Greetings, Survivors!
We hope that you all have received your long-awaited presents from the Santa! Today we're coming back with the second post from the "Behind the scenes" series, where we look into specific parts of Infection Free Zone, which are currently in development. This week it's time for the day and night cycle!
Day and Night cycle
The whole thing has gone through quite a few iterations, but this is the current state of the day and night cycle:
How does it affect gameplay?
The day and night cycle has a fundamental influence on the gameplay of Infection Free Zone. It basically provides the rhythm to the whole game, dictating which actions should've been done at what time. Remember that:
- Infected are vulnerable to the sun - intensive UV light hurts them. They start their nightly hunt when the suns sets, swarming out of the buildings. And before the dawn they come back, hiding in the non-adapted structures.
- Due to the above, it's the best idea to explore the zone during the day and defend from the infected at night. Until late game, it's safe to assume to any human squad left in the wild is probably going to end up dead.
- Important - when searching through the abandoned buildings during the day, there's always a chance to encounter the aggressive infected inside. That's why you're always supposed to send your best units to survey/clean up the buildings first.
- Artificial lightning is also useful! Powerful searchlights installed on top of your walls can be considered one of the best defensive tools out there.
- We are still looking into the possibility of introducing the seasons. If we can ever reach the Biomes stretch goal in our Community Challenge, we will look into adjusting the days' and nights' length dynamically, depending on the actual season. This should add an additional layer to the gameplay complexity.
Any questions?
If you have any questions, let us know! We will try to answer them all. And other than that, we would like to wish you a happy new year, on behalf of every team member working on Infection Free Zone! Thank you for sticking with us and see you in 2022!
Best regards,
Jutsu Games Team
