Bohemia Interactive has announced that the PC version of its long-in-development online zombie survival game DayZ will leave early access and launch in its 1.0 guise next week, on December 13th.
It's been a lengthy journey for DayZ, of course; the game started life as a fan-made mod for Bohemia's Arma 2 in 2012, and was an almost immediate hit, reaching one million players in the first four months of its release. As a result of its popularity, Bohemia made the decision take on the project in an official capacity, and early access development of a standalone version, with original creator Dean Hall at the helm, began in 2013.
Since then, much has changed; Hall left the project to start his own studio in 2014, and the originally PC-only game is now available as part of Xbox One's Game Preview programme, with a PS4 release also planned. After years of seemingly glacial development progress, DayZ eventually entered beta in November, with a full release pencilled in for the end of 2018.