Making zombie combat feel right
A zombie taking damage shouldn’t look like someone hit Pause on its walk animation. This is where I test reactions, movement, weapons, and the small things that make combat feel good.
The question
How do I make a hit readable without enemies snapping, freezing, or getting stuck in reactions?
What I tried
Use separate animation, damage-range, and effects labs to inspect locomotion, attacks, reactions, hit regions, and weapon feedback in controlled scenes.
What it proves
The existing lab captures document the test environments. Combat tuning is ongoing; this page is a build log rather than a playable combat sandbox.
Where to go next
Read the observations and see the lab captures in the World case study.
What felt wrong
Movement and reactions have to read as one character. An isolated hit animation tells me very little about what happens when the enemy is already moving.
What I changed
I split the questions across small development labs. Animation playback checks the handoffs. The damage range checks distance, hit regions, ammunition, and occlusion. The effects lab puts visual and audio feedback beside the events that trigger it.
What improved
The test scenes make each part easier to inspect and repeat. I can examine a weapon or reaction without starting a full survival run.
What still bugs me
An isolated test is only part of the answer. The same feedback still has to make sense in a busy encounter, from the player’s camera.