So, this game developer for Bohemia thought 'You know..I think I know what gamers REALLY want." And looks like he made just that!
Basically, DayZ is just a mod for Arma II:CO (have to have ArmaII and Op arrowhead) but it puts you in this 225km/225km square zombie apocolypse sandbox (huge) where your measure of success is how long you can survive. All the gear you collect, zombie kills, player kills, vehicles, helicopters whatever you control/gather is reset when you die. So literally, you have only 1 life.
You get shot in the leg? sucks, you can't run. Shot in the arm? don't plan on using it! Outta bandages? you'll bleed out, well you'll fall unconscious once or twice..but you'll bleed out soon enough. No food? water? you'll starve and die. etc. etc.
Nighttime? unless the moons out or you have night vision no amount of gamma or brightness correction will let you see your hand in front of your face (well pretty much)
Oh and the best part! Don't expect your fellow survivor buddies to help you out. Since once you die you die and have to start all over people aren't exactly 'friendly'. A majority of people once they have a little bit of life and gear just shoot on sight.
Anyways, the most realistic zombie game i've found BY FAR, and it's caused Arma II sales to go up 500% in the last week on steam, I think at some point it was the #3 purchased game in all of steam over this last week.
Plays and feels a LOT like the stalker games, mostly cause of the Arma II engine but also the environment.
I think the biggest challenge I've faced so far on a consistent basis is figuring out where I am, theres a huge online map that you can reference landmarks and whatnot but its still really tough. There's maps and GPS in-game, but you'll have to find them! Its very easy to get lost in the wilderness, just like IRL
Oh, and if you're one of these recent crop of gamers that expect loot and mobs to fall at their feet with no effort or skill. I wouldn't bother. You'll get fustrated too quickly. But I don't think there are many of those types of gamers here:)
