Best Features Coming In 7 Days To Die 2.0 Update

Summary

• Improved game start options for multiplayer, making it easier to team up with friends.
• Enhanced random map generation with 50 new points of interest for more diverse exploration.
• New tougher zombie types added and perk system rebalanced, providing a more challenging endgame experience.

7 Days To Die spent a very long time in early access before going gold – more than a decade. However, this long development cycle has resulted in arguably one of the best zombie survival games around. But it seems that the developers, The Fun Pimps, are not finished yet, and the 2.0 update is due to be released on or around the 15th of April 2025. The update brings quite a few great changes to the game.

The update brings in a number of very useful quality-of-life changes, and also some more sweeping updates to features such as the perk system, and hazardous biome progression. Overall, this looks like a solid update to an already great game.

1

Spawn Near A Friend

A Great New Addition For Game Starts

• Makes teaming up much easier
• Friends can start a game together

Players who enjoy tackling 7 Days To Die with friends will be pleased to hear that teaming up will be far simpler than before in the 2.0 update. The Fun Pimps have added an option when joining a multiplayer game that is a cool quality of life addition.

When joining a game, players will be given the option to choose a friend to spawn close to so that they can group up from the very start of the game. This is a much better idea than the current one, where players can spawn quite far apart and have to find each other if they want to work together.

2

Random Generation Improvements

Better Procedurally Generated Maps

• More wilderness POIs to explore
• More natural placement of wilderness roads

Anyone who has had 7 Days To Die in their game collection for a few years will know that the procedural generation of random maps has improved by leaps and bounds since the early days. However, there is still room for improvement.

In the 2.0 update, random generation gets another small tweak in the form of increasing the number of POI spawns in wilderness areas. Alongside this, the way that roads are placed in the wilderness has also been improved. Combined, these changes should mean exploring outside towns will be more rewarding.

3

Trees And Foliage Update

Visual And Performance Tweaks

• Better performance rendering trees
• A more natural look for forested areas

The second improvement to wilderness areas in the 2.0 update for 7 Days To Die relates entirely to the way that trees and foliage are placed and rendered. There are actually three changes being made in the update that impact forested areas.

Firstly, trees are being changed to run on the same speed tree shader, so this will hopefully lead to fewer draw calls and a subsequent boost in performance. Secondly, there is a new foliage system being patched in. This new system adds the ability for forested areas to contain clearings and also makes them more natural-looking, as toward the edges of a forest, the foliage will become less dense and not as tall. Lastly, trees in the burnt and wasteland biomes have had their models revamped to make them look better.

4

50 New Points Of Interest

More Diversity And Better Maps

• New POIs added to the random map generation system
• Players can expect to find new structures

Going back a few years, randomly generated maps in 7 Days To Die used to look pretty odd and were very repetitive, with the same POIs being used several times in a single town or city. As the game has developed, the random map generator has been improved, and many new POIs have been added.

The 2.0 update is adding a whopping 50 new POIs that can be used by the random map generator to improve the diversity of towns and cities. The hand-crafted, standard Navezgane map has also been updated to include these POIs.

5

New Higher Game Stage Zombies

A Tougher Endgame Challenge

• New tough zombies at later game stages
• Added charged blue and infernal orange zombies

Experienced 7 Days To Die players don’t have a lot of options for making the game more challenging. They can change the difficulty level, switch on zombie feral sense, and make zombies move faster. However, the best players still find the game to be fairly easy, even with all of these options maxed out. The 2.0 update is going to make things tougher, though.

There will be two new types of late game stage zombies, similar to the radiated zombies that are in the game currently. These two new zombie archetypes are charged blue zombies and infernal orange zombies. These new types of zombies will have their own set of behaviors and should make the game more challenging for skilled players.

6

Rebalanced And Updated Perks

Further Tweaks To The Perk System

• New sledgehammer perk line
• Perks are standardized to have 10 perks per attribute

The perk trees, tied to the key attributes of strength, perception, agility, intelligence, and fortitude, have been tweaked several times in recent updates to 7 Days To Die. And let’s not forget the change to the book-based perk unlocks that was introduced several updates ago. Looking at player feedback, it is obvious that the perk system still needs improving. In the 2.0 update, some big changes have been made to the perk system.

All of the five player attributes will now have a full list of 10 perks they unlock. There is also a whole new perk tree, which will be under the general tab and not tied to a specific attribute. Each of the 10 perks in a tree will have 5 levels, as well as a new mastery perk for each attribute. Finally, an often requested addition, a new perk purely related to sledgehammers, has been added.

7

Biome Progression Elemental Survival

More Immersive Survival Gameplay

• Craft temporary buffs to survive in harsh biomes
• Unlock innate biome protection through challenges

Player progression in 7 Days To Die is generally gated by the biome the player is operating within. Harsh conditions result in debuffs, and the zombies and animals found within these biomes are much tougher enemies. Put simply, as a player levels up, opens up new perks, and upgrades their gear, they will move on to tougher biomes. Which means greater rewards and better loot if the player can survive. But once again, experienced players find the negative impact of operating in a dangerous biome to be a trivial challenge for the most part.

In the 2.0 update for 7 Days To Die, dangerous biomes will become more hazardous, and some new biome-specific zombies are being added. But on the flip side, the player will be able to craft short-term buffs that protect them from radiation, cold, heat, and smoke. Lastly, new challenges are added, which can unlock biome-specific immunities once completed.