You should give DayZ one more chance

Being young means you want the adrenaline to rush into blood without stopping. And this is justified on the physiological level — the human body, being in one position at home and at work, literally begs for some movement. You have to admit that you wanted to go on an adventure more than just once, right? And video games help to cope with it. Of course, besides games, it would be good to help the body with some physical activity (at least, follow the instructions in this guide), but this should be a topic for a completely different conversation. 

It is adrenaline that makes you faster, stronger and more attentive due to the stimulation of additional oxygen and glucose injected into the blood. It works on the muscles, but after all, the eyes, hearing and the brain are also a muscular complex. 

What has From Software ever done to make game journalists treat their hardcore games so disrespectfully — you cheats to complete the game, therefore, cannot truly acknowledge the game created for a specific target audience. The high entry threshold is rewarded by a greater volume of serotonin and endorphin.

21st-century people are happy with incredible tools that help them feel the emotional explosions while sitting in a comfortable chair. Instant adrenaline, you can call it that way. Thanks to Apex, Fortnite, Dota, CS and other games with almost immediate action, the player stimulates the adrenal glands at an accelerated pace, but will the quality of such emotions based on this adrenaline be sufficient? To someone, yes, but not to me. Tired of the continuous action and remembering that my beloved DayZ recently released, I downloaded this pre-pre-pre Battle Royale. And launched, despite my friends' ridicules backed by server saturation statistics and low FPS. 

But DayZ is not about shooting. Five minutes since I've started the game, I had a meeting with a stranger who threatened to kill me, but suddenly there appeared a more significant problem — a sniper in full gear came out of nowhere to aim at two guys in shirts, one of whom was with an axe (not me). I had to, by the will of fate, act as an interpreter and reassure the newly made comrade so that both of us would not be shot. He tried to rob us, but spared in the end, because there was nothing to loot anyway. Such stress strengthened the relations between the other guy and me — started in one way, we agreed to team up and get to the Novodmitrovsk hotel. And did it successfully. He did not shoot me, although there were a lot of opportunities, and I did not betray him, thanking for the trust given. We were forced to split because my comrade's partner was waiting at a military base, and I had to leave. That's what DayZ is about. It's about human relationships. 

For two years I hadn't visited Chernarus, but the skills, as they say, do not downgrade. Yes, I was surprised by the new interface, the new engine, by everything, as it all was new in terms of gameplay except for one thing: the essence. Rushing between the empty houses in search of rusty cans, leaky flasks and darned trousers with the hope zombies won't make you bleed, or the first ever survivor you meet will kill you. This is the deep and sacred meaning of perhaps the most hardcore battle royale ever — the chances of success in comparison with other games are much less, and the amount of pleasure obtained is much lower. The difference lies in their quality and palette. 

Of course, we should not forget that DayZ is primarily a survival battle royale, not an action game. But in Standalone, the primal fear comes along with combat tension, the burning horror of losing all you have gained, the everlasting, permanent sense of danger. Spending hours searching for items is similar to lootboxes openings, weapon behaviour, character's needs, crossfire gameplay and shooting physics refer to real life. Hyper-realism can be annoying, but get used to it — and it can be a catalyst for deep immersion. The deeper the immersion, the stronger the emotions. 

Perhaps PUBG, Fortnite and them all are fast food. The result of the growing Y-generation, whose culture of fast pleasure consumption is logical and close to their pace of life, which implies a "get-forget-anew" system. Perhaps, in the future, the value of measured and pragmatic games will drop even more, and they will become something of a vent for stiffened olds. And perhaps, with technologies development and the creation of an alternate reality with the appropriate devices like the "Ready Player One", everything will turn out differently. 

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