DayZ dev focused finalising development of the game this year

By: Moses Abaortae

  |   September 29th, 2012   |  

Uncategorized

Dean Hall, the creator of DayZ, admits that although he is disappointed by the number of copycats there is nothing he can do about it but focus on ensuring his own title is as good as it can be and that it needs to hit the market by the end of 2012.

If one looks at the Android and iOS systems, they can see that the culture of seeing what’s successful, in terms of applications, and replicating it is something that is common. Games such as Fruit Ninja, Doodle Jump and Temple Run have spawned so many imitations as developers look to take a proven formula for success and try to earn their five-cents off of it.

It seems that the same trend is beginning to develop in the modding community as Dean Hall has found out the hard way. Having released the insanely hardcore mod, DayZ, which sees players traverse an open world filled with the undead and other players who could be either friend or foe, or in some cases a bit of both.

It is an interesting mechanic and a concept that zombie slaying fans had been waiting for. It may have lacked the extra polish of a triple-A title but for a mod, it was more than decent.

However, since the release of DayZ and its rise to success a number of similar games and mods have sprung up, most notably The War Z, which is also in development and is set to release in the near future on the free-to-play model.

When asked how he felt about the number of copycats in the market trying to beat DayZ to the release punch, Hall replied, “Obviously you feel lots of things and a lot of your feelings aren’t legitimate.”

He explained how he did not hold the rights to the zombie-horror genre but conceded he did feel “upset, jealous, scared”.

Commenting on the War Z, he said, “Maybe they will make a better game – I don’t know. Maybe what they’re doing is not cool to me, but the way I look at it is what are my options? What could I do?”

Hall raised a number of questions along the same line and concluded that nothing he did apart from focus on DayZ would benefit him or make his game any better.

The creator also explained how it was of the utmost importance that DayZ is released before the end of the year in order to beat all the copycats.

He said, “It has to be out before the end of the year. Not just because we’ve committed to it but in order to achieve what we have to do.”

DayZ is still in development but Hall hopes to have the game functioning before December, after which they hope to add the “more ambitious features.”