Project Zomboid

Last time I played you couldn't drive cars. Now you can drive over zombies with cars!

Cars can be complicated to maintain. It’s not Dwarf Fortress but it’s a lot. Ive only ever found on set of keys I think, too, so the simulation is pretty rich.

Put some time into Zomboid over the weekend and I gotta say I'm mighty impressed.

I know it's been around forever but I had no clue it was a super hardcore simulator. For some reason I thought it was more of an action Robotron w/zombies type affair.

But man, this thing is the real deal. I love games with a lot of crunch and this thing has it in spades. It's crazy how many systems running under the hood. Health, crafting, zombie awareness states, skill trees, heat/cold temps., player stress & boredom...there's just a million things going on at once.

For example one neat touch I found was treating a wound one time. I got scratched on my arm so I ripped up a bed sheet to make bandage strips. Wrapped up my arm and moved on, hoping for the best. Few in-game hours later I checked my health and it said the bandage was actually dirty. So my wound stopped healing and I was at risk for infection. I could replace the bandage with a new one or even in a pinch take off the old one, rinse it clean with a local water source and reapply. Of course I didn't even know at the time that you could sterilize the bandage with found disinfectant before application (duh).

Damn, I love this kind of minutia in games. Where subsystems and depth take priority over graphic fidelity. Guess that's why I'm such a fanboy for the likes of RimWorld and CK2. Ironically I actually quite dig the visuals in Project Zomboid. They make me feel all nostalgic 'cause they look so much like Sims 1.

Very pleased with the game so far. Still can't believe that I slept on it for so long, thinking it was a completely different genre & experience.

Anyone have a good Let's Play or maybe quick start guide video they would recommend? I'm interested in this but system heavy games can be hit or miss for me so I'd like to see what I'm getting into before I buy.

I've been watching Mathas' playthroughs.

He's been playing the game since before it even launched on Steam in EA.

I guess he just picked it back up and has done a couple runs over the past 2 weeks.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...

The first few episodes do a lot of tutorializing.

He's a great streamer as he narrates the characters story on the fly while he's playing.

I knew I was in love with the game when the tutorial shows you how to cure the disease.

I also think it’s a trip that when you die and start a new character in the same instance, you can go find your last character, risen from the dead. Also, I haven’t tried any scenarios other than the default, but you can start six months into the zombie outbreak when most of the perishable food is spoiled and most buildings are looted and the zombies are a little faster and there are more of them. If you last long enough starting from the default scenario you’ll get there anyway.

Which is to say: systems ftw.

Arise ye!

Played Project Zomboid’s “IWBUMS” beta version (“I Will Back Up My Save”) and about 10 minutes in got scratched. And in that game, unless you’ve got lots of resources , you’re toast in that situation.

There was no medicine, no spare clothes, no sheets, no rags to make bandages with. And the mode I chose was supposedly for a chill experience, but there were lots of fairly perceptive zombies in clusters around the neighborhood.

In the end, I flustered when attacked by two of them, forgot my controls, and got taken down. I waited for the sweet release of death. Curiously, the game stopped before I rose up. I guess they don't do that in the beta version.

If you want to play the new b41multiplayer branch, be ready to die. A lot. Or maybe my boy and I are just rubbish.

Playing with default settings, there were clumps of 6-10 zombies all over the place in addition to random straggler zombies. They detected us from a considerable distance, and moved fairly quickly (though they're not the runners). It was frustrating.

I turned down a few things, played some, turned them down more, then turned down more things. We eventually got to a point at which it was pleasant enough to play together and get some gear. We even eventually scraped together a little HQ.

Then I got ever-so-slightly overconfident and thought we could take out a cluster of six or seven. With all the tuning I did to game settings, they move slowly, are the weakest I could make them, and suchlike. But I got taken down, by fumbling my controls a little and also getting grabbed, and then just straight murdered. A few minutes later, after I respawned somewhere else, my boy was similarly made dead.

Then I died again.

Now I logged off with another character huddled in a house, with canned food but no can opener, having already been bitten and infected.

The main, non-beta branch is cake compared to this.

muraii wrote:

If you want to play the new b41multiplayer branch, be ready to die. A lot. Or maybe my boy and I are just rubbish.

...

The main, non-beta branch is cake compared to this.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...

Have you considered nabbing the Cheat Menu from the Workshop?

I've found that it's a forgiving way to reacclimate after time off with the game.

You can set limits to strictly avoid frustration. Basically the only one I use from time to time is Heal Player when I just don't want to restart after getting bitten.

Overall I've been super-impressed with Build 41. It's been in development for a long time, but with the completely overhauled animations, expanded audio suite, 2D to 3D objects and lots more, it practically feels like a full-on sequel compared to where the game was a few years ago.

Impressive stuff.

Thanks for the tip! And yeah, they’ve done amazing work and we’re for sure sticking with our server. The distribution of difficulty in IWBUMS generally feels very different from the main branch and we just need to get used to it.

But being able to crouch alone is super cool.

Also forgot to mention that if you create a Custom Sandbox map on game setup you can really tweak the game's difficulty.

There's like a dozen tabs in the Sandbox Options menu where you can go totally ham to create a true Peaceful Mode if you so desire. Stuff like Loot Rarity, World options for electric/water shutoff and loot respawn timers, Character settings where you can add 100 Trait Points for character creation, make Vehicles fully fueled & fixed, and even turn off zombie respawns under Advanced Zombie Options.

It's incredibly dynamic in letting you tailor the sandbox experience you'd like. And at the bottom of both the Sandbox Options and Character Creation screens there's a Save Presets drop-down that lets you dial in the perfect formula, name it, and then instantly load it back up in future playthroughs.

I play with "Story Mode" settings all the time. It's takes a lot of pressure off and lets you enjoy the game at a more leisurely pace.

I started futzing with those settings in the servertest_SandboxVars.lua file directly, which I'm pretty sure is the codification of the settings you make in that Sandbox Options menu. We haven't progressed far enough to deal with vehicles, let alone even consider the electricity and water being shut off as existential threats. But! I finally found a car that's operable and has a nearly full tank.

Just wondering, is anyone interested in a private server? Did some research and found I could rent one pretty cheap.

I don't know how active I'll be, but I'm interested in checking it out. As I mentioned in our chat yesterday, I picked this up last week on a whim. I've been playing survivor mode and it's been pretty fun and frustrating at the same time. Probably not the best mode for learning how to play, but I guess I'm a gluten for punishment.

A dedicated GWJ server would be pretty interesting.

I rented a little 4 slot server this morning. Still have to figure out how to configure it. I’ll post info when I do! If enough interest, I can always make it bigger.

I'm interested!

Well, I had this game for quite a while, but never got around playing it for real.

It is gaining some tractions on Streaming platform. Which is nice for a 8 years old game.

OK, I think i have it set up like my current sandbox, but not 100% sure. Hit me up on discord or steam (same name) and I'll send you the ip info. Just trying to do Baby's First Zombie Apocalypse at first, but will def be willing to try other stuff out once I start to get the hang of how to do the server stuff.
I didn't actually do a whitelist because it sounded complicated, but it's not publicly listed so I'm hoping it'll be fine.

I have a substantial amount of spare server capacity - though it is based in Europe. I'm happy to stand up a GWJ PZ server? I am currently running one for another group, but it is quite far on in the game, so may not be best to start in, especially for new players.

Takes minutes to set up, so more than happy to do so, if anyone is interested. Not trying to steal your server thunder or anything, just offering as it's zero cost to me, but really wont feel shunned if you'd rather just keep what you have. I'm far from a PZ expert, but I do know enough to become self-sustaining for when the water and power eventually run out.

I think for now I'm gonna keep on with the server since everyone seems based on this side of the pond, but I'd love to be able to use you as a resource for server admin questions if that's ok?
(also, you're more than welcome to come and play in the server anytime!)

Sure. Feel free to ask here or on discord and I'll help where I can

For anyone that isn't US based, or has played on my servers before, there is indeed an omnigaming PZ server available. PM/Discord if interested!

It seems we have the sleep option disabled on the server? Is that on purpose? Seems a useful option.

I have mine set so sleep is possible, bit not required - players don't need to sleep for exhaustion reasons, but it's still possible for all online players to sleep and pass time of they want.

Oh, and just in case, the most important setting is to pause the server when no players are connected.

omni wrote:

Oh, and just in case, the most important setting is to pause the server when no players are connected.

You mean the one that I did not even think about setting? It has def caused some heartache...

So here's settings I'm planning on changing next reset...

Pause server when empty
Shorter nights? Still holding on opinions and was thinking maybe zombies more powerful at night (faster/tougher)
Any other suggestions or advice, i'm happy to take. I figure I'll make the changes and reset when I get back into town (thurs or friday), so hop in and see what you don't like.

fogrob wrote:
omni wrote:

Oh, and just in case, the most important setting is to pause the server when no players are connected.

You mean the one that I did not even think about setting? It has def caused some heartache...

So here's settings I'm planning on changing next reset...

Pause server when empty
Shorter nights? Still holding on opinions and was thinking maybe zombies more powerful at night (faster/tougher)
Any other suggestions or advice, i'm happy to take. I figure I'll make the changes and reset when I get back into town (thurs or friday), so hop in and see what you don't like.

Awesome, I look forward to the reset. Pausing time when the server is empty will help a lot.

Yeah, learned that the hard way the first time years ago running a PZ server. I got it up and running, but it was a week+ before we got around to playing it. The whole city was run down, no power, no water, food was mostly rotten... we thought it was the hardest game ever made

Planning on resetting server on Friday, work permitting. Please get any changes you’d like posted on here for easy reference. Until then, good luck survivors!

I don't mind a fresh start after every death. It's the way of these hardcore games sometimes. There is, however, a mod that allows you to write in a journal and recover your skills by reading it if you do happen to perish. Not sure how others feel about it. To be honest, I've never survived long enough to miss the skills I had picked up.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...

Over the years, I have many many hours in this game and would be very interested in a public server if we're running one! Base difficulty is always good imo, but if there's an option for communal sleep and communal reading to speed up the passage of time, that'd be awesome.

If possible, would you mind scheduling an exact launch time for the server tonight? I'd love to start with others and gameplan, but also take advantage of the Life and Living TV schedule in the early game.

I'm running a home server for my boy and me, and can't quite grok if and how I can have multiple servers available to run. It doesn't seem organized like, say, Minecraft, because the StartServer64.bat file isn't a per-world script the way running the .jar file for Minecraft is. And I don't see a parameter fed to Java that sets the path to the server world.

I created copies of the .ini and .lua files used for my current world, renamed them and the relevant settings (IDs and the name), and restarted PZ to see if it automatically spun up a corresponding server world. I don't see it. Since the hostname and ports are the same, I don't know if there's network collision happening there. I don't see the new world in the server list but I don't see the existing world which I know exists in the server list, either. I had to enter it as a favorite.

I didn't find clear documentation about how to do this, but maybe if y'all know how to do this, I'd be ever appreciative! EVER.

I'm afraid I have practically zero experience hosting anything on Windows, ususally because it performs so poorly in doing so. However, a lot of the time, game server instances is more to do with launch command options, rather than config file contents (at least in terms of basica settings; port, config file location, password, etc).

You may consider a hosting application. Again, no real experience with this on Windows, but something like WGSM (Windows Game Server Manager) might help you get up and running - https://windowsgsm.com/download/

Specifically their plugin for Project Zomboid - https://github.com/DoctorBeardz/Wind...

There are no doubt other hosting panels available for Windows, but the above may be a quick and easy (relatively) way of getting what you want up and running, without puzzling over why it doesn't 'just work' with config files and launch params.