World of the Living Dead

Hunger and thirst deaths are back, but the two of us have done extensive testing to make sure there won’t be a repeat of the widespread carnage that resulted last time. We’ve also made some other small tweaks and changes to other areas based on our tests - including missions, the tutorial and visibility - and tried to deal with the main bugs that have been interfering with play.

To cushion the hardship of survivors again facing death from starvation and dehydration, we’re resetting all health (injury points) to max and also resetting Hunger and Thirst levels to zero. This gives everyone a chance to find supplies and assess the situation.

• Survivors will suffer an injury point loss after 24 hours at max Thirst, or 96 hours at max Hunger.
• Hunger and Thirst will no longer penalize injury recovery rate, but being at max Hunger or max Thirst will completely prevent injury recovery. The error which was making Fatigue and Fear not recover due to max Hunger or Thirst has already been removed.
• Only a single notification will display when one or more of your characters is at max Hunger and/or Thirst and you click to check recovery status.
• Test subject delivery missions are now only specific as to the Blood Type required by NECRA researchers.
• Scavenge location visibility has been increased to 750 meters for all users.
• Only one scavenge location - the Red Cross Tent - is created for the tutorial. This now has its own map marker and the yellow exclamation marks are no longer used.
• A bug which was generating NECRA missions at excessive distances has been fixed - however, some missions are still being generated with errors and we’ll try to deal with these soon.
• New player squad icons are hidden from the map until they are level 5 (at which time they can be attacked). Lower level players can see squads belonging to players over level 5.
• An existing route on map load was showing incorrect end marker - a standard Google maps marker. This should be fixed.
• Armor filter should now work on the manage inventory pages.
• PvP attacks should now generate a notification as well as incrementing the attacks count and adding the yellow border if no existing attacks.
• All membership options removed and replaced with “SCUGS Upgrade”.

After listening to your feedback, we took the decision to remove the three membership options. We agreed that the SP boost and other features of the membership packages were too powerful so have replaced them with a single SCUGS Upgrade option which lasts 30 days. 

The SCUGS Upgrade can be bought with NC. This makes it possible for players who complete offers to get the most important aspects of the interface upgrades. Thanks to everyone who supports development of WotLD by buying NECRA Credits - we really couldn’t have made it this far without you!

You can comment on the changes over at 

This release is primarily aimed at improving the tutorial, to help new players get into the game.

• Removed step zero (welcome to WotLD) of the tutoral
• Fixed problem with skull toggling getting stuck
• “Next” button pulsates when step is completed and tutorial pane reappears
• “GO” pulsates when first route is planned
• “Plan route to here” pulsates and is highlighted by an arrow when first step is completed (to indicate the first emergency cache)
• “Manage inventory” pulsates and is highlighted when squad reaches emergency cache
• Video added to explain drag and drop inventory management - shows until first inventory mission is completed
• “Manage team” pulsates and is highlighted when squad reaches first survivor mission
• Video added to explain drag and drop survivor management - shows until first inventory mission is completed
• Tutorial pops up after each step is completed, along with completion text

Features

• Safehouse integrity chart now shown on Command page
• Moved operative status update box to Command page
• Premium membership button on top menu drops down to show current membership and days remaining, along with list of pending NECRA deliveries
• NECRA Credits balance button on top menu drops down to show quick links to NC pages
• Zeds killed counter now shown under current SP in top menu
• New players can now register using Facebook, Google, Yahoo or OpenID
• URL change in free NC tweet
• Google +1 button added
• Multiple changes to how the tutorial works. Completing a step should now update the tutorial box without a page refresh and a notification will tell you when you have completed a step.
• Map filter drop down added to replace the previous click to filter. This allows us to more easily add to the filters and should make them more useful and obvious.
• Marker mode activation link moved to bottom of map PDA
• Faction rankings now computed by combining the ranks of the members, rather than simply the number of players in a faction. The faction rank shows a breakdown of these numbers in a tooltip next to the name.
• Faction chat added to game. Players can now chat privately with members of their own facton. Global or faction chat can be toggled by clicking on the tabs above chat. The red radio will also toggle between chats, or reopen them both if they were closed.

Bugfixes

• Changed the unassigned infocard box so that it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the screen for some users. This may mean you have to collapse some survivors in large squads to assign cards.
• Fixes for Firefox 5 login problems
• Multiple fixes for IE9
• Some players were getting minors on registration. This is now fixed so that only adults are in starting squads.
• Reworded premium membership to better explain that there’s a bonus to the number of NC given, rather than a discount on price.
• Fix for apparent icon visibility when a squad hides. This caused some of you to assume it was only related to the large premium squad icons, but was actually caused by the squad icon only being removed when movement occurred. This has been fixed, so you don’t need to be afraid of making use of the larger icons.
• Raiding a destroyed safehouse no longer allows SP farming from killing of zeds. Shows a message “Safehouse is destroyed” and no further SP is given.
• Fixed a problem where Super rewards was not showing the full range of offers, so there should be more ways to earn NC now.
• Deleting a squad should no longer cause the squad box to disappear from the Command page.
• Clicking the tutorial skull should now always work
• Successfully raiding a safehouse should now always allow raiders to enter the safehouse - the previous capacity is ignored
• Multiple left menu layout fixes to prevent elements from flowing into each other
• Fix for NECRA Delivery page errors for Task Force members
• Fix for not clearing map z-density overlay, which was caused by code to keep showing bookmarked locations. Z-density colors won’t make the map hard to read now.
• Fix for problems with the display of PvP attacks by auto-archiving reports older than 5 days

Expansion

We’re making a change to how registration works today. We’ve consistently seen problems with new players supplying invalid email addresses, adding spaces to the end of the beta key or just losing interest when it takes time to receive the key. 

WotLD is still in closed beta but we’re removing the beta key requirement so that, at the moment, anyone can sign up and start playing immediately. We need more players to test the world and this seems like the best way to do it. As most of you will confirm, the zombocalypse is currently a lonely place.

Getting more players will help us troubleshoot and improve areas which aren’t getting much attention at the moment, such as PvP and faction features.

The beta key invitation system has been changed to a straightforward invite a friend system, and I’m archiving the beta key invitation thread on the forum. Feel free to get your friends involved.

You can now log in by clicking the green login button on the top right.

Item deterioration

Thanks for all your help with testing items over the last few weeks. We finally tracked down a rounding error which was having a massive effect on how rapidly items would get damaged. It was a tough one to find. In itself it was a tiny thing but when applied to thousands of steps, you would have seen a noticeable effect.

Firearms, weapons and armor should now correctly see damage based on the surrounding z-density. The condition of the item also has a significant effect, so be careful when relying on fair or poor items. Armor will continue to be damaged if an injury gets through to your survivor, which means that you still need to consider fear and fatigue, along with all other factors, when pushing squads beyond their limits.

Mostly bugfixes today. We’re working on other bugs that have been reported.

• Fix to not allow non-armor items to be placed in armor slots. These items would not have remained in the slots upon refresh, but it was visually confusing.
• Fixed the ration timer.
• Adjustments to some left menus which had broken after yesterday’s release.
• Strikeouts on NC purchase page that Task Force and SCUGS Elite members get 50% and 25% more NC when purchasing credits.
• Disabled premium membership purchase if player is already a premium member.

We’re looking at changing item deterioration so there might be another release soon.

This update took a while to get out as it includes a big new feature which we wanted to get right. Armor!

Armor

Armor provides protection from bites, general injuries and also against PvP combat. Survivors can now be protected in four areas: head, torso, legs and arms. 

Each type of armor has different strengths against different types of attack. A football helmet might be great at stopping a zed from biting off your face, but won’t do much to stop a round to the back of the head. A kevlar combat helmet will do the opposite, exposing the face but giving better protection in combat versus armed survivors.

You can scavenge armor at various locations around the city. To incorporate the new items, we’ve also changed the balance of the existing items, so you may see some changes in what you find.

Armor takes damage as your characters move through z-density, and also if your survivor is injured from PvZ or PvP, as this reflects the fact that the damage was absorbed by the armor but failed to protect the character. The protection offered decreases as it becomes damaged. We will be adding a skill soon to prevent damage to armor.

You can equip armor from the inventory management page, where you can drag and drop specific types of armor to slots for each character. A helmet can only be placed in “Head Armor”, a vest in “Torso Armor”, while the arms and legs also have their own slots. Armor items show up as dark blue. 

Good luck with the new armor and we look forward to hearing your stories from the field!

Item damage

Damage to items has been significantly changed so as to take into account z-density. Your items should now last much longer if you only expose them to lower z-d areas. 

Easter Egg Prizes

We delayed the egg rewards partly because we wanted to give out armor as prizes, so Easter Egg rewards are finally being delivered around Los Angeles County. 

Each type of egg will create a named cache (e.g. Blood Egg Cache) which will contain the items awarded for the threshold of eggs you collected. The thresholds are 1, 10, 20, 50, 100, 150, and so on. If you have eggs over a threshold, you will receive the items from the that and all previous thresholds, so some people will be collecting a lot of items! Eggs will disappear from the game.

Premium membership

Based on some extensive and appreciated feedback from players, we have made some changes to the way the 30 day premium membership works. 

Premium membership has been divided into three levels: NECRA Task Force, SCUGS Elite, and SCUGS Lite.

Everyone currently with active SCUGS Elite membership will receive all the great new benefits of SCUGS Elite, including free NC, a discount on buying NC, boost to earning SP and even a special bug-out bag, character mission and free meds!

Each level is discounted to half price for closed beta and we will continue to add features to all three levels as we develop the game.

NC item catalog

Firearms, melee weapons, armor and ammo can now be bought for NC. Items will use the new NECRA delivery system. Bug-out bags and items can be delivered directly to a selected character. The new range of bug-out bags are filled with items at a massive discount and aimed at rapidly getting a survivor equipped for the zombocalypse.

Bugfixes

• The message flashes when your survivors are too fatigued to scavenge.
• Grave Digger changed from 50 items looted to 50 bodies looted.
• Bookmarked locations do not disappear on moving squads.
• Cancel button on create marker infowindow works now.
• Survivor info in safehouses fixed.
• Changes to achievement categories
• Fix for errors with Halligan Bars

Bunch of bug fixes and shareable map markers added to SCUGS Elite!

• Fix for being trapped in the blue area indicating the extent of SCUGS coverage. Fear still goes up faster, but your squads shouldn’t get stuck there.
• Added missing icon for Large Gun Dealership locations.
• Equipment transfter not allowed at locations or caches if it will leave the survivor unable to move.
• Removed “undefined” from notifications for mission completion.
• BBCode for faction description fixed.
• Squad movement problem caused by a character being bitten is now fixed.
• Added pagination to reports on route submit and next leg.
• Fixed error in Inbox count for messages.

SCUGS Elite now also includes map markers. Enter “Marker mode” (a link will appear when your Elite subscription is enabled) and click to add a marker. You can give the marker a single character to identify it, add notes and remove old markers. Use them to plot waypoints, remember dangerous areas, plan trade or launch a plan of attack against enemies!

You can also share the marker with other players or with your entire faction. A message will be sent and they can then choose to display the marker on their map. Let us know how you find them!

Includes a number of bug fixes and new map markers for SCUGS missions. Details on the forum: http://bit.ly/mE7iJY

Exploration achievements, free NC giveaway, silenced weapons.

Some bugfixes and a few new features today.

• Three new achievements added for travelling to landmarks around the Los Angeles County region. Just write on the wall to check in!
• The game now includes suppressed and silent weapons.
• Archer skill added for use with bows.
• The Neptune and Quartermaster achievements have been permanently removed. They’ve been too difficult to reliably track.
• Grave Robber achievement added for extensive looting of Lost Property
• Safehouse achievements now require the safehouse to be constructed and then all defense slots filled.
• The infocard found dialog box now opens again on the map page.
• Fix for the stuck squads problem.
• 10 free NC for liking WotLD on Facebook or tweeting about WotLD!

Today’s World of the Living Dead update includes lots of bug fixes, introduces in-game chat and SCUGS Elite!

Bug fixes

• Missions problems, mostly to do with completing item missions
• Stuck squads problem should no longer happen. Please let us know if you have any stuck squads.
• Fix for squad shown as ‘moving’ when coming out of safehouse
• Cannot move items to collect mission locations. Items can only be moved to mission locations if they are a delivery location
• Fix for route planning outside visible z-density blocks
• Can enter broken safehouses regardless of original capacity
• Can’t write on the wall in private safehouse until it is either shared with faction or destroyed
• Fix for ration break bugs, although please tell us if your timers go above 24 hours! Because of the recent problems, we’ll be resetting hunger and thirst to zero for all survivors.

NECRA Operative Comms (aka chat)

There is now a small red radio to the right of the top menu. You can enable global chat with any other operatives online at the time. Be nice to each other (or don’t, that’s your choice as NECRA operatives).

SCUGS Elite

We’re introducing a new package for anyone who wants to support the game and get some bonus features. SCUGS Elite won’t give you a material advantage over other operatives, but it has some useful and fun elements - all accessible from the command page - and we’ll keep adding to it as we develop. SCUGS Elite currently gives you the following for 30 days, and we’re keeping it half price during closed beta!

• Custom larger squad icons (choose from an initial selection of over 100 icons, including flags of Europe and the Americas, and alphanumeric icons for the minimalist)
• Remove advertising (removes the top ad for the duration)
• Rename squads (rename at any time)
• Rename characters (change the full name or just add info)
• Strategic downloadable map (in KML format, for use in Google Earth)
• Downloadable spreadsheets (in csv format, can be opened in Excel or Open Office)

Find out more details about SCUGS Elite: http://worldofthelivingdead.com/account/subscriptions

New achievements

There are dozens of new achievements now available for you to unlock! Some of you will already meet the criteria for these, and you should see those unlocked already.