The game is said to be making its way to Early Access soon, during either SOE Live or E3

Apr 12, 2014 21:05 GMT  ·  By

Sony Online Entertainment has recently unveiled their upcoming zombie apocalypse survival game, and now more information on the upcoming massively multiplayer online game comes our way.

The deftly titled H1Z1 will feature a single sprawling map when it first launches, which will gradually become bigger and bigger, allowing players to really feel the sense of isolation, according to SOE boss John Smedley.

In a follow up to the Reddit post, he said that the team will be able to add massive areas to the game in a very fast manner, once they figure out how people play the game and what would best suit them, thanks to the system that they are working on.

“On Planetside 2 we made a mistake by making multiple continents before we had a strong enough idea of what worked and what didn’t,” he said on Reddit. “This game is different. We’re doing it smarter.”

He continued by saying that when the game will open on Early Access, there will be a massive map for players to enjoy, and that over time they will be able to “magically” go farther in the world.

The team is aiming to convey a strong feeling of post-apocalyptic isolation, and as such the game has to properly offer the remote and haunting experience of being alone, both in the wilderness and in urban settings, and that your first instinct should be to hide whenever you see something moving.

“If there are 20 players in your view it’s not a very convincing Apocalypse. So, not to worry: Zombie Apocalypse isn’t going to be any fun if it’s like Disneyland on Spring Break and super crowded,” Smedley shared.

For now, there is no definitive information regarding the actual number of people who will be present on any server, because as the team adds more real estate, the number of people who can play at the same time without altering the intended experience will go up.

But the maps will be far from desolate, as there will be a lot of zombies to fight, entire hordes if we are to believe Smedley.

Earlier this month, he said that the game will be fully playable “soon,” which means that the game will be unveiled either during SOE Live, taking place in Vegas in August, or during the E3 convention in June.

H1Z1 will be released on PC first, on Steam Early Access, with a price tag. When the full game is released, it will become free to play, and will be supported by in-game microtransactions.