We ran through the games wondering what to play. Perhaps one of the regulars: Lunch Money? (an ok game), Settlers? (good game); Cash and Guns? (great game), Dalmutti? (great game). Or perhaps one of the waiting to play games: Junta? (said to be excellent), Credo? (complete unknown). But no, in a moment of madness I hear myself say 'Lets play Zombies!. It sucked last time but loads of people like it. Lets give it another try'.
Last time we played the first half of the game turned out to be pointless as everything that happened before the helicopter pad was located turned out to be pointless except to establish who was near the pad and had some sort of chance and who was too far away and could spend the rest of the game watching to see who would win. So we introduced a house rule to say that the helicopter pad could not be placed closer than three squares from any player or from the town square.
To cut a long (make that very long and dull) story short it sucked again. I have to say I cant believe much thought went into designing and testing this game. There were six of us and the game lasted about 4 mind numbing hours.
The first 2 hours were spent revealing the map and went the same as last time: no one ever got a card that went with a location they could reach because the odds are far too slim. Several people held onto location cards hoping to get lucky until they realised that you move so slowly and take so much damage moving that there's no realistic chance of crossing the map to visit anywhere.
Eventually the helicopter pad turned up and was duly placed in a location that meant half the people would struggle to get there for another hour. Did our house rule help? No. Well sort of... Ok, no. The previous game had finished almost immediately the helicopter was found excluding most players for no reason other than luck, so we had agreed that it could not be placed near to a player or the town square. This did have the intended effect of allowing everyone to have a chance of finishing so it was sort of a success. But it meant we had to play for another two hours which doubled the dullness of the game so no, not a good idea.
During that last 2 hours we all repeatedly attempted to get to the helicopter pad. Cards that create more zombies came up from the deck fast enough that there was always a block of zombies in the way and the odds of getting through unscathed took care of most peoples attempts. When the occasional person had a string of luck there was always someone with a card to scupper their chances, and these cards were coming up fast enough that nothing really changed over the last two hours of play.
In the end we only finished because enough people were tired and bored that they refused to play any cards to stop Martin from winning.
I have to admit we all laughed quite a bit during the game, especially the last hour. However they were all bitter despairing laughs at the games expense. We could not believe that the game was so badly thought out.
Because of the rate at which negative cards came up I suspect that the game can't work with 6 people. But last time we played there were only 4 of us and it sucked then too. I cant think of a part of the game that works satisfactorily.
Oh I forgot - you can also win by amassing 25 killed zombies; though you lose half your stock every time you die. I cant imagine this happens much as the fights are pretty much 50/50 and you start with three lives. Because you lose half your dead zombies on each death you are going to level out in the high teens even if you do well. Given a extensive play time you might eventually get a long string of lucky rolls and reach 25 killed - but frankly your fellow players are never going to let that happen. And forget about wading through the zombies with a chainsaw clocking up kills, there's two butterfingers cards in the deck so someone will soon have that off you.
The physical and graphic design is good. The event cards have clear explanations on the cards which puts it one up on two otherwise good card games: Lunchmoney and Bang. The town tiles look nice but are not well thought out - the location of doors are very important to movement but pretty much require the players to examine the picture under a good light and then take a vote on where they are. My guess would be that this is a game created by a gaming company with good graphic designers but no understanding of what makes a game a game.
The only thing in Zombies! favour is that you get a load of plastic figures and a load of printed town tiles and so its a great start for a DIY game. And the manufacturer has thoughtfully provided a set of rules that are so bad whatever DIY rules you decide on will make you look like a game design genius in comparison.
If I am ever mad enough to waste 4 hours of my life again I will consider some or all of these house rules:
- placing the town square and the helipad first so we can all see where the exit will be.
- dealing out all the tiles to players so they can choose what to play to introduce a bit of control over the map.
- possibly even laying the tiles out first so players can see where the shops are.
- placing the item cards for locations on those locations for characters to search for in that building.
- not allowing the sadistic card that sends a potential winner back to the start to be used after the helipad is found/connected.
- making movement d6 plus life counters instead of just d6.
- or taking the randomness out by making movement 2 + life counters.
- allowing a player to get a bullet from any zombie killed with a 5 or 6.
- a card that is played is out the game, only discarded cards go in the discard pile to be reshuffled.
- or once the helipad appears no more cards can be drawn.
- if you are killed once the helipad is placed you are don't respawn and are out the game.
- when a character is killed only max (say) 6 zombies are lost not half.
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