This demonstrates the gaming community placing value on traditional story-rich, micro-transaction-free, well-crafted content rather than the slop that the gaming industry tries to shove down customers' throats.

Gaming industry management are to blame. Rather than making "the best game they can" they focus on customer retention, invasive data telemetry feeding into analytics, and milking whales for extra money.

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Having played plenty of the Demo, I guess it is about time I got the full game (on discount until 1st October).

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Played it lots on mobile. Good game. Music great too - As you unlock levels you get access to more of it. Warning - Potential to be a big time sink.

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I'm not here for a conflict, or to being insulting towards you.

However, you glossed over two important facts I mentioned regarding supposedly worthless things.
- Most items can be scrapped into base materials, which are entirely useful for crafting (or selling).
- Many items can be sold, and the money gained can be used for purchasing more useful stuff.

You also complained about inventory management taking 50% of your play-time and this is surely a massive exaggeration. Anyone else play the game and spend half their time in the inventory window?

I was using examples in my description to make my position clear (to you and anyone else reading who is not familiar with the game). It was not meant to be condescending to you, although I can see from your response that is how you interpreted it.

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I feel perhaps that my earlier comment and Dubigrasi's ones have been unfair towards 7 Days To Die latest version.

For me, the grind is most noticeable *at the start* of the game. Once I have been playing for over 15 hours in a game world, my more powerful tools and player level does reduce the grinding aspect. Right now I have Wrench level 5 with 2 Mods Installed, and I have Perception level 5, Salvage Ops level 4, and it takes me 2 power-swings to take apart a fridge. (In previous Alphas, getting to this point was quicker.)

Even though Dubigrasi finds inventory management is a strain, I've never had that problem. Partly, it comes down to playing strategy. For instance, I tend to put a storage box outside buildings that I am looting. Then as my inventory fills up, I drop off all the excess into outside storage. Once I am back at base, I ensure that I use multiple boxes, and place similar items together - Food/Meds, Components, Weapons/Ammo, Clothes/Armour, Building Materials.

I disagree with Dubigrasi's comment about "worthless things". Practically every item mined, looted or salvaged is useful. Rotten flesh is useful for farm plots and hobo stew. Paper is useful for shotgun shells. If you pick up a chair, you can scrap it for wood. Seeds are useful for growing crops. AND... on top of all the above, if you have stuff (let's say paper) which you aren't using (to make shotgun shells) then you can collect up stacks of it, and sell those stacks to a trader, and then buy useful stuff with the money. Even excess "dukes" of money can be smelted in the forge for making bullet cases.

In my previous 7 Days v1 game where I died on day 17, the game-world put me out in the wilderness and the closest trader as well. Being so far away from a town, I was forced to play strategically. I took the Living Off The Land skill very early, so I could collect double the amount of Plants as normal, and then sold these to the trader in order to get the Cooking Pot. With the Cooking Pot, I could boil dirty water to make fresh water for safe drinking. (This would have been a lot easier if the trader had been on the edge of a town, but I still managed despite the unfortunate start.)

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Here is some praise of the latest 7 Days To Die version 1 :

The new Dew Collector design which allows you to craft a basic model without needing to purchase from a trader - This is a good design choice.

It's always nice to get more POIs (buildings) added to the game for exploration.

The new Armour System seems to be implemented okay, and it is nice to progress through the (new) game, and find this new stuff.

The new Quest system is okay as well.

Even though Screamer frequency increase is a pain, it also means that you need to consider it and plan against it in your game strategy. (For instance, I plan to move away from my starter base, and sort out another base which is more defensible against these fiendish scouts.)

When that new monster appeared in the second horde night (day 14) for me, and I was struggling to take it down (Insane toughness setting), I thought that was going to be the end of my play-through (Permadeath setting). It was a nice addition to the regular game. It reminded me of playing some of the game mods (e.g. Darkness Falls).

I'm also glad that The Fun Pimps are planning to keep on improving the new content for the next year or so.

Although early game grind is somewhat tedious (due to inferior tools), once you've been playing for a while and got good equipment and levelled-up, that grind goes away. It is an acceptable level of grind for me.

The new zombie skins are a welcome addition. The additional game-world maps (and ability to random-generate your game-world) are very welcome.

7 Days To Die continues to be my favourite computer game. (5000+ hours played)

I find it to be a game where you can adapt your play and try different strategies, you don't have only one way forward. Thanks to random-generation of the game-world, it is very replayable. Also, so few games have a decent destructible environment. Compare the graphics of 7 Days To Die, versus Minecraft or other destructible environment games (Vintage Story, Teardown, Enshrouded). I don't even count a game like RUST, Sunkenland or Valheim as destructible environments, because the only things you can destroy in them are specific structures (e.g. player-built walls in RUST).

Even though the game is now considered as release-ready, 7 Days To Die is still being worked-on and tweaked, and I expect that Game Balance is going to be modified as part of that.

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I've been playing the v1 version for a couple of days now. I was very impressed by the new game visuals and the game plays noticeably faster (framerate) than Alpha 21.

Here are my settings:

Zombie Speed: Nightmare (all the time)
Zombie Toughness: Insane
Horde Size: 64 (maximum)
Permadeath (lose everything if you die)
Feral Sense: Off
Show Airdrops on Map: Off

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I have died once already (approx day 17) when I got surrounded by a wandering horde while I was clearing out a basement.

So far, in this second game-run I haven't died (day 15 so far).

Liking the new monster on horde night.

The increased Screamer frequency is quite a pain (for my settings).

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Compared with Alpha 21, the game grind has increased. It takes ages to progress, especially if you play on extreme settings. Chopping away at a wood wall with a stone axe takes about 30 seconds per block. It used to take about 5 seconds. And, on Day 15 of my play, I'm still using stone tools and the wrench. (You can progress more rapidly if you play on easier settings.)

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There's currently (18 July) a Card and Tabletop Game bundle on Fanatical, and noting that Luck Be A Landlord is on there. Excellent game and your opportunity to snap it up for cheap.

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Make sure you buy some games to celebrate

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Thinking to get The Hand of Merlin (85% off) at Fanatical's site. Gedonia (90% off) at Steam. Castle Crashers (90% off) at Steam. Recently I got Ultimate ADOM (90% off) at Steam (just before the sale) and I've enjoyed my time with it (about 18 hours so far).

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Over 5000 hours played in the 7 Days Alphas. Other than the recent Dew Collector addition (in Alpha 21) I've been very happy with the developers' vision. Noting that 1.0 has cut back on the necessity to get a Water Filter component from the traders, and a murky water Dew Collector is craftable without them - This is an improvement as far as I am concerned.

I do very much like how the "old" game played (particularly Alpha 20) and I'm a bit saddened that I won't be able to play Alpha 20, Alpha 21 versions of the game with the all-new POIs and world-graphics improvements.

For me, I would *love* it if Alpha 21 could stay like it is now (well maybe with the Dew Collector fix) but gain the graphics and POIs from v1.0 - and at the same time, have the option to play 1.0 with all the game-design changes. Two (new) games for the price of one, so to speak.

I hope the Devs get to see this comment :)

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