DayZ to get radios, Dean Hall on sabbatical for two months

Dean "Rocket" Hall has taken a holiday from development of the standalone version of DayZ, but the rest of the team is hard at work on new features, including radios.

In a new developer update, Hall broke down what each team is up to at the moment. Most of the Bohemia crew is hard at work on the same tasks as last time - the new client-sever architecture; zombie animations; assets and more - but one member is working on something new.

"Bebul is working on our Radio implementation, allowing players to communicate using a basic radio, similar (but more simple) to the popular ACARS radio mod for ArmA2. Players pick up radios, and they can set a frequency and talk/receive text/voice from other players," Hall explained.

"The microphone or speaker can be turned on or off to allow players to use radios as a listening device. If the player has not crafted a headset onto the radio, then the output is public (either voice or text). The results are fantastic, and Bebul is now ensuring this all works properly in the all special cases during Multiplayer play."

Meanwhile, Hall's update comes from a base camp on Mount Everest; the developer is currently on a two month sabbatical to fulfil a lifelong dream to climb the world's highest peak.

Hall apologised to fans for taking time off from the project at this point, but he has likely planned the trip for a very long time, and cancelling invokes a $100,000 fee. DayZ's standalone release was originally going to be a fairly quick and dirty job before Bohemia granted the team the resources to completely rebuild it, so it's likely Hall didn't expect to still be leading the project when he began organising his trip.

Thanks, PCGamer.