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There are no good zombie board games?
10-25-2012, 09:01 AM
Post: #1
There are no good zombie board games?
After a dismal playthrough of 'The Walking Dead' boardgame, a friend of mine contended that there are no good zombie boardgames. He stated that this is due to the fact that zombie movies and stories do not translate well to game format.

Intuitively, I felt that he was wrong, but I couldn't think of any particularly strong counterexamples. Zombies are fashionable right now, and there's a lot of zombie related dreck out there lately, boardgames included. But there must be a few diamonds in the dungheap.

First off, I want to make it clear I have never played 'Last Night on Earth'. I'd wager that I'll find plenty of LNOE fans here, and plenty of fans of zombie board games in general. I'm curious to hear this forum's opinion on my friend's statement. What are the best zombie boardgames out there? What makes a good one? Has the recent trend toward cooperative/semi-cooperative games the key to capturing the feel of a good horror movie?

Conversely, if you agree, what can be done to make a better zombie game? What is lacking amidst the current field of zombie games today?
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10-25-2012, 01:34 PM (This post was last modified: 10-25-2012 02:00 PM by mqstout.)
Post: #2
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
Most people think that LNOE (or perhaps Pandemic... depending on what they like) are the best zombie board games. Most other (if not all?) zombie board games I've played have been mediocre at best.

LNOE hits the mark. It is, as you mention, semi-cooperative. That is -- there are two teams, the would-be survivors and the zombies. (Best played 4 players as heroes and 1 player as zombies, but it can scale down to 2 or up to 6 players with no issues.) LNOE, I might point out, came out early on in the "zombies are fashionable" trend. That alone could help you to overcome your fear of it.

How does the game play out? Well: cinematicaly. It was designed that way. The heroes are all unique and have back stories. There are tons of hidden elements of lore in the rule book, on the cards, etc, that lets you form a story as you want to. There are different scenarios, many of which play quite differently, to form different stories. It feels like a movie when you play it more than any other [board] game I've played. Their art style on the card images helps that along too. They actually had done a "casting call" and dressed people in costume and did a photo shoot for the images on the cards (instead of just artwork).

Your friend is otherwise right, though -- most Zombie board games suck, for various reasons.

Plenty of ground left for other posters!
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10-25-2012, 02:40 PM
Post: #3
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
While I am huge fan of Flying Frog, I have yet to play LNOE. So I can not comment on it per se, however I will say I think there are two different types of zombie gamers out there.

On one hand you have the shotgun wielding, sword swinging, hack and slash lovers who are primarily just looking at eliminating all threats in the game.

On the other are the people who just want to survive the apocalypse; resource gathering, base building, defense planning strategists. I fall into the latter category. Don't get me wrong, zombie stomping is awesome, but a little overplayed and I think that is what your buddy is referring to.

I think there are too many games designed around the first category. Play the offense, hunt 'em down, and put 'em back in their graves. But I don't see many of the second grouping. There was one pc game that was close (honestly forgot the name of it) where you could choose one of three places to fortify, and you needed to go out and salvage materials for your base, but the game was buggy, at least for me. I am looking for something to challenge me mentally. Which provides more fulfillment, wasting all your bullets on a swarm of 5 Z's, or carefully using your environment to trap/trick the Z's and save the ammo for a last effort escape? My preference would be for the latter.

The only hope I have is that Zpocalypse sounded like a resource gathering survival game. I can only hope that it really plays out that way (I pre-ordered, delivery this winter).

In summation, are there no good zombie games to play? Not necessarily, many of the hack/slash games out there are a lot of fun, but it is all in the eye of the beholder (Come on, no beholder emoticons?! Watchmen02). However, can the genre take a different stance on the subject and focus more on true survival, I think so.

W.J.

P.S. To fulfill my undying need for a beholder:

[Image: behokl.jpg]
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10-25-2012, 07:30 PM
Post: #4
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGHHHHHHH!!!!! I just did a big write up saying how good the game is then deleted it...
One sentence. The best game I've ever owned in 2 decades.
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10-25-2012, 09:51 PM
Post: #5
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
I myself have only played LNoE a few times and only the beginner scenario and "get to the truck" once.
I have the expansions awaiting my family for Xmas, and Im really hoping there is more of a "survival" feel to it.
Supposedly barricading? If I remember correctly?

But will see...I also have Zombicide waiting and hidden for Decmber 25th as well, but I know thats only a shoot em style coop game.
Kinda like Left4Dead but a board game version as I understand.

I myself would love to see a more survival zombie game like the comic/tv series Walking Dead.
Mostly scavenging, barricading with fighting zombies at your own risk ONLY to get what you need.

I am in the midst of designing a game (and it will be funded via Kickstarter) and initally we were going to create true zombie survival game, but sadly there are just too many in this genre now and wouldnt be a smart business move even though we would offer a much different take on the popular genre. Instead we are thinking along the lines of a post-apocalypse survival game using the same mechanics.

Just my opinions.
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10-25-2012, 10:05 PM
Post: #6
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
I've been playing games for more than a decade now, but I've only really started playing board games a few months ago. And I've never played any zombie board game outside of Last Night On Earth.

I like several things about Last Night on Earth: First, the mechanics are so simple that it's easy to learn and the game engine is relatively free-flowing and customizable. One game won't capture the feel of an entire zombie movie or story, but it can capture one part of a story quite well. Do you want an action-packed zombie experience? Play the Die Zombies Die scenario. With a good number of Heroes, maps, scenarios, and events, each game experience is almost guaranteed to be unique.

One aspect that I haven't fully taken advantage of (and I'll even go as far concluding that a majority of players haven't done this as well) is the customizability of the game engine. Want a REALLY action-packed game that is akin to Zombicide? Create your own scenario, where all of the Heroes start with a Weapon and up to 21 Zombies are already in play. Just tweak the rules to suit your needs. You can even give it a Left 4 Dead feel by arranging the board in such a way that it's a long map rather than a square one and give the Human players the objective of getting to the safe room. Timber Peak already has an Experience system to add an RPG feel to the game.

What's hard is that people have different tastes. I know that there are a lot that prefer the fast-paced games of Zombicide over the more imagination-dependent Last Night on Earth (and seriously, the LNOE game experience really becomes fun if the group is imaginative and brings a little roleplaying into it). Some want a little more depth and more defined roleplay experience that lasts beyond one game, something with more continuity. Just by sticking to the core rules, Last Night on Earth can provide a taste of all these things but to really get the most out of the game, you have to customize the game as necessary.
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10-25-2012, 11:46 PM
Post: #7
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
(10-25-2012 10:05 PM)LabRat Wrote:  I've been playing games for more than a decade now, but I've only really started playing board games a few months ago. And I've never played any zombie board game outside of Last Night On Earth.

I like several things about Last Night on Earth: First, the mechanics are so simple that it's easy to learn and the game engine is relatively free-flowing and customizable. One game won't capture the feel of an entire zombie movie or story, but it can capture one part of a story quite well. Do you want an action-packed zombie experience? Play the Die Zombies Die scenario. With a good number of Heroes, maps, scenarios, and events, each game experience is almost guaranteed to be unique.

One aspect that I haven't fully taken advantage of (and I'll even go as far concluding that a majority of players haven't done this as well) is the customizability of the game engine. Want a REALLY action-packed game that is akin to Zombicide? Create your own scenario, where all of the Heroes start with a Weapon and up to 21 Zombies are already in play. Just tweak the rules to suit your needs. You can even give it a Left 4 Dead feel by arranging the board in such a way that it's a long map rather than a square one and give the Human players the objective of getting to the safe room. Timber Peak already has an Experience system to add an RPG feel to the game.

What's hard is that people have different tastes. I know that there are a lot that prefer the fast-paced games of Zombicide over the more imagination-dependent Last Night on Earth (and seriously, the LNOE game experience really becomes fun if the group is imaginative and brings a little roleplaying into it). Some want a little more depth and more defined roleplay experience that lasts beyond one game, something with more continuity. Just by sticking to the core rules, Last Night on Earth can provide a taste of all these things but to really get the most out of the game, you have to customize the game as necessary.

Excellent post LabRat
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10-26-2012, 02:28 AM
Post: #8
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
A stumbling block that I think zombie games suffer from comes from the convention that in zombie movies, the merest scratch or bite from a zombie is a death sentence. This does not translate well into board games because it eliminates any margin of error or buffer against bad luck when fighting zombies.

Also, in most of the zombie games I've played, the players rarely become infected and become zombies themselves, rather they simply die.

How does LNOE deal with these issues?
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10-26-2012, 02:33 AM (This post was last modified: 10-26-2012 02:34 AM by mqstout.)
Post: #9
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
In LNOE, most wounds are wounds that don't cause infect/death until they add up and can be healed. However, some of the cards the Zombie Player can get to play (stronger ones, I might add), cause the hero to become infected such that they die the next time they take a wound. And immediately become a zombie hero under the control of the zombie player. Zombie heroes, as fresh bodies, move a little bit faster than the rest of the zombies (1d3 spaces instead of just 1), have a few more wounds before they die (most zombies are 1; zombie heroes depend on how tough the hero was in life), and have certain other cards that make zombie heroes a little bit better (such as being scarier because the other heroes recognize them).

Most of the fighting in LNOE resolves in stale mates -- "fending off" the zombie. Actual kills are rarer. Most heroes have 3 wounds before they die. (Teens 2, but they can heal simply by resting for a turn. And big tough guy has 4.) The nurse character, if she's in the game, can cure 1 wound per turn. And the hero cards have ample "Just a Scratch" (prevent a wound), med kits, Doc Brody, etc, cards to heal up -- but not enough that there's never a tough decision as to whether to use them now or hold on to it for later.
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10-26-2012, 05:23 AM
Post: #10
RE: There are no good zombie board games?
This is a home run question Watchmen02 the zombies have zombie event cards that simulate this. I only know of a few since i only have the base set and some cards that I've seen online. One such event is 'i feel kinda strange' that is played when a Hero is wounded - it turns the Hero into a Zombie Hero the next time he gets wounded unless the Heroes can cancel the event. Another is Bitten, which has the same effect but is played when a Hero wins a fight.

In the base rules, there are special moments (Black Zone, last Hero) that results in Heroes turning into Zombies when they die. Timber Peak suggests the Always Zombie Hero dot rule as part of the game, which means at any time a Hero dies, it becomes a Zombie. Timber Peak further adds to the mechanic by introducing Infected counters - again I'm not too familiar with the set, so I'm only assuming that when a Hero is Infected, there are effects that further the Infection and result in the Hero turning.
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