V3.0 "Dead Hot Summer" Release Notes
Posted on June 11th, 2026 10:38 PM EST
Dead Hot Summer V3.0 Update Release Notes
The apocalypse just got hotter. Amid the chaos of the Dead Hot Summer, we’re happy to deliver this ambitious systemic update. Built around a core philosophy of player agency, V3.0 gives survivors more freedom than ever to shape the apocalypse their way.
Version 3.0 introduces 150 sandbox customization options, giving players greater control over their survival experience. Survivors can fine-tune a wide range of settings to emphasize the parts of the game they enjoy most, or reduce and even disable systems they prefer to avoid, with the goal of letting players craft the survival experience they want. Player-made presets can also be shared with others, and we’ve created a selection of special preset modes of our own for players to experience.
Moment-to-moment survival is expanded through the introduction of Item Magnitude, a new system that reshapes how weapons and gear scale, alongside an optional Repair and Degradation settings that ensures every battle leaves a lasting impact. Together, these systems make loot more varied, meaningful, and rewarding to pursue, adding greater depth to progression and itemization.
The world itself has evolved. A full overhaul of POI signage powered by the new Sign-Tech system brings hundreds of new environmental signs to towns, compounds, businesses, and ruins, enhancing atmosphere, readability, and immersion across the wasteland.
Alongside these updates, Version 3.0 delivers a redesigned main menu, over 60 new POIs, and a customizable crosshair system. A new cosmetic outfit will also be available alongside the V3.0 Stable release.
A new scorched season of survival awaits. Read on to learn more:
Take Command of the Sandbox
A New Era of Control arrives. The V3.0 “Dead Hot Summer” update transforms the game into the ultimate survival simulator with 150 sandbox customization options. Whether reliving the tension of classic play styles with no magazines, turning off zombie digging, diving into a brand-new official preset like Undead Matinee, or forging entirely custom worlds through player-made presets, the power to define survival is now fully in your hands!
Your Rules. Your World. Your Survival Story. V3.0 introduces full sandbox preset creation and sharing, allowing players to build personalized survival experiences unlike anything before. Name your creations, fine-tune every setting, and unleash limitless gameplay permutations designed entirely around your vision of the apocalypse.
Along with the Classic Difficulty Presets, V3.0 comes with these brand-new Official Presets, including:
Undead Matinee – A melee-focused vintage movie-inspired mode with slower zombies, swarming numbers & scarce ammo. Includes the new headshot finisher setting.
Madmole’s Mayhem – Fewer supplies, harsher penalties, including the new item loss and item durability loss on death, along with constant pressure. Madmole… It smells good!
Almost Creative Mode – The apocalypse, minus the actual apocalypse. Because Dying Is Inconvenient.
Bite Club – Respawning is for cowards in this hardcore, perma-death mode. One life left; use it wisely.
Legacy Survival – Old-school survival with modern consequences. Play like it’s 2014.
7 Days Later – Modern movie-inspired with chaotic hordes of fast-moving zombies.
Caveman’s Life – Survive an apocalypse where tools peaked at sticks.
Dumpster Diver – Turning Garbage Into Greatness. It’s not hoarding if you use it.
Dying World – Resources are fading, and you’re not far behind.
Disaster Film – Catastrophes stack faster than you can fix them.
Chibi Mode – Not only are they cute… They’re fast, too! Good thing you have some speed of your own.
For notes about Sandbox server configurations, V2.6 server save game compatibility, and a complete list of all Sandbox Options, see those sections below.
The Arms Race Begins with Magnitude
Powerful new Magnitude variants are changing the face of survival in V3.0, bringing boosted stats to looted weapons, tools, workstation mods, and more. An orange star will highlight the special stats along with a % in teal. You might find a Pickaxe with boosted block damage, a Shotgun with boosted range, a Machete with increased damage, or a Cooking pot with faster cooking time. The permutations are endless!
All tools and weapons will have a chance to roll boosted stats when found in loot.
Tools and weapons still have a chance for random stats and may show a teal percentage, but they are not considered boosted stats unless the stat is marked orange. This could allow combined items to cross over into a boosted range.
A wide variety of mods for armor, tools, vehicles, weapons, and workstations will now have progressive quality levels.
Higher-quality mods provide stronger bonuses. A Quality 1 Grave Digger mod adds 5% dirt damage, while a Quality 6 version adds 30%.
Not every mod benefits from higher qualities. Mods with simple on/off effects, such as the Helmet Light, are still limited to a single version.
Survivors can now use the new Combine Station to merge attributes of similar items to incrementally increase their power until they reach their full potential! It also provides an alternative method for repairs! Traders will now carry Magnitude-enhanced equipment such as weapons with special boosted stats, creating a new high-end economy for serious survivors.
The highest percentage stats will be moved to the combined item regardless of quality.
When a boosted stat from a Quality 1 item shows 20%, combined with a Quality 6 item, it will have more impact on the Quality 6 item’s higher base stat.
With the various degradation and repair options available, players can now choose how punishing the apocalypse can be on items. Repair Method options include no repair, repair kits only, combine repair, or use both kits and combine. Permanent Repair Degradation can be set to 5, 10, 15, 20, or 25% of the item’s max durability per repair (the first repair is free). Death Degradation allows players to choose how much durability items will lose on death or even permanent max durability loss.
A new M60 turret has been added to help with those late game hordes. Uses all .762 ammo types.
Signs for the End of Times
A complete POI signage overhaul arrives in V3.0 thanks to the new Sign-Tech system delivering thousands of signs to the POIS in the game. This brings a richer atmosphere and deeper immersion to every corner of the world. Streets, shops, compounds, and ruins now feature dramatically improved environmental signage designed to make the wasteland feel authentic, coherent, and alive. POI creators will gain access to the Sign-Tech tools through the level design editor at launch.
Canvas & Decal signs of various dimensions (e.g. 1×1, 2×2, 3×3, etc.)
Add Text, Shapes and Noise
RGBA color picker
Layer Masking (Color Only, Color And Mask, Mask Only, Punch Out)
Layer Warping (Skew, Pinch/Bulge, Twirl, Kaleido, Perspective, Arc, Stretch, Grid)
Points of Interest (POIs)
60+ new POIs, adding expanded depth and variety to the world.
Tier 5 – “Champions Coliseum” (soccer_stadium_01)
Tier 4 – “Granddaddy’s Cable Regional Service Center” (industrial_60_01)
Tier 4 – “Ironwood Paper Mill” (industrial_60_02)
Tier 4 – “Beanthere Coffee Company” (industrial_60_03)
Tier 4 – “ChemTech Distribution Center” (industrial_60_04)
Tier 4 – “Water Treatment Plant” (industrial_strip_06)
Tier 4 – “Camp Hollow Point (army_camp_09)
Tier 4 – “Green Hill” (army_camp_10)
Tier 4 – “McOivey Farms” (farm_18)
Tier 4 – “Sprout & Sons Nursery (farm_20)
2 new RWG tile variants adding more spawning opportunities for 100×100 commercial and industrial themed POIs.
A Fresh Interface for a Brutal World
Survivors will be greeted by a newly redesigned Main Menu UI featuring upgraded visuals, improved presentation, and a darker post-apocalyptic aesthetic. While the front end has entered a new era in V3.0, the full in-game interface overhaul is still to come in a future release.
In your Crosshairs
Survivors now have complete control over their combat visibility with the new customizable crosshair system. Adjust crosshair scale, opacity, and color to match your personal playstyle, while expanded display settings let you decide exactly when and how your reticle appears. All new customization options can be found in the dedicated Crosshair tab within the General Options menu.
Sun’s Out, Guns Out!
The new Beachwear Pack cosmetic DLC brings tropical chaos to the apocalypse with stylish new outfits built for survivors who refuse to let civilization’s collapse ruin their summer plans. From sandy shores to blood-soaked boardwalks, the wasteland has never looked this relaxed. And remember, when the world ends, the tan begins!
Modding
The WebDashboard code was integrated with the core game code, meaning it will always be up to date. For mods there is only two changes:
You no longer need to reference additional assemblies, but only the game’s core Assembly-CSharp.dll
Due to the code being run through the code publicizer process you might have to adapt some of your code that overrides vanilla methods to also be public
“Localization.txt” was renamed to “Localization.csv” to properly indicate its contents and make it easier to open it with spreadsheet tools
Changed entitygroups.xml format back to proper XML elements
Previous text based format is currently still supported for backwards compatibility
The XUi framework has received a massive internal overhaul and code cleanup
New binding system moving more control from code to XML. Documentation can be found on the official Wiki (https://7daystodie.wiki.gg/wiki/XUi)
Heavily reworked XUi views to reduce code duplication, provide more common features (attributes) across different view types and increase compatibility
E.g. tables and grids have more similar attribute names, window anchor names and view pivot names use the same values
Removed unnecessary view attributes, rects now always have an underlying UI widget and panels always a UI panel. Rects should be used over panels wherever possible
Added new views video, scrollbar and scrollview
Removed “force_hide” attribute, visibility is now properly handled on each view element through the regular “visible” attribute
Tweens can be controlled from XML
Renamed folder “XUi” to “XUi_InGame” to make it clearer what each folder is for
Renamed “controls.xml” to “templates.xml” to get rid of confusion between XML templates and XUi controller classes
Removed unused “ruleset” XML element level from xui.xml
Support for using templates as windows
Lots of small bugfixes to different parts of views, controllers and the overall framework
Sandbox Options
Here is the complete list of the 150 sandbox options in our Dead Hot Summer release. Each setting includes at least two unique variables, resulting in billions of possible permutations of preset game modes in the 7 Days Universe. The complete list is as follows:
Player Settings
Ranged Damage
Melee Damage
Block Damage
Terrain Damage
Headshot Multiplier
Player Damage In
Walk Speed
Run Speed
Crouch Speed
Jump Strength
Stamina Regen
Stamina Usage
XP Multiplier
Show XP
Level Stat Bonus
Skill Gain Rate
Skill Gain Amount
Death Penalty
Lose On Death
Death Loss Count
Death Degradation
Death Degradation Amount
Drop On Death
Drop On Quit
Infection Rate
New Player Buff
Encumbrance Slots
Jar Refund
Entity Settings
Enemy Spawning
Max Enemy Tier
Enemy Density
Enemy Respawn
Biome Animal Respawn
Enemy Damage Dealt
Entity Damage In
Enemy Block Damage
BM Block Damage
Headshot Mode
Entity Health Bars
Show Entity Damage
Zombie Day Speed
Zombie Night Speed
Zombie Feral Speed
Zombie BM Speed
Zombie Feral Sense
AI Smell Mode
Zombie Rage
Zombie Digging
Zombies Eat Animals
World Settings
Global Game Stage
Biome Game Stage
Biome Progression
Temperature Survival
Max Tech Type
Workstations in the Wild
Blood Moon Frequency
Blood Moon Range
Blood Moon Count
Blood Moon Warning
Air Drops
Air Drop Variance
Storm Frequency
Storm Warning
Heat Map Sensitivity
24 Day Cycle
Daylight Length
Mark Air Drops
Allow Map
Allow Compass
Allow Screen Markers
Show Location Info
Show Day/Time
Resource Settings
Max Loot Tier
Global Loot Stage
Biome Loot Stage
POI Loot Stage
Loot Respawn Days
Loot Timer
Loot Bag Drop
Loot Abundance
Food Abundance
Drink Abundance
Medical Abundance
Ammo Abundance
Resource Abundance
Armor Abundance
Melee Abundance
Ranged Abundance
Currency Abundance
Magazine Abundance
Treasure Map Chance
Mining Yield
Crop Yield
Seed Drop
Resource Yield
Crop Growth
Crafting Settings
Crafting Progression
Crafting Max Tier
Magazine Progress
Backpack Crafting
Workstation Crafting
Smelter Type
Crafting Timer
Crafting Cost
Crafting Yield
Scrapping Yield
Dew Collector Time
Dew Collector Yield
Dew Collector Input
Apiary Time
Apiary Yield
Apiary Input
Item Degradation
Repair Method
Repair Degradation
Traders
Trading Enabled
Vending Enabled
Trader Hours
Trader Protection
Trading Dialog
Global Trader Stage
Trader Max Tier
Trader Item Count
Vending Item Count
Trader Reset
Vending Reset
Sell Price
Buy Price
Trader Buy Limit
Task Settings
Challenges
Quests
Intro Challenges
Intro Quest
Trade Routes
Buried Quests
POI Quests
Quests per Tier
Quests per Day
Base Skill Points
Miscellaneous Settings
Vehicle Fuel Usage
Vehicle Entity Damage
Vehicle Block Damage
Vehicle Self Damage
Electrical Output
Celebrate Kills
Big Heads
Tiny Zombies
Gravity
Silly Sounds
Black and White
Server Admin notes for Sandbox Options and legacy property removal
With the addition of over 150 Sandbox Options, some of the legacy options previously set in serverconfig.xml have been moved to a new SandboxCode XML property.
For server admins that wish to continue their V2.6 save game, you will need to recreate your legacy serverconfig.xml settings using the in-game Sandbox Options menu.
Copy the code, and then paste it as the SandboxCode property value in the updated V3.0 serverconfig.xml file.
Although we have done our best to communicate with server providers, you may need to work with your specific provider to help setup these options.
The name and default value for the new property is:
<property name=”SandboxCode” value=”AAAJABJACJADJARFBNC”/>
The SandboxCode above is an equivalent setup of the legacy default GameDifficulty setting of “Adventurer” or 1.
The following is a list of the legacy properties that have been removed/converted:
GameDifficulty
BlockDamagePlayer
BlockDamageAI
BlockDamageAIBM
XPMultiplier
DayNightLength
DayLightLength
BiomeProgression
StormFreq
DeathPenalty
DropOnDeath
DropOnQuit
JarRefund
EnemySpawnMode
EnemyDifficulty
ZombieFeralSense
ZombieMove
ZombieMoveNight
ZombieFeralMove
ZombieBMMove
AISmellMode
BloodMoonFrequency
BloodMoonRange
BloodMoonWarning
BloodMoonEnemyCount
LootAbundance
LootRespawnDays
AirDropFrequency
AirDropMarker
QuestProgressionDailyLimit