Xbox Addict

If you couldn’t make the livestream, here are the notes I typed up:

During the chat, Jeff reminded everyone that the price of honesty and transparancy is sometimes that we can’t do a thing we’ve said we wanted to do. But we just aren’t wired to NOT talk to you while we’re still trying to find our way. That means sometimes we will talk about wanting something, and later discover it can’t be done. We try to distinguish between wants and promises, and to trust you to know the difference.

For example, a player asked during the chat "could we bring along an NPC on missions?" Jeff says that’s the second most requested feature... and so we’re putting it in TU3. And that’s a promise.

Another of our most popular requests -- being able to toss rucksacks into vehicles -- is not happening in TU3, but we’re still seeing if it’s possible to add sometime in the future. That’s a want 

Speaking of things we want but cannot do: Brant says, short version, zoomable sniper scopes aren’t possible because of the way the game loads. The whole map doesn’t load at once, just the bit you’re actually in. Stuff that is far away loads in at a very low resolution if it loads at all. In other words, what you saw through a scope would be ugly as sin, and if you shot the blocky low res thing, the game might not be able to register it as a kill. Thus, no true sniper zoom in State of Decay.

Will the PC version have enhanced graphics? Higher res? Improved framerate? Yes. A high end PC can do all those things, so we’re modifying the game to support those things. The PC version will not have different content or features, however.

What the PC version also won’t have are modding tools (for time/testing reasons), but we have no objection to mods or modders, and we look forward to seeing what our PC players come up with.

Speaking of the PC version, Jeff confirmed that we are going to be taking part in Steam’s Early Access program. That means we will be doing a controller-only PC version in advance of the final release for the purposes of feedback. The final version of the PC version will of course have keyboard/mouse support.

Finally, he confirmed that it would be out in 2013. We’ll be more specific as soon as we can.

We teased a little sandbox stuff during the chat! Jeff said, "The goal of sandbox is to provide an unbounded experience, one with no victory condition that ends the game. The way we do that is to continue to have a world with finite resources, but find out ’how long can I stay alive.’"

Without going into too much detail (although details are coming within a week), you start in the world, build your community, clean the valley out - and when it runs dry, you can leave with some portion of your community and go to "the next valley." The next valley is the same map, repopulated with resources...but harder. More zombies. More difficulty. Just...more.

What else is coming? Jeff promised everyone a first round of TU3 patch notes this week. He also said the future of the SOD world is under active discussion with our publisher, but we can’t say anything beyond that. As soon as we can, Brant will be required to don bells and dance a jig on the live stream.

(Editor’s Note:  Anything that will allow for more versatility with State of Decay’s NPCs is a good thing, and Survival mode will at least provide more game for those looking to see how far they can develop their community and/or see how long they can last.  It seems that if fans have suggestions on how to make the game even better, Undead Labs is listening, so head on over to the Undead Labs forums and share your feedback!)