Der Survival-Hit Project Zomboid has now been in development for well over a decade and recently celebrated its breakthrough when the multiplayer overhaul drew more players into the zombie apocalypse than ever before.
Managing Director Chris Simpson has now leaked some details about the next big update on Twitter. Apparently, the long-awaited for years NPCs serve a much more complex simulation than previously assumed.
From the stepmother to the brother-in-law, there should be a wide range of family ties that are generated when a new game is started. Then, depending on when you meet the characters, they have different things to tell you about their past and motives.
Incidentally, we took the upheavals with the massive Update 41 as an opportunity to subject Project Zomboid to a thorough post-test. You can read what we found out here:
Project Zomboid im Test
Secretly to the best zombie game
NPCs keep moving
In a specially designed thread on twitter chatted Chris Simpson a lot out of the sewing box. He describes how he creates up to three generations of a family, marries them off with others, gives them children and then lets the eldest die right back of old age.
The numerous characters would eventually be split into related households and assigned to houses on the map. However, not everyone was at home when the disease broke out, so many families had to find each other before they could think about escaping the zone together.
Of course you also mix random NPCs from outside with the population as needed, but it’s the survivors of these original core families who are likely to tell you the most interesting stories. They should remember the most important events that have happened to them since the game started.
You can see what Project Zomboid currently looks like in moving images in this trailer:
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Project Zomboid – New trailer introduces you to the survival secret
When will the NPCs move in?
Interestingly, in the early days of Project Zomboid, there were already NPCs in the game. A rudimentary version of the inhabitants was even in this around the year 2012 that tutorial
They were later removed in favor of other features, but always remained one of the most requested pieces of content. Simpson did not reveal when the time will finally comebut if you look at the previous development history Looking back, it is probably months and years rather than weeks.
As a special service, we have translated Simpson’s exact statements for you. You can find them together with the patch notes for update 41.66, which, by the way, completely revised the foraging talent, on the second page of this article.
Did you also start with Project Zomboid again with Update 41 or would it only be the described NPCs that would let you take a look at the former insider tip? Let us know in the comments!
