Decayed of Zombies Online RPG

Project Status - Complete

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The DoZ 1.0 server will be permanently shut down on Friday at noon, eastern time, so that the DoZ team may continue work uninterrupted on DoZ 2.0

Thanks to all who have played over the last three or four years. I can't believe its been that long since I created this game, and I have no regrets but hope that DoZ 2.0 will be more like my original vision.

I learned a lot creating DoZ. I'm going to attempt a brief history based on my admittedly poor memory of such things...

It was April of 2005 (and probably a dark and stormy night)... DoZ was started with the wonderfully generic name of "TYUMMORPG" which stood for 'The Yet Unnamed MMORPG". It was a few weeks before finals of my junior year of college when I decided to create a 2d MMORPG based on players being zombies and the apocalypse, and I believe that I was the first undead-themed MMO where the player took on the primary role of the undead (pats self on the back). I started this project to learn (and boy did I learn a lot), and so I created this entire game from scratch with my own fingers. One hundred percent of this game was programmed by myself which includes the editor, updater, client, and server because I wanted to learn and for the game to have its own distinct feel.

The original game as I envisioned it had no skills, and was extremely simplistic. There would be attack, defense, and the basic melee combat as it is today. My only requirement was that everything in the game could be dynamically updated without any special download waiting by the player. To this goal I will say I was very successful, as maps, monsters, items, quests, skills, npcs, etc can all be changed without any interruption of the player's experience. If you think the graphics we have are poor today... you should have seen what I started with!

There were of course many bugs in this initial version, perhaps one of the most amusing was when I was writing the movement netcode. I tried approximately 10 different methods of controlling movement via netcode and there was one fun interation where the code was so lagged you could essentially ice-skate around. If you've ever played mario 3 on the ice level, you know how the movement felt, it was very slippery and when changing direction it was easy to crash into obstacles.

Anyway, after my junior year of college I moved south to be with my girlfriend ladykit (who is now my fiance), and I took a break from working on DoZ while I got settled in my new location. This took a few months, but eventually I started work on DoZ again.

After working on the editor, server, and client for TYU I decided that it was becoming something that could be viable as a playable game, and not just a little learning project. I went out on the web to try and attract an artist or two, someone to help make the maps, sound effects, etc. It was somewhere around here that Comrade, Abadon, and Shrike turned up and stuck around. There were a few others but they didn't stick around for very long.

Around this time I also need to thank my best friend Paul (who doesn't play DoZ) but came up with the name of the game over IM one night.

I must say that if it weren't for these early team members, and the early players like Predhunter (and more, but I do not remember all the names), DoZ would not be what it is today. After much encouragement from these people I was eventually motivated to make DoZ extremely flexible by incorporating a custom scripting language into the server that could be edited remotely to add skills.

I searched and experimented with existing scripting languages such as LUA for several weeks until I realized that nothing was going to be as simple, fast and easy to use for new programmers as I wanted it to be. So over the next two months or so I created (the predictably named) DracScript. I had no idea how much DracScript would dominate the future of DoZ. I knew it was a big deal (hey it performs almost as fast as LUA in my tests) but it took Comrade and Shrike to show me just how much it could do. Right now the script folder on the server takes up nearly 1MB of worth of code over almost 700 scripts.

The biggest example that stands out in my mind was the creation of the event system by Shrike. He took a scripting system that was meant for simple effects and damage/healing and used it to create a system that could run everything from auctions to races to brutal deathmatches. He was also responsible (I think) for creating the projectile weapon system that practically crashed my server and led to my removal of damage on moving effects. He adapted his code very well to accomplish the same task another way, and there you have the current form of projectile weapons on DoZ 1.0.

While those two things were the most surprising to me, Comrade created the bulk of the maps, scripts, and just about everything else on the server with some exceptions for maps created (poorly) by myself. Shrike and Comrade's help and innovation with the initially limited abilities of the scripting language, are probably the only reason DoZ is still around today, 4 years after its creation.

I don't really know what else to say here. I'm very proud of the DoZ team, and very happy that you players were able to enjoy the fruits of our labor. In the end we've had AT LEAST 10,000 people try this game, and although only a few stuck around for the long haul, I feel that this is way beyond my expectations. I have high hopes that a more cohesive and well planned DoZ 2.0 will allow those 10,000+ players to come back and stay a little longer this time.

With a virtual tear in my eye... thanks again to all you who helped make DoZ 1.0 what it is and was. I look forward to seeing all you DoZ 1.0 players in 2.0 when it is eventually released.
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About DoZ
Based roughly in a fictional rundown 1920-1950s, Decayed of Zombies -or DoZ for short- takes place on a large island with British-American style cities. The world is steadily falling apart, and is in a state of semi-chaos. The undead walk the world and many other creatures and things as well, some which are better off left unmentioned. The two main factions of the game, however, are the humans and the zombies. The humans and zombies are at war, with the zombies currently coming out on top, but in place has been set a mutual cease-fire that is shaky at best, and non-existent in most cases anyhow, with each side killing any member of the other on site.

Taking control of a zombie, the player has the starting option of what general 'type' of zombie to be. This choice reflects the starting stats of the player in minor ways, but the actual path the player chooses is forged as he or she plays. There is no 'leveling' in the traditional sense of the word, but rather, the player's stats increase depending on what he or she kills most. The player never actually increases in level, so power is gained through what weapons one acquires and how one trains.Decayed of Zombies strives to break out of the typical sword wielding fantasy games and tries to offer a more unique experience. Swords a few and guns even fewer, but rather, players must fight for the better equipment and the common weapons are but makeshift ones. Chains and broken bottles are the norm in DoZ weaponry, and if you someone carrying a weapon you like, take it from them. Decayed of Zombies is PvP in most areas, although in some places one can find refuge from the wholesale slaughter of the world around them. Life for the undead and living is alike in one sense only: You must fight to survive. You will perish quickly if you don't find a balance in the game, whether it be as a loner ambushing people on highways, or part of a clan. Clans are usually the best bet, so try to find others in-game who you can relate to, and ally (I use that word lightly) yourself with them.

Clans or gangs can, for a sum, purchase a place of their own which is usually a place where one may rest from the constant struggles of life and chat with other members or even store items. It takes a certain amount of upkeep a day to keep a guild hall, and you can buy halls of varying sizes, from small dumpy backrooms to extravagant hideouts but the bigger it is, the more you must pay.

You can store items you don't need (Always keep your best on you) in the hall, and they will stay there unless another player picks them up. You basically share a storeroom with your guild, and can keep items there that you think another member may want. Be warned, though: other guilds can get together and raid your halls and you, their's. If you fall in battle, your equipped items are up for grabs, whether it is he who killed you, a passerby, or a friend you saves them for you. Thus, it is always good to keep a second set of equipment in your inventory, as only your equipped items are lost.

Skills are another attribute of DoZ, although this is of course, not an uncommon feature in MMOs. You can use any of an array of skills if you have learned them, but they cost Blood to use. Your Blood is essentially the equivalent of MP or SP in other games, and you can drink bottles of blood to recharge your overall Blood points, as well as through selective killing you can raise the amount of Blood you can hold in you at a given time. As you might have guessed, we offer a decent sized world with multiple terrains, such as forests, desserts, mountains, snowfields, barren terrain, beaches, devastated cities, and more. This is along with the obligatory caves and crypts a well experienced looter seeks after, and of course, quests for those who wish to lend a hand... as long as they're well rewarded in return.