Zombie Panic! Source News

After 2 years in public beta testing, the ZPS v3.1 update is finally OUT for everyone! Time to gather your fellow survivors, carry only what you need, and split some zombie skulls! The update features the long-awaited Linux support, brand new animations, achievements, and melee weapons, improvements to classic maps, game balance adjustments, countless bug and exploit fixes, community-made content, Steam Workshop enhancements and much more!


[h2]Highlighted Features[/h2]
Linux Client support for Ubuntu and SteamOS machines.
Revamped recoil system to allow players to have more control
Major source code clean-up and rewrite from the ground up to remove all code from HL2DM.
New first-person and third-person animations for firearms, explosives and cell phone.
Improvements to player hitbox registration synchronizing with the player's model animation.
Reworked the melee system with 'hit rays', creating an arc of line tracers in the player's FOV.
Enhancements to the Steam Workshop support with additional "Add-ons" menu.
Implemented Steam Rich Presence.
30 new Steam Achievements.




[h2]Key Changes[/h2]
We have plenty of new content hidden in the update that we couldn't fail to mention! Here are some of these minor but important changes you should know...

Unarmed survivor's punch and push abilities.
A 30-60 second warm-up round after a map change.
Support for crosshair customization and style, available in ZP Options.
Achievements can now be earned on Custom Servers (but the official map restriction still applies).
A portable inoculator for self-heal, healing your teammates or delaying the infection.
New sound effects, three new melee weapons, and a brand-new grenade model.
New community-made content added officially into the game for Survivor and Zombie textures.
Zombie are able to see their teammates glowing through nearby walls within a short range.
Glock 18c is now a fully automatic weapon, but is much more inaccurate than other pistols.
Biotec and Club Zombo have been redesigned with visual and gameplay improvements.
New Game Instructor hints for survivors and zombies regarding basic gameplay.
Feed-O-Meter now automatically regenerates slowly over time.
New Berserk zombie bar, now separate from the Feed-O-Meter.
New options for classic, modern and minimal ammo bank HUD visuals.
Improvements to voice wheel menu system.
New "Round End" stats panel.
New UI vote menu panel.
Updated ZPS Angelscript API doc.




[h2]General Bugs Fixed[/h2]
We also want to take a moment to address some of the v3.0.9a issues that have caused problems for years and have finally been fixed in v3.1!

Fixed "scooby-doo" survivor walking animations.
Fixed spectator camera freeze bug when joining servers.
Fixed fake player ragdolls spawning in mid-air at the center position of the map.
Fixed SDK 2013's QuickTime video provider issue, using Bink instead.
Fixed randomly infected Survivor not turning into a Carrier if needed.
Fixed a bug during map changelevel through RTV/admin command.
Fixed Steam Workshop mounting for Dedicated Servers.
Fixed many client game crashes and memory leakage.
Fixed lobby players spawning outside the lobby room.
Fixed weight issue with delivery items and grenades.
Fixed all ZPS Steam Achievements reported broken.
Various security and stability improvements.



It has been a long and difficult road during the public beta testing period for this update. Essentially, the goal of the beta was supposed to be a major code rewrite to address the unfixable bugs from v3.0.9a which would be released as soon as possible. However, as time went on, we began work on a bunch of new features and game changes that would affect other areas of the game, especially regarding game balance. This, along with community and playtester feedback, made us realize how awful some things were functioning in the game, and that forced us to continue working on these issues for a while instead of shipping what was planned at first. That also meant more things to fix, monitor, and playtest, further delaying the release of 3.1 to the public, and even more minor issues had to be shelved due to complexity, necessity, or time constraints.



We've expanded this update beyond its original scope and we're sorry for this inconvenience. Hopefully, we can continue to focus on releasing frequent quality-of-life updates in the future, rather than holding off for a huge patch that could take many months to develop. We want to thank everyone who has supported us and helped us with the beta testing of 3.1, and everyone who has provided their feedback in the forums!



[h3]Lastly, here is the list of major changes we've made since the Beta 5 release based on community feedback:[/h3]

The new character Larry has been postponed indefinitely due to voice recording issues.
Major adjustments to the recoil system for rifles and pistols, removing the static pattern (on-going).
Removed walking and running accuracy penalties. Jumping was moderately reduced. Crouching still improves your aim very slightly (untouched since release).
Refined the objective list panel, now it uses the O key instead of using the phone. You can now also walk and move while in this screen.
Removed the "Custom Server" tab that was separating community servers from vanilla and official servers if they were running any modified plugins.
Reduced ALL melee hit arcs slightly, preventing players from hitting areas that they weren't really aiming at (on-going).
All prop_door_rotating props in official maps have had their speed increased by 150 (default) and their breakable HP tweaked.
Various changes to player movement values, making movement smoother for both teams (e.g. climbing ladders is faster now).
New optional classic ammobank adapted for v3.1.
Reverted both Revolver and Remmy models and textures to the stock versions.
Added Characters Update by Mage and Silent.


Barricade hammer still uses the new system - we're planning to revert it soon.
[Linux] Users may experience their main game menu to be completely blank due VGUI.
[Linux] NVIDIA users with Nouveau might face few problems related to anti-aliasing (AA), causing a black screen. If you're getting this, please disable your anti-aliasing to fix this issue.


You can check the FULL list of v3.1 changes in our Changelog thread.



We've invested quite a bit of energy and time into other stuff behind the scenes that were put on hold during the development of the version 3.1 update, but there are plans for this content and other new features to be released to the public. We'll be sharing these features with the community in the near future, and we hope that you will give your input on what sort of new content should be added to the game by responding to community threads and public surveys!



In the meantime, enjoy the update as much as you can and be sure to tell us what you think in our Steam Discussion forums!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/17500/Zombie_Panic_Source/

Hello everyone! It's been a while, hasn't it? Hopefully you all are doing well and staying safe out there!

We've taken a long break from development in the months since Beta 5 released, working at a comfortable pace, and took time to discuss our future plans and ideas for the update based on your feedback provided on the forums, as posted in our '3.1 To-do Plans' thread. We highly appreciate each one of you who took the time to voice your concerns about the game's development. Hopefully, your requested changes are here in the list below, where we'll also take a moment to recap all the major features and highlighted changes in the update. We do also have some other topics to share so stick around until the end!


[h2]Linux Support[/h2]
After 12 years, Linux client support for Zombie Panic! Source is arriving in the v3.1 update for Ubuntu and SteamOS machines! This is a huge, long-awaited step, opening an important door to another OS besides Windows! All thanks to our programmer, Shepard, for accomplishing this challenging task! We're very aware that there is still more to do to continue support and fix it for other distros. Be sure to report any Linux visual bugs or crashes in our sub-forums! Unfortunately, Mac OS X support is still out of our reach, and not in our plans at this time.



Special thanks to all Linux enthusiasts out there who assisted us debugging and fixing the bugs reported. We also want to give a huge shout out to @GamingOnLinux!

[h2]Player Hitboxes Improvements[/h2]
This may have gone unnoticed in the past, but we've made huge improvements to our player hit registrations, synchronizing them with the player's client model much better than before! Special thanks to Mehis, programmer for Zombie Master: Reborn, for helping us with this issue! It's recommended to try out the changes in a low latency server for best results. Here's a little comparison:



[h2]Melee Hit Rays[/h2]
We've implemented an interesting feature for our melee weapons called "hit rays" to improve their attack range and accuracy, making combat against multiple targets more viable. Each swing will create an arc of line tracers in the player's FOV according to the melee weapon's range. You won't be able to 360° swing hit.



This means you will now be able to hit multiple targets depending on how well you swing the melee during battle. After the first hit on X target, it will deal the same base damage on the next one. It works in a similar fashion to many modern zombie games in which you can mow down multiple targets with one swing. During the beta, we made the hit registration instantaneous (no longer has a delay) for better gameplay.

[h2]Zombie Teammates Glow[/h2]
An important zombie feature has also been added to improve the team's communication and create better tactical ambushes against the survivors. Zombies will be able to see their teammates glowing through nearby walls, but with a minimal range that is more limited when compared to the Carrier's roar glow - without consuming any of the Feed-O-Meter.



[h2]Feed-O-Meter Adjustments[/h2]
The Feed-O-Meter will now auto regenerate itself when not in use. The regeneration process is very slow and you still should use your feed bar wisely. The Berzerk, on the other hand, now has its own bar separated from the normal Feed-O-Meter bar. This will make the zombie's life easier while allowing them to manage which feature they would like to use without affecting or wasting a single berzerk bar while lunging. The Berzerk function remains untouched beyond that.



[h2]New Zombie Panic! Options[/h2]
We've updated and added some optional features and in-game commands that you can configure to your preference in Zombie Panic! Options. Those include: ability to change the color of the item's glow, sort the scoreboard by score or kills, choose the destructibles color in Zombie vision, and more.



[h2]Steam Workshop Enhancements[/h2]
We've made significant changes to the Steam Workshop support, forcing players to only download the current map running in the server they're joining, instead of downloading the whole Workshop collection of the dedicated server (32bit integer to 64bit integer). We also improved the items mounting in your game client, making easier and faster when launching the game, and added a new "Addons" menu where you can manage the Workshop items you're currently subscribed to.



This is a great opportunity to search through our Workshop Hub and subscribe to your favorites!

[h2]New Community-Made Content[/h2]
Speaking of Workshop, we've been paying attention to a few specific community-made items based on the quality and effort put into them, worth being added as official content. We got in contact with those authors and we're starting this experiment with the following Workshop item being implemented into the game: Characters Update Ultimate - by Mage and Silent! Hopefully you guys welcome these changes and let us know what you think! In case it gets well received, we may consider adding more custom content like this into the game for everyone via public surveys.

[h2]Steam Rich Presence[/h2]
We've enhanced the capabilities of our rich presence system to show more about the games being played by your friends, displaying extra information about their game in your Steam Friends activity. You can now easily see what gamemode, map or server they're in with Steam Rich Presence.



[h2]Localization Support[/h2]
It's now much easier to support different languages in-game. We have reached out to our community contributors in the past who volunteered their time to translate Zombie Panic! Source into their main native language to update our localization files in the upcoming update.



You will be able to read objective lists, phone messages, storylines, tips, in-game beacons and game texts in your language of choice! We've reworked our entire localization system (still developing a better-easy system), making it easier for volunteers to translate the game in their own native language by using a translator application, which is available in the Zombie Panic! Source Mod Tools. We currently support the following in addition to English: French, Simplified Chinese, Spanish (Spain), Swedish and Russian. You can set your game to use one of these languages via Properties > Language tab.

There are numerous new features, adjusts and fixes to list here. Check the full list of changes for more!


When the 3.0 update released back in Dec 2017, we created a Steam beta branch for ZPS v2.4 to be stored safely in case people wanted to play whenever they feel like. As we've stated in the past, we didn't have any plans to keep supporting it, and the build started to become unplayable until players couldn't even launch it anymore. However, a few people from the community got together and made an external fix out of the Steam version to make v2.4 playable once again. They've been using this fixed version for since the beginning of this year and reunited lots of veterans with it.

We've reached out one of the authors of the fix, asking if we could grab these files and use them to fix up our current Steam build. They worked perfectly as expected! Then we took the time to prepare a working build of v2.4 (Win and Linux DS) containing these fixes and we're releasing it today! Players will be able to opt-in to the Legacy 2.4 beta branch and play the old version again normally through Steam. We're leaving some extra info regarding the availability of the build in our Store Page too. We are also brainstorming some ideas and planning to discuss more solutions for v2.4 with the community in our forums soon. See more here.


Lastly, it's finally time to announce the long-awaited release date of the upcoming major 3.1 update. We've been listening closely to previous community feedback, making huge adjustments and tweaks based on what you all have been requesting for a long time. A lot has been taken into consideration, ideas and features were changed or scrapped for their own good, future plans were revised and the build is ready to be rolled out for everyone! We're scheduling the release for the first weeks of October - somewhere between Oct 8th and 15th!

We're currently making a few minor adjust, debugging the code and polishing up the build to be sure nothing gets left behind. In case something big happens, we'll unfortunately push the release a bit further.



See you soon,
Zombie Panic! Team

We have shipped a crucial hotfix to the unstable beta branch, bringing server optimization, minor adjustments, and some bugs & game exploits fixed! This hotfix is focused on game performance and putting an end in a few nasty bugs you guys have reported to us. We do appreciate every single feedback from the community and the team is already planning the next steps with the beta. You'll hear more from us soon and, hopefully, we'll be able to make necessary changes and tweaks you've been asking for.

[h2]Changelog[/h2]
Balance

• Added a small cooldown before stamina starts to regenerate after you start walking in order to prevent the "infinite stamina" exploit.
  
• Reduced the time to wait for panicking after switching to a weapon from 0,5 seconds to 0,25 seconds.
  

Client

• Fixed SourceMod (1.10 - build 6460) menus not showing up.
  
• Fixed "sv_zps_afk_time" and "sv_zps_afk_time_lobby" not working properly.
  
• Moved the characters data parsing code from the player class to the game rules class in order to optimize the code.
  
• (Windows only) Removed SDK 2013's QuickTime video provider, we're using Bink instead and might fix some startup issues for some players.
  

Game rules

• Clients are no longer able to join teams when the round is ending or ended.
  
• Clients are no longer able to respawn when the round is ending or ended.
  
• Fixed dead infected Survivors delaying round end.
  
• Fixed delivery items not adding weight.
  
• Fixed infection not being removed on dead players.
  
• Fixed "mp_timelimit" live changes not being taken into account.
  
• Reduced the maximum amount of phone messages to transmit between client/server in order to optimize the network code and reduce bandwidth usage.
  
• Reworked how round end time is networked in order to reduce bandwidth usage.
  

Maps

• Keretti (Objective)
  
  • Radio prop can no longer be destroyed.
    
• Harvest
  
  • Disabled collisions on the fuse and the bomb in the basement causing players to get stuck when arming it.
    
  • Reworked outside ladder near house's kitchen door so that crouched players are able to climb it instead of being forced to drop down and climb it again while standing.
    

Score system

• Fixed team killing granting kill points to the attacker.
  

With today's patch out to unstable, it will improve the testing of the beta in the official and community 3.1 servers. We'll continue to play with you all during the weekends (if we get a free time to play on), hear your thoughts about the update and discuss it together! Please, consider sharing your feedback in our forums where we can go back and read them anytime.

See you there,
- Zombie Panic! Development Team

We apologize for the long absence in the past months, but we've been hard at work and we're finally back with exciting news regarding another beta update. Bringing lots of improvements and major adjustments to the game's balance and performance, and Linux client support! We've heard lots of great feedback from everyone that we hope today's update should address

You can check the full v3.1 patch notes here.

[h3]v3.1 Full Public Release[/h3]
This should be the last major update to the unstable beta branch. Any more beta updates from this point on should be for smaller things like bug fixes, or balance adjustments. We'll be focusing on preparing v3.1 for full public release as soon as possible, which could be anywhere up to a few months or more. So please tell us what you think about the update, so we can make necessary adjustments before full public release.



With today's update Linux client support has finally arrived - bringing graphics fixes, performance boost, and crash fixes! We want to take a moment to thank the people from @GamingOnLinux community/staff who've been helping us to promote and assist our upcoming Linux client support. As well as a huge special thanks to our programmers, Jonnyboy and Shepard, who managed to make this all happen!

If you use Linux, then we ask that you please give the unstable beta branch a test to see if there's any issues with the game for you (information how at bottom of announcement). Please report any issues to us on our Steam Discussion Boards, or in our Discord server.





Some time ago we introduced a new recoil system into the game, similar to the one used in Day of Defeat: Source, but heavily modified. We did this to eliminate issues with our previous default Half-Life 2: Deathmatch recoil where it caused some imbalances that made some weapons a bit too over powered due to high accuracy, and others under powered because of too much random spread in the bullets. We thought it was a good improvement from the previous system, but we overlooked many of the issues with it.

Thanks to everyone who tested it and provided feedback, we were able to come up with a better design that addressed some of the issues. We've made a video demonstrating how the improved recoil works for all the firearms under some different movement conditions (standing, running, jumping, etc.);

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGG5EH62QnU

[h3]How Does It Work?[/h3]
The simplest way to explain it is that it works very similar to the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive weapon recoil. The more you shoot, the more inaccurate your weapon will be due to the recoil. There are patterns in the recoil for most weapons, each weapon type has a similar pattern with subtle differences between weapons of the same type (such as less recoil or random bullet spread).

The recoil works by utilizing several different features to create the effect;

• View punching is the effect that pushes your camera view upward and left/right whenever you fire a weapon. It's used to simulate the physical recoil of the weapon on your character.
  
• The bullet origin is the exact point for which the bullet would hit without any random spread. The bullet origin starts exactly in the center of the crosshair. But as you fire more shots, and your recoil becomes more extreme - the bullet origin will separate from the crosshair and move upward and left/right in a pattern. This is what simulates loss of accuracy control due to recoil.
  
• The cone of fire simulates the random spread of the bullets caused by movement. It's the area that the bullet has a chance to hit within around the bullet origin. The faster you move, the wider your cone of fire becomes - meaning your shots will be more inaccurate. Each bullet you fire has its location randomly generated within the cone of fire.
  
• Recoil decay determines whether or not your shots will be inaccurate due to recoil, it's what makes consecutive shots inaccurate. Your shots will remain inaccurate and continue through the recoil pattern if your recoil does not completely decay before your next shot - which is around the time your crosshair returns back into the position it was at when you started firing.
  

Movement will also make your shots inaccurate, with each movement condition affecting your accuracy differently;

1. Crouching makes your shots slightly more accurate
   
2. Standing makes your accuracy normal.
   
3. Crouch Walking makes your shots slightly inaccurate.
   
4. Walking makes your shots fairly inaccurate.
   
5. Running makes your shots inaccurate.
   
6. Panicking makes your shots even more inaccurate.
   
7. Jumping makes your shots extremely inaccurate.
   

Players have been saying that many weapons don't feel different than others of the same type for a long time, or that some weapons aren't very useful - and we agree. We recognize that some of the weapons may not feel very useful, or powerful enough - so we've made adjustments to them. Attributes such as damage, fire rate, random bullet spread, and the amount of recoil have been balanced differently for most weapons.

Here's how some of the changes affect a weapons' role;

• Pistols:
  • Effective at short to medium range.
    
  • Able to be used for long range combat, but is not very effective due to inaccuracy and slight damage drop off.
    
  • Weaker recoil than other weapon types. Useful while running because of this.
    
  
  
  
• Revolver:
  • Effective at short to medium range.
    
  • Damage drops off quicker than before, so it can no longer be used to one-shot snipe at long distances.
    
  • Capable of long range combat, but is no longer accurate enough to be as effective for it. On top of damage drop off making it better to use your bullets at shorter distances.
    
  • Slightly faster fire rate than before. So that you don't have to rely on headshots to kill a Zombie quickly in close quarters combat, you can make three quick shots to the body instead. However, your shots will be inaccurate if you don't wait to recover from the recoil.
    
  
  
  
• Shotguns:
  • Effective at short to medium range.
    
  • Damage drop off was reduced. Meaning the range at which Shotguns do damage has been slightly extended.
    
  • All Shotguns have had their spread tightened, making them more effective at longer ranges. Winchester has the tightest spread, followed by the Remington 870, and the Super Shorty has the widest spread.
    
  • Accuracy is barely affected by movement.
    
  • Winchester is the only Shotgun actually affected by recoil (single shots). Remington 870 and Super Shorty only use view punching, because recoil is completely decayed before you make your next shot.
    
  
  
  
• SMGs:
  • Effective at short to medium range.
    
  • Very fast fire rate, useful for killing enemies quickly.
    
  • Moderate recoil. Easier to control than Rifles, but still becomes very inaccurate when fired fully automatic.
    
  • Lightweight.
    
  • MP5 is accurate at longer distances than Pistols. Glock 18C is accurate at short distance, but is more useful while moving than the MP5.
    
  
  
  
• Rifles:
  • Effective at short to long range.
    
  • Best weapon for long range combat, accurate and least affected by damage drop off.
    
  • AK-47 is stronger but less accurate. M4 is weaker, but slightly more accurate, and has a faster fire rate.
    
  • Heavily affected by recoil, shooting fully automatic is very inaccurate.
    

We're expanding upon Zombie Vision to include the glowing of more destructible objects, particularly physics props. Now objects that can either be moved around or are destructible will glow an orange color while Zombie vision is active. (This color can be customized in Zombie Panic! Options, or via their cvars.)

We've added this feature to communicate to the player what objects can be moved or destroyed. Because these props can often time be used as static props (indestructible and don't move) throughout different parts of levels. Which can waste time and cause confusion for those who are not familiar with the level. So this feature will let players know right away whether they can move or destroy an object, instead of having to spend time figuring that out.






We've updated and added some optional features and in-game commands that you can configure to your preference in Zombie Panic! Options. Those include: ability to change the color of the item's glow, sort the scoreboard by score or kills, choose the destructibles color in Zombie vision, and more. Be sure to check them out!





We've added some more Quality-of-Life improvements;

• You can now bind another key to rotate your barricade board placement counter-clockwise, instead of just the normal clockwise rotation.
  
• You now have the option to choose whether Berserk is activated by Panic instead of Lunge. So you may prevent your Berserk from being wasted when you intended to Lunge. (It's still activated with Lunge by default.)
  
• Some more levels will now have their size restricted for lower player counts.
  
• Fixes for the item balancing features, improving level balance.
  
• Basically everything related to movement speed was rebalanced to be more fair for both teams. Things like movement speeds, fatigue (stamina) charge and decay rates, feed-o-meter regeneration, and panic length and cooldown.
  
• You can no longer walk while Panicking. Which would cause your speed boost to be wasted.
  
• Feed-o-meter will no longer drain while Berserking.
  
• Armor can be dropped again.
  
• Trigger_barricade was fixed so that a barricade somehow placed inside of it will be dropped on the ground as ammo.
  
• Achievements can now be earned on Custom Servers and Levels.
  

We understand the community content (maps, models, skins, sounds, etc) inside and outside of Steam Workshop are a part of ZPS's identity. It's always a pleasure to see new content being created and shared. Unfortunately, we had some hard times where we had no choice but to sacrifice some backward compatibility with the existing third-party content for the benefit of stability, performance and maintenance of the game.

Although, not everything is broken and lost, as some content might still work without any required update from their respective author(s). We prepared a documentation to guide the community on what changed and what needs to be done to get the addons properly working with ZPS v3.1. We invite those content creators to opt in the beta and check your content to see if it works, and prepare an updated version of your addons for v3.1 before it fully releases to the public.


You can find info on how to switch your game to the unstable beta branch here.

Or you can install and manage multiple different versions of the game using SteamCMD. There's a guide explaining how to do this.

Don't hesitate to contact us directly here, on our Steam Discussions Boards, or via Discord for further instructions and questions.



We'll be hosting events, mainly on the weekends, where we are going to test the unstable beta with all of you from the community. Join our Discord server for notifications when we, or players from the community, are playing. We hope to see you around sometime!

We have a public unstable beta branch server you can play on any time;

Server Name: Official ZPS EU Server #3 [UNSTABLE BRANCH], Courtesy of NFO
Server IP: 95.172.92.228:27018



Providing your opinion on the update and its changes is crucial for us to be able to create a game that is enjoyable for everyone possible. We are always listening and taking your feedback into consideration. But please understand that we cannot always follow your requests, it depends on the situation. In some cases, we may not want to if it conflicts with other aspects of design.

Please do not be discouraged from providing your feedback to us because of this! If you want to make a difference in the game, then we need you to tell us what you think! We would appreciate it very much if you could take the time to provide your feedback. We'd prefer for you to do so on our Steam Discussions Boards - where we can go back and read it anytime, and other community members can provide their feedback too.

But please provide constructive criticism, and be sure to tell us in detail what the problem is and what it's happening with! Giving your opinion on how you think the problem can be fixed can also help to clarify what the problem is.


See you around,
- Zombie Panic! Team