Zomboid build 42 released today and i decided to give it a try. My character is Darren Floyd. He's a young 20 something Night Guard for the Knoxville Mall. I spawned in a house and made my way into town on foot, eventually making it to the Gas Station in the screenshot. I ended up clearing it out and making my base in there.
I also went down to the Basement of the Gas Station and checked it out. I found a lead pipe down there i took to replace my Baseball Bat and then sat on the stairs eating canned peaches.
The game added a ton of Ambience which i love as it adds to the feel of the game. There's wind wipping around and i'm pretty sure zombies make ambient noises. Doors swing open and the lighting has been expertly redone. While exploring the gas station i had to go into a dark hallway and used a lighter to see.
The way the lighter lit up the area raised tensions in an exciting way, as i didn't know what was down the hallway. For all i know there could be 10 zombies and i'd only be able to tell when i got close. Luckily there was only one though.
After taking him out back using the new dragging mechanic, i buried him and took his ID. I've started keeping a collection of IDs. I feel like it's something Darren would do to try and cope with it. After that though it crashed, which is to be expected for an Unstable build. So i ended up stopping there.
It's a weird game. You're not really supposed to play it like a game and have fun like in a game lol, if that makes sense.
For example - you should avoid combat if you can. Take only one or few enemies at a time and that's if you are in good condition (not panicked, exhausted, in pain, malnourished and drunk at the same time)
Never run anywhere, it just tires you out and creates noise. Calmly walk away from zombies and lose them by breaking LoS. This takes practice and is generally tedious
Don't do fun stuff like rely on vehicles or guns too much, at least in the early game. They are noisy and attract too much attention, you use them once you have enough ammo and a place to fall back to in case it goes wrong. Cars are great once you have a secured base away from the main city areas but aren't that useful for city exploration.
Bases are not really safe. You can barricade all you want but if one zombie starts banging on it, soon the others will join due to noise. Generally you want to be out of reach and hidden rather than well defended. Proactively clear out the areas you spend a lot of time in.
etc. etc. It's much more of a simulator than a game at times, for better and worse. I have a love hate relationship with it xd
Thank you for the pointers. I'll keep these in mind!