DayZ StandAlone (number 9) DayZ is a multiplayer open world survival horror video game in development by Bohemia Interactive and the stand-alone version of the award-winning mod of the same name. The game was released on 16 December 2013 on PC for Microsoft Windows via digital distribution platform Steam, and is currently in early alpha testing. DayZ Standalone Logo.jpgThe game places the player in the fictional post-Soviet state of Chernarus, where an unknown virus has turned most of the population into violent zombies. As a survivor, the player must scavenge the world for food, water, weapons, and medicine, while killing or avoiding zombies, and killing, avoiding or co-opting other players in an effort to survive the zombie apocalypse. DayZ began development in 2012 when the mod's creator, Dean Hall, joined Bohemia Interactive to work on it. The development has been focused on altering the engine to suit the game's needs, developing a working client-server architecture, and introducing new features like diseases and a better inventory system. Prior to release, DayZ won the MMORPG.com award for Best Hybrid MMO and IGN's People's Choice Award of Gamescom 2013. Over 172,500 copies were sold in the first 24 hours of release. GAMEPLAY The goal of DayZ is to stay alive during conditions of a zombie apocalypse. The player must scavenge supplies from around the 225 km.2 map in order to survive,[1] including food, water, medicine, and clothing, which are found in locations such as houses, barns, and abandoned vehicles.[2] Various weapons are present, allowing players to protect themselves from zombies or other players if found, largely focused on melee weapons, though some guns can be found. The player begins on a beach and has to begin searching for items in order to keep their character alive by, for example, eating and drinking enough.[3][4] A range of diseases are also a threat to the player, requiring them to have access to medicine if needed,[5] with diseases including cholera, dysentery, and hepatitis, caught from sources such as dirty water and rotten food.[6] Players can customise their character with a range of clothing, changing things like the amount of items they can carry.[7] If a player is shot or otherwise hurt, the items on their person may be damaged.[8] Hundreds of public domainbooks are in the world for players to read including titles such as War of the Worlds and Moby-Dick.[9] When players clear an area of zombies within the game, such as around a town, further zombies will not respawn within that area, though others may wander back in, providing a safer area for some time.[10] Planned features include being able to build bases in the world in which players can keep their items safe, with the possibility of security systems and programmable computers having been considered.[11] The standalone game will build on the text and close range voice chat of the mod version by including a new whisper channel, which will allow players to communicate over a very short distance without players nearby hearing, as well as radios (based off the "ACRE" mod for ARMA 2), which will allow longer range communication, including the possibility of encrypted two-way radios and player run radio stations.[3][6][12] A number of features which are not currently available but will be added in a patch some time during the alpha have been confirmed including vehicles, more zombies, animals and hunting, and cooking.[13]

GAMEPLAY

As in Peace Walker, Ground Zeroes will offer a base-building feature that allows player to develop weapons and items from their virtual motherbase. The player is also given the ability to access the motherbase from their real-life smartphones.^[7] Series director Hideo Kojima revealed that the game has a new day and night cycle that runs in real-time, and that "depending on how you travel between one stage to the next, the travel time will affect the time of day when you arrive at your destination".^[8] A new gameplay direction will allow the player to choose in what order the story events take place by selecting missions in any order they like, and yet still "understand the encompassing message by the end".^[9][10]

Kojima has spoken about the restrictive nature of previous Metal Gear titles, saying that they "set [the player] on one rail to get from point A to point B, with a certain amount of freedom between". In stark contrast, Kojima's team will instead offer the player new ways of traversal and sneaking methods, such as taking a plane, helicopter or motorcycle to the mission area. This is in order for Kojima to accomplish a "true open world experience" with Ground Zeroes.^[11]

PREMISE

Metal Gear series fictional chronology
1964 – Snake Eater 1970 – Portable Ops 1974 – Peace Walker 1975 – Ground Zeroes 1984 – The Phantom Pain 1995 – Metal Gear 1999 – Solid Snake 2005 – Metal Gear Solid 2007/09 – Sons of Liberty 2014 – Guns of the Patriots 2018 – Metal Gear Rising

Ground Zeroes will take place in 1975, some months after Peace Walker. It stars series protagonist Big Boss (or simply Snake) as he works with the Militaires Sans Frontieres to infiltrate an American black site on Cuban soil called Camp Omega. Snake's mission objectives include searching for the Cipher agent Paz Ortega Andrade, who had survived her fight with Snake in Peace Walker and also rescuing Chico Libre, the young boy from Peace Walker who attempted his own rescue operation but was captured as well. Sometime during his mission, MSF's mother base is attacked by the shadow organization XOF, lead by Skull Face. The events from Ground Zeroes will result in Big Boss's characterization undergoing a major change.^[12]

DEVELOPMENT

A poster of Ground Zeroes during the 2012 PAX event. The image is mirrored to disguise the message "From "FOX," two phantoms were born".

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In February 2012, a site named "Development Without Borders" owned by Konami was uploaded promoting development for a new Metal Gear title, which was titled "The "next" MGS". The site was recruiting staff for the 2012 GDC pavilion in March, and requested applications for several positions for the latest Metal Gear Solid targeted for "high-end consoles and PC" and "next-gen Fox engine".^[13][14] As the year went on, screenshots and videos of the newly announced Fox Engine were unveiled by the team.^[15] This media demonstrated many random settings and characters, although none related to the Metal Gear series. Certain screenshots, however, were noted to feature a character who resembled the Big Boss character of Metal Gear, walking up to a Stryker AFV previously seen in Metal Gear Solid 4.^[16]

The game was later announced on August 30, 2012 originally under the name of Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes. It was revealed at a private function celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Metal Gear series, and made its public debut two days later at the 2012 Penny Arcade Expo.^[17] Director Hideo Kojima confirmed that Big Boss would return as the game's protagonist, and that the story would serve as a prologue to another game in the series.^[18] It will be the first game to utilise the Fox game engine developed by Kojima Productions.^[19] On January 2013, Kojima revealed that Ground Zeroes will be the first title in the series to be subtitled in Arabic, a feature the team had originally planned for previous games.^[20] In addition, he also confirmed that the length of the cutscenes will be reduced as he believes that long cutscenes have become outdated.^[9][21]

Metal Gear Solid V was originally going to contain both Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain but the long development time resulted in Kojima splitting the project in two parts so that players will get an early access to Metal Gear Solid V.^[22] Kojima compared Ground Zeroes with the pre-title sequence in a Hollywood movie due to how it will build up the plot from The Phantom Pain.^[22] Kojima at one point expressed concerns over whether or not Ground Zeroes would be released. He claimed that his aim was to target taboos and mature themes, which he considered to be "quite risky", adding that his roles as creator and producer were in conflict with one another; as creator, Kojima wanted to take the risk of exploring themes that might alienate audiences, but as producer, he had to be able to tone down the content in order to sell as many copies of the game as possible.

Ultimately, the role of creator won out, and Kojima described his approach as "prioritising creativity over sales".^[23][24][25] Kojima has described the connections and differences between Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain. Stating that "the advanced capabilities of the FOX Engine have allowed me to tell the new story in a new way," and that "there will be a significant difference in what The Phantom Pain brings to the series, so we want to ease players into the new open world environment and its potential", hoping to achieve that with Ground Zeroes.^[26]

A teaser of Ground Zeroes was shown during the PlayStation 4 launch event on November 14. It confirmed exclusive content for PlayStation platforms in the form of a mission titled "Déjà Vu". The mission allows players to control "Classic Snake", a pixelized recreation of Solid Snake's model from the original Metal Gear Solid.^[27] An extended teaser reveals Psycho Mantis, a villain from the original, and other elements from the original in a Shadow Moses version of Camp Omega. A further teaser trailer was released on December 9. It featured Xbox One content in the form of a mission titled "Jamais Vu", featuring a Metal Gear Rising version of Raiden, who is tasked with eliminating "body snatchers" on Camp Omega. In this teaser, the release date for the game was confirmed as March 18, 2014.^[4] The game will be released both physically and digitally in spring of 2014, as a standalone release from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.^[28][29][30] Originally, a physical release was limited to Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, while the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 would only be receiving a digital release,^[31] but on December 10, 2013 it was announced that Xbox One and PlayStation 4 would also receive physical releases.^[32] The positive sales from Peace Walker in Japan resulted in Kazuhira Miller being added to the cover alongside Snake. However, due to the same game's poor sales in the west, Kojima believed Kazuhira would not appear on the English cover, which was in fact the case.^[33][34]

The Japanese version of the game was confirmed by Kojima to feature an English text option,^[35] rendering in-game menus and subtitled dialogue in full English. This would make it possible to play