After 12 years of Early Access, The Fun Pimps are ready to launch their sandbox zombie survival game, 7 Days to Die. The current version, Alpha 21, will soon transition into what the developers are calling the “Alpha Exodus.” Whether you’re a PC or console player, here’s everything you can expect from the 7 Days to Die 1.0 release.
7 Days to Die 1.0 launch date, post-launch roadmap
“The team, game, and community are ready for the next steps,” The Fun Pimps’ co-founder Richard Huenink said in a YouTube video discussing the team’s plans for 1.0 and beyond.
Currently, 7 Days to Die 1.0 is set to launch for PC and Console on Thursday, July 25, 2024, at an increased price of $44.99. A public experimental branch for PC players will be available on June 24, 2024, so the developers have a month to iron out any additional bugs. A 2024-2025 roadmap was introduced that shed light on what features players can expect with the 1.0 update along with three additional phases that introduce new systems into the world of 7 Days to Die such as dynamic weather and biomes, bandits, and the long-awaited story mode.
7 Days to Die 1.0, what to expect
At launch, 1.0 will bring overhauls and modernization to many existing systems. While official patch notes have yet to be released, TFP have said that the features previously teased for Alpha 22 will be included in version 1.0. That being said, here’s what we can expect in 7 Days to Die 1.0:
Character customization and animation update
- New models and character creation options that bring variety to the generic options that have been present for nearly a decade
- New animations and optimizations for existing ones
New armor system
- Clothing items completely removed in exchange for clothing mods that can be applied to armor pieces
- Armor slots reduced from 5 to 4
- Hat, outfit, gloves, and boots
- 16 different armor sets with different tiers (primitive, light, medium, heavy)
- Each armor piece has its own bonuses along with a completed set bonus, can be mixed and matched
- Ex. Scavenger Gloves (gain 10% more resources harvesting) + Lumberjack Hat (keeps head warm and increases wood harvest by 20%)
- At launch, clothing mods won’t be visually reflected in the game but in response to player concerns on the forums, The Fun Pimps’ staff member schwanz9000 reassured that, “we have a plan and will reveal that plan once it’s ready.”
Many NPC overhauls and updates
- New zombie variants that have different clothing and colors
- An animal overhaul that includes new fur shaders, models, and animations
- Gore and dismemberment systems for zombies
New Points of Interests (POIs)
- Two Tier 5 POIs
- Grover High School
- Football Stadium
- A Tier 4 Army Camp which may have an underground section
- Haven Hotel
- one of the largest POIs to date, no tier was provided in the dev diaries but players suspect it is possibly the first Tier 6
- Many additional Tier 2 POIs that add more variety to the world
- Wilderness POIs that aren’t connected to roads
Random world generation
- Brand new UI that will grant players more control over world generation
- Reduced memory usage
- Faster world generation time
7 Days to Die 1.0 console version differences
In 2018, Telltale games, the company responsible for publishing the 7 Days to Die console version, went bankrupt. The Fun Pimps announced that they failed to regain control over the console versions which led to an increasingly large gap between the state of the console and PC versions as time went on.
Fortunately, the developers seek to start anew and develop a console version parallel with the PC version. A month after 1.0 launches for PC, the new console version of 7 Days to Die will be released. Due to the issues in the past, this will be a brand new version of the game, meaning owners of the previous console version (dubbed the Legacy version) of 7 Days to Die will have to purchase the latest version from The Fun Pimps in order to receive future updates.
According to an official Q&A, TFP have said that they are, “working closely with Sony and Microsoft to provide a discount to digital Legacy owners on their purchase of the new console edition.”
While this may come as a disappointment to Legacy version owners, it is relieving to know that TFP are unifying the console and PC versions under their own banner to prevent a repeat of the past.
Along with the new console version of 7 Days to Die 1.0, players can expect to eventually get all of the same updates as the PC version in a timely manner. A few of the notable differences between the console and PC versions at launch are:
- Console version will not have random world generation at launch, can expect it to come in a patch soon after launch
- Only Navezgane and a few pre-generated maps will be available
- Will not launch with the level/prefab editor or world editor, no word on when these may be introduced
- Crossplay between PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S is set to be implemented in Update 1, until then, console players will be restricted to peer-to-peer games on the same platform
7 Days to Die has had a long journey and many players consider it a prime example of, “Early Access done right.” The exact launch date and official patch notes are to be announced within the coming weeks. Based on the excitement of the developers and the unified direction of the game, the future of 7 Days to Die is looking bright.
