Greetings, Survivors!
We’re about to enter the public testing phase of game update 1.28 on Steam and Xbox! Lets talk about what is coming, and what to keep an eye on during your experimental adventures. As usual, if you’d like to get spoiled with everything, head to our forums to see the change notes.[forums.dayz.com]
One of the biggest changes in this update is the introduction of vehicle synchronization. The goal was to make the driving experience more pleasant, allowing you to keep things under control, even during high latency conditions. Vehicle bouncing and a floaty feel should no longer be present during your driving. Since it was quite a fundamental change, there may be a few side-effects beyond what we’ve already found. We encourage you to try it on the experimental servers (we even have a dedicated cars server for you to play on) and tell us about your experience. We’ll be watching the feedback closely. If you are interested in learning more about what was changed and why, check out this detailed blog post[reforger.armaplatform.com] from Arma Reforger, as we are using the same approach for DayZ.
It's been a while since we looked at the gunplay in our game, so we decided to give it some attention by updating the weapon lifting mechanic. Ever since it was introduced years ago, we felt that close-quarters combat often ended in a frustrating experience, as your gun could move up at any point. Last year, we made a number of tweaks to improve the experience, but we ultimately had only two states: normal or lifted. With update 1.28, we’re introducing a gradual pullback to all of our firearms. This means your character now tries to pull the firearm back (if there’s enough space) before lifting it up. As you can imagine, this has major implications for indoor combat, as well as in cases of infected overwhelming you at close range.
Another thing we focused on was scopes. We’re introducing 3 new scopes for our firearms:
  • With its 2x zoom, the Sportpoint sight will be filling a gap in low-tier civilian scopes, making the hunting scope a lot more rare in the world
  • PSO-6 is a brand new variant of the well-known PSO scope; it brings a 6x zoom to all eastern firearms, including VSD
  • The rail-compatible Marksman scope, with its variable 3.5x-10x zoom levels, will be the new top-tier choice for all long-range engagements

Coupled with these new additions, we are also bringing much needed improvements to scope overlays. Damage state is now visualized on the overlays and support for illuminated reticles was added as well. Binoculars, NVG scopes, and the rangefinder have received visual updates and fixes to the overlay. And keep an eye on your Night Vision goggles - they may become more difficult to use when damaged!
Our audio team brought in a huge batch of sounds for the firearm overhaul, updating the shots and tails for all non-automatic rifles. They also looked at vehicles and balanced their audibility from inside, around, and from a distance. The goal was for players to be able to communicate easier when sitting inside the vehicles, while also making sure the vehicles are more audible from a distance. Feedback on the footsteps tweaks from update 1.27 was also taken into account. We separated the configuration of player character and infected steps, and slightly lowered the audibility of both. Lastly, the Sakhal caves received a brand new soundscape to get immersed in.
Speaking of Sakhal, a major focus of this update is on introducing new dynamic events to the environment. So make sure you go out there and explore!
On behalf of the DayZ team,
Adam