the world and his/her state. Losing all the gear, getting seriously sick or suddenly need fast travel often leads to sacrificing your character and starting from scratch as a fresh spawn. This behavior goes against the survival idea behind the DayZ in general. To build the value of your character we have planned three pillars which are connected to his life span and activities. Probably the most desired and awaited one is the visual representation of your character appearance like growing beards, scars, bloody hands and others which really reinforce connection between player and his character in world. Second pillar is pretty straightforward and it is connected directly to upcoming stamina system. With stamina in place, sprint wouldn't be intended for traversing long distances (that's what vehicles are for right?), however it will be an important factor for fleeing from immediate dangerous situations you may encounter on reasonable distances. Keeping the character alive longer will benefit from being able to carry more load until the penalty for overload in terms of shortening available stamina strikes in. Third pillar is obviously soft skills, which we have implemented in prototype state for quite some time. Same as with other stuff (for example stamina system mentioned above), this mechanic is waiting primarily for introducing his majesty, the new character himself, which as you may know will be formed from interconnected systems like new animation system, new controller and state machine, new physics, new damage system, new user actions and others. We had been speculating about soft skills for quite some time. Skills leveling system based on gained experience as we know it from traditional RPG games doesn't fit DayZ very well. First draft of soft skills was close to it, there was enclosed skill sets defined by actions which tried to mimic exact roles like medic, mechanic, hunter, builder, farmer and few others. Performing actions within skill sets add experience points to its pool and eventually raising its level. Such system leads to mindless grinding of actions without any meaningful gameplay context which, I believe can really easily ruin the gameplay experience for plenty of players just to witness such behavior. To minimize it, there needs to be some anti-grind solution like simple maximum cap for points per timeframe, or other more elaborate solution which demands more or less UI elements to be clear for players what are the rules and what's going on with experience and skills. In the end we decided to strip soft skills to bare minimum and dare to take different route once again so the vision of DayZ stays intact. Soft skills should not be mandatory, however they should reward long living, dedicated characters and reflect their past actions. Main idea behind it is simple - with little abstraction it's safe to say that if you can stitch up someone, you for sure are relatively able to gut animal or pick seeds from harvest, and on the other hand if you can build fences and watchtowers it should be relatively easy for you to cut tree down or dig garden plot. We introduced so called specialty, which is axis with two poles - precision and roughness, when a character is spawned the pointer is in the middle, neutral position. All actions in game can be divided between precise or rough ones. Even actions from traditional roles like medic can be categorized independently and sit somewhere else in specialty spectrum, for example transfusion as precise action while CPR as rough action. Performing actions in game is moving specialty dynamically towards one pole or other, every action can have different weight so it can move specialty in different amount, let's say while performing transfusion you gain more precision then with simple bandaging. Dedicated characters will be able to profit from current state of their specialty in terms of performing given specialty actions with shorter times, less materials used, wearing out tools less and more outcome gained as current specialty is multiplier for all of these. Not dedicated characters who don't care about specialty or those who feels like jack of all trades are not punished in this system as their specialty will be moving around the middle neutral position which means no penalty as both precise and rough actions will take default time, use default amount of material, worn out tools for default value and gain default outcome. Note, that we are not planning to punish dedicated characters yet (but there is a possibility to do so), if your specialty is more towards roughness you will be stitching yourself as you would do while your specialty is in middle position. I think it's kind of unique approach and it doesn't spoil DayZ with unnecessary tables, numbers, UI clutter and undesirable player behaviors. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year... see you in Chernarus folks! - Peter Nespesny / Lead Designer Dev Update/Mirek Today it will be quick again. We released stable version yesterday, but we're still working on fixing some major issues, like broken modifiers and statuses for some players. We might have a fix today on experimental branch. Looks like it's happening only when one player is connecting at the same time when another is disconnecting, which can happen very often for waiting players in the login queue. About vehicles, we made some progress with synchronization. It's still not perfect and you will experience some micro-teleportation during driving when it hits experimental branch, so please keep in mind that it won't be in its final state. Currently there is just one known blocking issue and it's related to passengers not being able to get out of vehicle sometimes. I don't want to give any promises, but it's still our target to release vehicles on experimental branch before Christmas and if we don't make it, it's priority No.1 at the beginning of next year. I wish you a Merry Christmas and happy New Year. - Miroslav Maněna / Lead Gameplay Progammer Community Spotlight I'm sure this happens to you sometimes. You meet a fresh spawn on the coast, befriend him, travel and loot together. But when he finds a gun with ammo, you hear a shot and your screen goes black and you are dead. Your trust in other players is down, but is it like that every time or is there hope for friendly players? YouTuber Cyborg Lyzard had an idea about a social experiment which would prove whether or not players are as cruel and hostile for real. When he released his first social experiment video it was a real successful. Look at this social experiment on update 0.59. Cyborg Lyzard gave a weapon with ammo to a random player and waited to see what happens next. DayZ Social Experiment - Giving Players a Gun 31% of players killed him immediately. The remaining 69% were friendly. This is not so bad. He tried it again. But in the second experiment he gave the players a gun with ruined ammo. What a lecture on trust and morality! Giving Players a Jammed Gun - A DayZ Social Experiment He repeated this experiment again a few weeks ago on update 0.60 and he found out that players are more friendly than before. DAYZ HAS BECOME FRIENDLIER - The Jammed Gun Experiment vol 2 And what about you? What would you do if somebody gave you a weapon with ammo? Would you put a bullet between his eyes or thank him and go your own way? Let me know on our official Twitter! Header image by: MrBlueAndQueenie Merry Christmas for you all! - Baty / Community Manager