Hey Survivors,
The 1.29 Road to Badlands update has officially landed across all platforms!
Just to recap the Experimental Article: Road to Badlands is not merely a pit stop to address technical issues. It’s a regular-sized update. In essence, we are utilizing the summer update window to bring assets from DayZ Badlands to the community ahead of time. So there aren’t just the usual bug fixes. There’s brand new content to enjoy! Here’s what you can look forward to in the Road to Badlands update:
SCR-17 Battle Rifle (with additional Black variant for Sakhal)
2 Buttstocks and a magazine for SCR-17
Holo Sights
Tanker Helmets
Military Caps
Brass Knuckles and a special new variant
Nasdara Military Convoy on Chernarus and Livonia
Desert Camo variants for Combat Backpack and Plate Carrier Vest
If you want to learn more about some of these assets, we discussed them in detail in the experimental article. Here are the patch notes for Steam.
There are also a few things we didn’t go over in that article. The most notable of these is the knuckle duster with the word "Friendly" engraved on it. This was done in collaboration with our friends at AWE me and Man at Arms: Reforged, a collective of blacksmiths and craftsmen who re-create various weapons from pop-culture and gaming. Check out their amazing channel and Man at Arms: Reforged series on YouTube if you haven’t! And stay tuned for the recreation of the "Friendly" brass knuckle! In addition, along with the Nasdara convoys, we’re also introducing the female variant of the infected soldier since there has generally been a lack of variety in that regard.
For our dedicated Experimental players, you might remember us testing a unique Central Economy setup back in April of last year. The original intention for this was to get a perspective on what loot and flow for Nasdara will look like, but also to emphasize survival elements of our other maps. With 1.29, we will be implementing some of those changes we made back then to our live environment. We are hoping the changes will slightly slow down the gameplay and bring more focus on resource management and general character upkeep. This should result in more importance being placed on how you loot areas early after you spawn.
We have also adjusted where players are able to find certain guns and rifles. While players can still expect to find them at their usual locations, like hunting camps or military bases, there should be more intent to their placement now. Rather than having a choice of firearms, players might have to work with what they find. Other gear, like vests and helmets, has also been made rarer to reflect this change. You might also start finding items at locations where you did not previously. Some examples of this could be some weapons/firearms now spawning exclusively around farms, and NBC items spawning outside of only Medical Centers, Fire Stations, and high-tier military areas. We recognize these changes might be significant to some of you, so please share your feedback with us on our new feedback tracker, as we are more than keen to make changes and adjustments in the future.
As with all roads, we hope this Road to Badlands will lead us to its destination: the eventual release of DayZ Badlands. The question is "when?" We would like to announce the release window for DayZ Badlands and we have prepared another teaser for it. Stay tuned as we’ll be airing it tomorrow on Convergence Indie Showcase at 20:00 CEST. Keep in mind that this is still a release window. We'll confirm the exact date later on down the line. Meanwhile, Dev Blog 5 for DayZ Badlands will be dropping on July 17th, so definitely stay tuned for that as well.
Some of you may already know that we invited a selection of community leaders and content creators to Prague for various activities, including a LAN party to try out DayZ Badlands. So if you need more info on DayZ Badlands, you may pester the creators in the image below. Thank you to all who visited us here. It was a blast to see you! Shout out to HollyRex, Slexify, Fresh Spawns John, Fresh Spawns George, Happybombs, WOBO, RunningManZ, Soursweet, Taskforcegaming, M1ndr. (Not in the photo) JLK, Kaitiac, Lottie. Ladyadventure, GeekFPS, TopeREC, Playguy, 9TSIXTH, and MB93.
We’d like to thank you, the general community, as well for your unwavering support and infinite patience. Working on Nasdara has been an immersive experience (with the European heatwaves), and we’re so excited for you to see DayZ Badlands.
Please wishlist it if you haven’t already.And please stay safe and hydrated!
On behalf of the DayZ Team,
Lynn
P.S. Enjoy the teaser for the update!