Following the launch of the long-awaited Stable branch for Project Zomboid’s Build 42, we managed to grab Christian Allen, Design Director at The Indie Stone, for a quick chat on the reception so far, some of the challenges they faced, and maybe some of the things we can look forward to in the future.
Congratulations on the full launch of Build 42, and for beating your record player count highs. Like 10 times! That must be a pretty validating feeling, right?
It’s definitely been a huge morale boost for the team seeing the community responding to the release into the Stable branch with such a huge influx of new and returning players. It’s very exciting to see players exploring and enjoying the new set of features that the team has been hard at work on for so long. The reactions of folks to the visual overhaul of the game, with the map upgrades and new lighting; as well as to new gameplay features that open lots of opportunities for exploration and creation are awesome to see.
As a game with such a long and complex development history, can you give a brief insight into the process of adding something new? Considering how the game used to look just a couple of builds ago, I feel that something like dragging corpses must have been some undertaking.
Between requests from the Project Zomboid community and the rolling lists of content from the team, there is no lack of ideas for features to implement into the game!
The process first involves discussing how proposed features will fit into existing systems, and what new gameplay options it presents for players. From there, we prototype and evaluate the technical side, and finally start rolling it out to our closed and open beta testers to evaluate and start giving feedback. For something like dragging corpses, the team actually implemented a whole new animation-sync system called Grappletech, and played with different prototypes for functions like tossing corpses out of windows, and then gathered feedback and adjusted game balancing on things like drag speed and player stamina effects. Zomboid is a very complicated game, so there are a LOT of factors to consider for every new element added.
Was there anything planned early on for Build 42 that you didn’t quite manage to squeeze in?
There are quite a few items that for a variety of reasons didn’t end up making it into Build 42 that we would still like to tackle in the future. An easy example is bows & arrows. We implemented a new projectile system into the game for firearms, and the early expectation was that this system could possibly also function well for bows and arrows, but as we worked with the system it became clear that to do physics-based projectiles right, in the Project Zomboid way, would take longer than initially expected, so we made the hard call to push bows and arrows out into the future, rather than try and hack in a substandard implementation to support them.
What were some of the big things you learned from the launch of Unstable to now? The quite loud reaction to Muscle Strain feels like a bit of a distant memory.
Muscle Strain is a good example of the validation of a thorough beta testing & feedback period for game systems before they launch to the wider playerbase. The early implementation was much more punishing than the version that launched as default in Build 42 Stable. Additionally, several other tweaks and balance changes to it were made over the course of the build’s development, and this change over time was driven primarily by consistent and constructive player feedback, the type that you need to be able to track over time.
There was a huge emphasis on lore throughout the Build 42 roadmap, from fliers to newspapers to shows, and even environmental storytelling in houses. Is there a Zomboid lore bible hanging around somewhere?
Yes, the expansion of the lore of 1993 Knox Country has been awesome to see in the game, and players are still finding new tidbits of story and easter eggs. There is a lore bible, although it is locked in a vault underneath our secret bunker. And some parts of it are even blocked off to me. I could probably talk my way into it, but as a designer it’s healthy for me to still have an air of mystery behind some of the stories swirling around the Knox Event.
Now that Build 42 is out, some eyes will no doubt be turning to Build 43 and the long-awaited NPCs. Is there anything you can tell us about that?
While I can’t give many details, part of our team is focused on technical/performance improvements, bug fixes, and keeping an eye on feedback around player progression when they start getting to late game stages in Build 42. Meanwhile, another part of the team has already started on the foundations for future builds, which includes cleanup of older code and prioritizing the implementation of features and content on the roadmap for the future. We’ll certainly take a lot of the learnings in process and pipeline from the past few years and roll those into improving our development cycles in the future.
I noticed there seems to be more emphasis on trains, train stations, and train tracks around the map. Should we be expecting Snowpiercer with zombies at some point?
While I can’t promise any features in the future, I know our modding community has already noticed the same thing and are putting out cool new things as we speak! It’s very cool to see the types of content that modders can create within the framework that the team has worked hard to build, and we are constantly amazed by the creativity the community has.
And finally: What’s your own favourite spawn point and weapon?
I always have a fondness for starting in Rosewood, mainly because of its central location on the map. It’s a great jumping off point to take a few days to get oriented and stocked up, and then head off on the road for a new adventure, whether it is a cozy farm out near Ekron or fighting my way into Louisville to claim a high-rise apartment as my new kingdom.
For weapons, I run blunt weapons almost exclusively, as I never want to risk poking holes in some of the awesome clothing my zed friends might be wearing that would enhance my drip. Plus, the sound of a metal baseball bat finishing a zed skull is always sooooo satisfying.
Project Zomboid is available now on Steam in Early Access.
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