Simple Survival Stories - Article about multiplayer survival games in general

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Surviving in competitive environments

We are humans (if you are not, that’s cool too). This makes us very fragile organisms – we don’t seem to have God-like powers. There are lot of dangers out in the wild too – big predators, small bacteria and what not. Thanks to evolution and civilization, you are probably reading this from a comfortable place – somewhere safe.

As a result, we all like survival stories – how the human body and mind can endure seemingly impossible obstacles – freezing cold, burning heat, intense stress, unbearable pain and many others. From time to time we all like to hear a good survival story – be it fictional or not.

Media that explores the nature of survival is kind a niche – I wouldn’t say everybody is entranced by survival stories all the time. But the fact remains that sometimes there are made movies like Robinson Crusoe and Cast Away, that capture our imagination. This type of media allows us to remember how easy we are to break and appreciate the vast amount of goods modern society offers.

Games of Survival

Naturally, there are video games that explore surviving as well. No, not horror-survival games, the ones that try to scare us with smart jump scares, but ones that allow us to survive in the middle of nowhere with nothing.

Years ago these games were scarce – the good ones even more so. But now it seems like every quarter a new one pops out of a bush. Why so? Because now there is an audience for them, larger than ever before – group of dedicated people that are ready "to play the shit out of" X game that has survival elements.

It all started with the DayZ mod in 2012 and its emergent gameplay. It combined few gameplay mechanics in a unique manner: permanent death, MMO-like multiplayer, open world and the most important one – a mix of PVE and PVP combat. DayZ became so popular that it made its base game, ARMA 2, a best seller on Steam for months.

At the time it was like nothing else on the market – it created a new sub-genre. And what happens if there is a new cool kid around? Others start to act like it. As a result of this (cliche analogy) other developers started making games like DayZ. Don’t get me wrong – companies being inspired by others isn’t necessarily bad, in fact, that’s what happens all the time, to some degree or not.

Most of these games, that are inspired by DayZ, try to change or add something new to the already successful formula (from above) – like the base building element in Rust. There are of course blatant rip offs like The War Z, which is another topic for another day.

Some live together others die alone

But looking at all of these survival games and how some of them come and go from the mind of the public so fast, made me realize few things about them that are concerning.

First of all, after certain amount of time the only type of encounter people stumble upon is the one where the opposite side will shoot you on sight. Unless you are with friends, you can’t trust anybody else. The gameplay in Rust and many of the versions of the DayZ mod have become series of skirmishes as to which group possesses the best items and vehicles. These games are supposed to encourage social behavior, yet those who get the most satisfaction from them do some extremely anti social actions.

Secondly, the individuals that are into these type of games often migrate from one title to another. Why? Because all of these games are not finished and their incomplete state can do only so much as to satisfy a hungry horde of players which are "ready for some action".

Some of these games’ popularity lasts more, some less. But the two major factors as to for how long someone would play X survival game are with how many friends can the person play and how populated the game in question is. The rest is pretty predictable – you play a game for some time and then wait for the next major content update. I can’t blame anybody if they experience burn out with these Early Access titles, as it is with most games in this category in Steam.

In between the major updates you can bash the heads of strangers with your friends. But if you are alone, you will often get outnumbered and overpowered by larger groups of people.

My third observation about DayZ and other games of its kind is that given enough time, they all become first person 4X apocalypse simulators:

  • Players eXplore the seemingly fresh game and its mechanics;

  • eXpand to create settlements, if there is base building;

  • eXploit one each other in the form of killing, robbing, trolling, betraying and many other activities. The game is simply designed for that and any type of civilized establishments are being attacked by individual bandits or other, larger hostile groups and eventually destroyed;

  • And finally eXterminate the desire to play of those who are new to the game, giving them no hope of succeeding. This is because hostile NPCs (zombies, wild life, etc) are more often than not a minimum threat for the players which makes killing real characters, more enjoyable. This eventually turns every one of these survival games into giant deathmatch arenas.

The sheer horror

Sure, none of these games are actually trying to be first person civilization builders – they are meant to create chaos and unexpected situations with their emergent gameplay.

But I wish at least one of them would actually facilitate mechanics that would allow for more friendlier encounters and be realized to its full potential. Because none of them are. All of them seem to be only good at rewarding players with worthy possessions and putting them in fight-or-flee situations.

The people who have first hand experience from the early stages of the DayZ mod and to some extent Rust, seek more kills in more creative ways. At the end of the day, there is only one type of a player that stands out in these games – the one who kills for loot. And I don’t have problem with them – if anyone is to blame for that, it’s the developers who have established certain rules into their games that allow such behavior.

Don’t get me wrong: developers can make games that support less bandit behaviour – there just isn’t one around. Maybe DayZ will be finished someday and it will work properly, but given the circumstances, I’m not sure if people’s interest in it will last that long.

The beginning life span of every multiplayer game is the best time to play it – everybody is equal, nobody knows what is going on and the skill gap between good and bad players is minimal. To me that time period in this multiplayer survival genre seems to be over.

I just think it’s unfortunate that there is a substantial amount of people who are late to the party and will be punished for trying to get in in this competitive space. It’s like people who jump into games like Tribes: Ascend – the skill gap between veterans and newcomers is enormous.

Games like DayZ are not strictly skill based, but I would say that knowing your whereabouts in Chernarus at all times and tactical movement are some that take time to master.

And that’s the biggest problem for newcomers in every new survival game that appears from nowhere: the horde of experienced players that migrate from one game to another – be it because the other game doesn’t have enough features currently or/and is plagued by technical issues.

In the meantime, if you don’t have friends to play with, your safest bet is playing a singleplayer survival game. These are decent: The Long Dark, Salt, State of Decay and RPGs like the Misery mod for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat. Some of them are more relaxed than others, but you don’t have to worry about bandits trying to force feed you rotten kiwis.

And why?

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You might say the following:
"Why do you even give a fuck about newcomers? Are you one of those same noobs you are trying to so much protect from some ‘bandits’? Is this article some kind of redemption, just because you were ‘late’?"

I just think that this multiplayer survival genre is going nowhere – it won’t survive this way for a long time. Developers keep making the same games for one particular group of people that don’t go along together so well. I’m not sure how much long we can keep the illusion that some excellent game is coming out of this.