7 Days to Die, content Alpha 12.0 update announced

The answers to gamers prayers were answered. Several issues in 7 Days to Die alpha 11.4 patch will be fixed in the alpha 12.0 update. Developers promise to fix dedicated server crashes and add performance tweaks that were the root cause of many problems. Also, developers added new features that beta testers have suggested. Source of the updates come via a 7 Days to Die developer's blog named http://joelhuenink.tumblr.com/.

The first major update that I am excited about will be the craftable minibike. Also shown is a motor bike temporarily dubbed “Duke’s Hog” which will be added later. It will be upgradable with armor. You can optionally upgrade it with a storage basket, horn, and headlight. The headlight eats battery power so turn it off when you park the bike or you might end up with a dead battery.

Here is a shot at the new steel pickaxe. It’s an improvement to the iron pickaxe. Steel crafting is gated by a rare book.

The use of predator animals will also be integrated into the challenge of surviving in 7 Days to Die. The bear is the first predator that will be gamer new challenge. Instead of hacking him in like we did the other animals, we are redoing how we import animals, which will give them detailed ragdolls and collision. So head shots on animals should be possible, and leg shots to zombies is coming too.

Developers announced a major effort to overhaul the sky and here is a first look. This will also include a time setting to where you can set how long your day is, so in Alpha 12 gamers can loot until about 9 or 10 again if you want.  There is a rumor that there will be weather changes in the game, so expect to see rain affect the conditions you survive in. 

Here is a WIP sunrise we are working on as developers improve the sky and fog. They’ve recoded sky (instead of using a unity asset store sky) and fog from scratch so it works better with the horizon. Fog will be controlled by weather instead of just fixed per biome and time like before. Developers also added repair to some missing clothing items, added quality range to clothing and have the leveled loot tuned in very nice. On day 25 gamers will still be very busy looking for things and working to survive the hordes.

Other updates: new rubble system. Basically most all blocks have a high chance convert to some kind of scrapped version of themselves, like concrete turns into rubble, metal turns into scrap metal piles, and wood will turn into scrap wood.