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[EpicVesselGames]

Zombie Safe Zone
- click here for the latest development log entry -

The development log for Zombie Safe Zone (ZSZ) will live here. ZSZ is just a fun little apocalypse game that I work on during the weekends. I imagine that it will be for free once it is finished.

In ZSZ you will lead your small team through a crumbling city as you try to save what's left of the city's population. Along the way you will have to manage resources, create safe zones, and complete mission objectives. It is intended to be a strategy/sim type of game.

I tend to tweet progress as it happens @EpicVesselGames, but any big changes will be here. I look forward to sharing the process and reading comments.

This short GIF of ZSZ shows the general GUI and mechanics.

I draw a lot of ideas from some of my favorite games (big and small). I think Rebuild comes to mind when anyone sees the game, and maybe the original Sim City. The city is randomly generated and there is no save function. It borrows some Rogue ideas and isn't intended to be a game that lasts hours. Maybe that will change in the future.

Right now I'm working on this by myself. I usually work with a great artist Matt, but he is busy with a new Director position at a historical society (on top of kids/wife/etc.). So the art is based on a city set by a nice guy name Alex and GUI by Buch. Much of what you see has been edited by me, so it's mostly programmer art, but I like the pixel feel.

Latest Update: 11/22/2014
Progress towards a demo: [|][|][|][|][|][|][|][|][|][ ]
 - End of Day Report
- Zombie Hoard Movement and attacks
 - Random Encounter Events
 - Splash/title screen
- Sound and Music

[EpicVesselGames]

DevLog 2: Experimenting with IMGUR & a game update with video

They say to put what's most important at the top, so even though I wrote the stuff below first, here is a video update of ZSZ. This particular video shows a dev test of how the survivors in the city react to different situations, such as lack of supplies or extreme danger. It also has some great chiptunes by 8bit bEtty.  

I've added simple icons to show the survivor populations, but this is purely for debugging and testing purposes. The city in which you play has a population of survivors that try to stay alive by moving, securing zones, and fighting off the zombie danger. Likewise, it has a population of zombies trying to eat those survivors. Most of this is hidden to the player, but I feel it makes for a more interesting and authentic environment. Even if that environment is presented in 8-bit graphics.

This is a dummy picture, it opens the video in a new window

You can see the icons, and including some of those might be a way to communicate the idea that the city is living (and dying) around the player. Other ideas I've brainstormed for showing this include maybe a news update thing (think MOO) or even a news ticker at the bottom of the screen. Maybe as if we are GTA I style in a helicopter. I dunno for sure.
 

Well I know these things are usually less of a "log" and more of a showcase, but having a place to drop in my thoughts is a big help actually. Having more than a 140 something characters is nice too. This one is all about my experience with IMGUR and thoughts on posting the GIF that is in the original post of this thread. I also post up a video that shows some of the more recent thoughts behind the guts of the game itself.

There is a ton written about what an indie developer should try to do to get as much exposure for his/her game. Some of that literature stresses the importance of social sharing on various sites. imgur is one of those sites (like tumbler, reddit, etc.), and much like this "breed" of site, I never seem to know what to expect.

I should of expected what i got, and that was a quick (nearly instantly) 12 downvotes. It isn't that I haven't had experience with sites like IMGUR. The shocking part is that I have a lot, and yet I was still surprised. The analytics are somewhat hard to understand.  Once chart shows 900ish views, while the page says 450 views, so I'm not exactly sure which is correct. Here is the image of the stats:

I did have one person who left a comment saying that they were interested in the game and wanted to see/learn more. At first, I got pretty down about it. I mean, this is more or less my "best" image of the game and it more or less face planted into the digital concrete, right?

What I eventually walked away with was a sense that, in this huge vast world of games and gamers, you really only need to capture the attention of a fraction of a percent of an audience take away something positive. In the eventual audience for this game (which honestly I view as ME, that's who I'm making the game for), capturing the attention of a hundredth of a percent means thousands of players. That's a nice way that numbers can work as a booster, rather than a thumbs down.

[EpicVesselGames]

DevLog Entry 3

I realize that I haven't talked much about the gameplay of Zombie Safe Zone! To put it into a few short bullet points along with the inspiration for each:

• The genre is strategy/tactical/simulation (think Rebuild)
• You control a military squad, or Unit, that moves from building to building within the city(think Urban Dead)
• There are a few basic resources, including supplies, weapons, and survivors (think, the Last Stand)
• The story of the game is progressed mostly through text (Dwarf Fortress)
  
• Each city is randomly generated with a variety of "zones", each with unique purposes (Sim City)
• It is inevitable that the city will die, you just have to survive long enough to reach your goal (maybe Fallout)
  
• Each game plays quickly and perma-death is real (of course, Rogue)

This game was really envisioned as a text-based or even symbol based game. However, I simply love the Sim City art style and the symbolic nature of pixel art in general. I gathered a set of city tiles and military icons (all from Open Game Art) and went to work.

The "player" in the game is a military unit made up of a few soldiers, troops, whatever you want to think of them as. I try NOT to specify because so much of the game is left (and benefits from) your imagination. Here is all the information I give you about, well, you:

 

Likewise, the information about each zone is vague (until you rescue certain personnel, like a scientist). Much like the experience in games such as Urban Dead, you are given a general idea of where you are and what you are doing there. You are given some basic information to create the scene, but the rest is up to you.

I'd love to hear some experiences with games such as this. What do you need to really get into a game of this nature? Would animations on the map help? Thoughts are welcome.

[Playaction]

Dude, this looks awesome. I wouldn't put too much thought into the feedback from imgur. Most people are probably not used to seeing work in progress, and evaluating it as such.

A few thoughts.

I feel like the zone window could use some icons instead of text to describe what's there. That would make it easier to quickly click zones and scan the difference. Like gray dot for no zombies, 1 dot for 1-10 zombies, 2 dots for 10-100 zombies or just numbers.

My first thought when seeing your gif's was that maybe this could have some of the elements and feel of the ancient game "Lost Patrol". Like ordering your squad to search a zone for supplikes, make temporary barricades for resting, random encounter events and stuff like that.

Looking forward to playing with your demo!

[EpicVesselGames]

Dude, this looks awesome. I wouldn't put too much thought into the feedback from imgur. Most people are probably not used to seeing work in progress, and evaluating it as such.

I really appreciate the feedback. I think you make a excellent point.

I'm really glad you mentioned the Zone information. It has gone through a couple of different styles and what I finally settled on (not set in stone by any means) shows information in word and number form. If you have found/rescued certain "special survivors", you are given more precise information about the zone. Similar to the board game Pandemic where each role has a benefit; a CDC hazmat guy allows you to see exactly how many dead bodies there are. I'm not sure if this is the best, but it gives added value to finding those special people.

Below is how the Zone GUI has changed over time. I also did a quick mockup that would show it using icons instead of numbers/words as you suggested. I'm not sure which is best, but i do like the look of the icons.

  ->    ->    -> 

I wasn't familiar with Lost Patrol, but a quick google search gave me an idea of the game. There are certainly some elements that are familiar! The idea of the passage of time seems to be a big component. In LP it looks as if each action has the consequence of costing some time. The same goes for my game. Although, I kept it simple and each action required 2 hours, I've given thought to making it more complex.

 
The left is from Lost Patrol  |  The right image from Zombie Safe Zone

Thanks again for posting, the GUI is such an important part of the game.

[Playaction]

Oh, cool. I really really like the idea, that teammembers can enhance the zone information screen, to make it more precise. Very cool idea.

That every action takes 2 hours is fine - that makes it easy to understand the "rules". But maybe attacking a zone cautiously would take longer, than attacking normal/bold.

Does the time of day come into play? Like it's more dangerous to run around at night because of visibility issues? If so, that could maybe be marked by a darker tone on the time bar.

I agree that GUI is very important in a game like this.
And also explaining the rules of the game. Like if i attack a zone, it could show me a danger/success percent for each attacking option. Or alternatively showing it, when the attack is resolved, so i can learn from it. (I hope that made some sort of sense)

[EpicVesselGames]

Does the time of day come into play? Like it's more dangerous to run around at night because of visibility issues? If so, that could maybe be marked by a darker tone on the time bar.

Currently it has no effect but it will. I'm not entirely sure in what ways exactly. I think certainly increasing danger, maybe giving an edge to the zombies at night or making searching harder/less successful. Maybe gathering/recruiting new survivors is more difficult. Time is definitely a resource that impacts the game, in what way is still open to new ideas!

I agree that GUI is very important in a game like this.
And also explaining the rules of the game. Like if i attack a zone, it could show me a danger/success percent for each attacking option. Or alternatively showing it, when the attack is resolved, so i can learn from it. (I hope that made some sort of sense)

You are quite right! Right now there is a general danger meter that gives a sense of the difference between the attack or move options. This is really quite vague, and I'm not sure if I did that on purpose, to encourage the player to learn as opposed to just being told what to do.

With this amount of information, feedback on the results of an incident becomes much more important. I like the idea of making some mistakes to learn. It increases the learning curve of the game for sure, but is it in a bad way?

The battle results are lacking right now. It is currently just text saying how many of your guys died and how many zombies you killed. I've got a mockup of what I hope to have in place. I will post that up in the next develog and would be thrilled to have feedback on that as well!

[Playaction]

With this amount of information, feedback on the results of an incident becomes much more important. I like the idea of making some mistakes to learn. It increases the learning curve of the game for sure, but is it in a bad way?

Oh, didn't notice those in the gif. I think learning from failing is perfectly fine, as long as I get enough information to learn from.

[EpicVesselGames]

Development Log Entry 4

Having yesterday off allowed me some very productive time to work on Zombie Safe Zone. Not only did I get some terrific feedback on the GUI elements of the game, but I was able to implement the "tutorial" storyline. This not only lays the groundwork for other scenarios and events, but it is one more step towards a playable demo!

As you can see in the image above, character portraits have been added to these storyline features. In the tutorial, your basic task is to locate a missing police Sergent (and presumably those who he/she has saved). Along the way you are guided to complete simple tasks that teach the basic controls and ideas within the game. For example, your first task is to build up the walls surrounding the police station zone. Following from there, other simple objectives are presented in addition to optional ones, commonly referred to as "side quests" or bonus missions.

I was really happy with the way the messages turned out, and while there is still plenty of tweaking to do (as well as polishing), I think I achieved my goal of making a fun player experience. Likewise, my target for releasing a demo is to have the tutorial in place as well as most if not all of the game actions and options. I've bumped the demo meter up a notch and listed some things that still need to be finished.

[EpicVesselGames]

Development Log Entry 5

I captured a gif of the current stat of ZSZ. The biggest missing component (aside from any and all sound) is the zombie hoard AI. I'm actually looking forward to planning it and believe that I know what I'm shooting for (we will see). One of the questions that comes to mind is how "smart" to make the hoards.

There are some movies, books and games that give zombies certain abilities to band together. Typically, when this happens their collective intelligence seems to go up. For example, I Am Legend introduces a certain zombie leader who guides the undead to where they need/want to go. The Walking Dead seem to give the zombies a natural affinity for finding camps and the living. The Zombie Survival Guide talks about the consistent general nature of zombies and therefore (like 5 year-olds and a soccer ball) they just sort of gravitate to the same locations/stimulus.

In games there has to be some balance with what we would expect and what is actually fun. In this scenario the major antagonist are the zombie units that contain large numbers of zombies. When and how they appear is driven by that sort of Survival Guide idea of zombies gravitating towards the same thing. What happens when they become a zombie hoard is entirely the issue.

That's where I'm at for now. I think I will just try something and see how well it works.

[Playaction]

I like the idea of groups/hordes of zombies coming occasionally. That could add stressfull and calm periods of the game. And if your scouts warned you of a horde underway, you would have time to prepare defenses.
I think i recall "Rebuild" having something like that as well. It makes sense to have a couple of zombies in an area being minor annoyances, and having to fear the hordes.

[EpicVesselGames]

I like the idea of groups/hordes of zombies coming occasionally. That could add stressfull and calm periods of the game. And if your scouts warned you of a horde underway, you would have time to prepare defenses.
I think i recall "Rebuild" having something like that as well. It makes sense to have a couple of zombies in an area being minor annoyances, and having to fear the hordes.

That's it in a nutshell. I'm really not trying to break any molds (i know that's like ani-indie logic). I hope I can balance these hoards the right way so that it adds that "fun stress" and doesn't become an annoyance. I will actually have something ready by tomorrow, and for now I will have check that off of the list.

** I posted up on the r/gamedev showcase and will be there for AMA.

[Ticebilla]

Following.

[EpicVesselGames]

Development Log Entry 6

While programming the zombie AI for the hoard actions, it became increasing apparent that a better attack report was needed. Here is the result:

@Playaction: Your ideas and feedback were very helpful and I appreciate it! I'm still tweaking and changing, but this definitely gives a lot more information to the player. It might give too much, but there is a purpose for everything there. Definitely need to see how this fits, but an upgrade from what I previously had for sure!

[EpicVesselGames]

Development Log Entry 7

I sent a tech build out today! This wasn't to a media outlet or for promotion. It was just sent to someone who needed to see the game. However, it made me think of this question in a serious way:

How polished should a first demo be? And that is a question I would like to direct towards the community. Unlike many of the games on TIG, ZSZ is a strategy game which means most of the images are pretty much the same. It isn't about flashy animations and pretty graphics (at least, not to the extent of games with more action).

Therefore, the conclusion I've come to is that demos, alpha builds as they come along, is almost necessary to show off the changes in the game.
Do you agree or disagree? I really need some help on this.

And finally, here's a new image of a character from the game:

In the tutorial campaign, you rescue the doctor from the hospital
I'd call it pixel art, but pixel art people would kill me

[Playaction]

I like the report screen. Easy to skip if you don't care, and lot's of info if you want to know why.
Hopefully the icons make sense when you play it, because right now it's a little confusing.

As far as the demo, I would suggest that the scope of the demo can easily be very limited, but the things that are there have to work and make sense.
I think most people would understand if some buttons are unclickable with a "coming soon" label. Text saying "Weapon description here" and black outline of character portraits, are probably fine as well.
Weird debug labels and broken features would probably confuse and give a bad impression. I remember testing Europa Universalis a long time ago for a preview article, and that had way too much debug info and missing button labels to make any sense.

The Tigsource users will probably be way more understanding of a work in progress alpha than a lot of other places though.

I would love to try frequently updated releases, but i think a combination could do as well. A playable demo would explain a lot of the basics, but gifs and screenshots are easier to give quick feedback on.

[EpicVesselGames]

@Playaction: Great points about the icons. I think they make sense, but I guess I will find out soon enough. That's one positive for getting a demo out. The TIG community has proven to be generally awesome and it seems like a safe place to get quality feedback on a WIP. I have some extra debug stuff that would need to go before a build and that general idea is something that I will keep in mind.

My goal is to complete my short list of things for the demo (as stated in the first post) and then put out a build for some feedback. With a game like this, I feel it is more of a niche audience than most games. I could be wrong, but I think I will just have to be as clear in the description as possible.

In addition to the list, I'm in the middle of reconfiguring the way zombies interact within the city. I thought heavily about the game Urban Dead and how the player zombies behave. Aside from simply sitting there (for inactive users), the active zombies are troweling the streets looking for human flesh, with the occasional breaks for brain rejuvenation. Simulating an AI like this is something I've been looking at. I want to show what I've come up with properly, so I'll post up a dev log with nice pictures sometime this week.

[EpicVesselGames]

Just a screenshot to show that I'm working hard on the zombie AI. It's coming along nicely. It just needs lots of play testing and tweaking. I made a bunch of other changes. Here's a new screenshot (with a bunch of debug information all over it).

[EpicVesselGames]

Happy holidays everyone!

In lieu of devlogging, I've been using those spare moments to get more work done on the game. It's actually in a state where it could be played as a full demo. However, being this close, I really want to polish it up a little before it goes out into the big world all by itself.

Here is the latest screenshot. There are plenty of changes since that last update, but its moot to mention them because, generally speaking, nobody has played the game yet!

But I will anyway. A few big changes:
 - Zombies act like zombies
 - The first scenario/story is implemented fully (sans the end debriefing screen)
 - animations are finally making their way into the world of the game
 - some new art/buildings/zones
 - more player feedback in various areas
 - still no sound or music

With the holiday coming up, I don't think I will be ready to present the demo this weekend. However, it shouldn't be long after that. Thanks for reading!

[Playaction]

Looks good. I like the city skyline, but the brown earth seems a bit too bright, compared to the subtle colors of the city tiles. It draws the eyes more than it should. maybe darker and more desaturated could still give the same effect.



Looking forward to trying the demo.