flex wood wrote:I have been playing a ton of the Dayz stand alone lately and I think it definitely feels like survival horror to me. Right now in the state it's in the zombies are no threat to you it's the other players that want to kill you and take your loot in hopes of finding a can opener or better parts for the gun they have. Every single time I've run into another player my heart starts racing and is pounding in my chest. Hell even just hearing another character eating is terrifying since most other players are ready to kill another on sight.
I'm trying to do some extremely stupid funny stuff in the game like server hop until I can fill my inventory with can openers and wander the land giving them out. Hell just imagining getting killed and having someone going through my equipment only to find out that it's full of can openers gives me a shit eating grin.
I have been playing a lot of DayZ as well and am enjoying it immensely, although I know the game is not for everyone. Put in about 15-20 hours in the game, died only twice so far. I have only come across a few people, but those moments are the most frightening.
The first death I experienced was my naivete as was making pleasant conversation with someone and then when I went off he follow me and shot me because he liked my gun....sad thing is...he had the same gun.
Second death was an epic firefight. A friend of mine and I were in one of the numerous cities looting things and I had gotten sick. He was using a Saline bag on me when a group of 5 came up and told us to get down on the ground. I relented and hit the deck while my friend gave them the finger and ran off.
I convinced them that I didn't know the guy and he was just being nice to me as I was sick and they believed me, saying they weren't gonna kill me (yeah right) and they ran off to kill my friend. My friend took down two of them before getting killed and the other three were walking back to me. I had my gun out and took out the two who had guns...but ran out of ammo so I hid. The last guy was taunting me and swearing at me to come out. I found him hit him a couple times with my axe, but he looted one of this friends for a gun and shot me. I went down like a champ and was not frustrated with that death.
Right now I am just in the wilderness being a crazy hermit, coming across a few people here and there who try to kill me unsuccessfully. One guy had nothing on him and I let him know I was friendly...he kept trying to punch me, but kept missing. I let him go until I noticed he was searching a body of a bandit who tried to take me down. I took aim, just in case, saw him pick up the rifle and aim it at me. I laid one into him. Poor guy thought he had a chance.
It is a thrilling and frightening experience this game... something that I as a player am not accustomed to. I tend not to play survival horror games, but DayZ really fits what I like about games. It is a strange social experiment with people behaving in unconventional and unpredictable ways. I gravitate to it because it offers something different in the world of survival horror games.
Sure, the majority of people you come across in it treat the game like any other deathmatch FPS game, but those that don't do that provide an experience unlike any other. Trust is hard and people get into their character. They become desperate for food, water and gear and will commit heinous acts against innocent people who are willing to help. People become genuinely afraid when someone is wielding an axe,when they themselves have a rifle. A game that can instill such paranoia and a sense of hyper-self awareness should be commended for providing a very fresh and interesting experience to the genre.
