The once thought dead and heavily criticized survival game DayZ is experiencing a resurgence on Steam. Now, the zombie classic boasts not only new content but also a fresh record in player numbers.
What are the current player numbers? DayZ has currently overcome its poor player counts and can showcase an average of 28,291 concurrently active players on Steam over the last 30 days (via SteamCharts.com)
The zombie classic hit a high on April 24, 2022. On that day, 58,240 players played the 9-year-old survival title concurrently, setting a new record. The previous peak was reached by DayZ in January 2022 with just under 53,000 concurrent players.
Massive Criticism: “DayZ is measured in bugs per minute”
Why was DayZ considered dead? The survival classic DayZ has not always been doing as well as it currently is. After the peak player count in December 2013, player numbers declined for years.
DayZ hit its lowest point in August 2018, when only an average of 1,600 players played concurrently on Steam. The peak player count at that time was 3,300 concurrent players.
Even when DayZ was released as a full version in December 2018 and left alpha status, it only saw a minimal increase. Until June 2019, DayZ had an average of under 10,000 players.
In addition to the poor player numbers, Steam reviews from December 2019 clearly illustrate the state at that time and explain why the player numbers were so low.
The release month of the official full version still stands as the worst DayZ month in terms of Steam reviews, with almost 2,000 negative reviews. MeinMMO shows you a selection of the reviews from December 2019:
- invisibler7x via Steam: “Despite 1.0, and precisely because of the full release yesterday, I have to advise everyone against this game.”
- Stesch via Steam: “It’s outrageous what is being sold to us as ‘release’. As others have already written, you best measure DayZ in BpM – bugs per minute!”
- Battlerabbit via Steam: “So for me, DayZ was actually dead for a long time, and I was surprised that it actually got a bigger update.”
Update 1.17: New weapons and items made from bones
This is new in DayZ: With version 1.17, DayZ received a new update on April 19, 2022. This brings new weapons and new craftable items, as well as the in-game event for Walpurgis Night running until May 09.
Additionally, a new sensitivity setting has been added to the settings of DayZ. MeinMMO shows you a selection of the new content:
- New weapons: CR-550 Savanna rifle, Longhorn pistol, P1 pistol
- Craftable spear (bone and stone head variants)
- Craftable bone knife
- New cooking utensils: cleaver, meat tenderizer, kitchen timer, craftable fire pit stand
- Broom can be ignited and used as a torch
- New improvised items: improvised clothing from rags, improvised belt from ropes, improvised gas mask filter
- Gas mask filters can now be refilled with charcoal tablets
- Additional sensitivity settings (camera, aim sensitivity)
You can find the complete patch notes for update 1.17 in the DayZ forum.
To this day, DayZ is a big name among survival games and is considered a co-founder of the genre. However, the original creator of the zombie classic, Dean Hall, has long taken a different path.
With his development studio RocketWerkZ, the New Zealander launched a completely new survival game called Icarus in 2021. MeinMMO reveals who Icarus is worth it for.
New survival game from the DayZ creator starts on Steam – who is it worth it for?
