DayZ dev 'effectively doubling' team size, adding cooking system (update)

DayZ developer Bohemia Interactive is "effectively doubling" the size of the game's development team prior to the beginning of production on a cooking system, the studio announced on Feb. 28.

"We are inducting a large number of new people to the team, effectively doubling the whole project," reads the latest update on the DayZ development Tumblr. It's unclear if the increase in team size is related to last month's announcement that Dean Hall, the creator of the original Arma 2 mod that became the stand-alone DayZ, will be leaving Bohemia and his game at the end of 2014. We've reached out to Bohemia for more details, and will update this article with any information we receive.

Bohemia is adding more developers to DayZ as the team looks to renew its focus on the game's survival elements in March, according to the Tumblr post. That includes the development of a cooking system that is "heavily inspired" by the one in The Indie Stone's Project Zomboid, another survival-focused title. Hall said earlier this year that he does not see that game as a competitor to DayZ.

In DayZ's cooking system, players will heat up food on a stove or fireplace, and after a particular amount of time, the food will become "cooked" or become a different type of food, like soup. It will be possible to overcook food, and items will also cool down over time.

"We're very excited by the possibilities for this system," said the team.

The DayZ developers are also testing a new system for game updates that should reduce the desynchronization problems that some players are experiencing. And they're now working on finalizing all the animations for using two-handed melee weapons.

Update: Reached for comment regarding the DayZ team size increase and Dean Hall's upcoming departure, a Bohemia representative told Polygon, "I can confirm that the two things are not related."