DayZ standalone still not out due to optimization issues and bug fixing

The standalone version of open-world zombie game DayZ has yet to see an official release because developer Bohemia Interactive is still polishing and fixing bugs on the title, according to a post from creator Dean Hall on Reddit.

Under a subsection titled "Optimizing/Bugfixing Dedicated server," Hall wrote, "This is why we are not out. We need performance." According to Hall, the team is reluctant to publish the game before it's running at a minimum of 15 frames per second with 50 players, 2,000 zombies and 25,000 loot items in the open-world sandbox.

"Our latest tests have all shown some runaway systems in the code we have to tidy up," Hall wrote. "The variable synchronization system that was developed for work with the network bubble, is checking the variables very often. We're optimizing this.

"We also have a bug where sounds (which are temporary vehicles) are being queued up and sent to all [playing running JIP clients]," he added. "This causes us a steady loss of performance on the server. The synchronized variables are also checked for each player, this is inefficient and we are refactoring that. It is our biggest obstacle to releasing the alpha right now. We know what needs to be done with it so we're working on that, then we will again reassess the performance.

"The build of DayZ Bohemia is currently working with functions with 10 to 20 players participating and has been given a handful o fnew zombie types. The client is still prone to frame rate drops, however, and according to Hall the inventory system is still a "mixed bad."

Hall noted that he is reluctant to announce a scheduled release date just yet.

"If I start saying, 'Oh it won't be out then,' people start asking me about the day after, and the day after," he wrote. "So it just encourages people to keep asking me when it is, and the ‘announced date' would be when I go, ‘Yeah, it could be out then.'"

Last month, a listing for DayZ appeared in the Steam Early Access database, suggesting the game would soon go into public testing. At the time, Hall was quick to clarify that the listing didn't necessarily meaning testing was imminent, but did state that "progress has been very good" on the title.