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Dear Game Industry,

With the recent barrage of mediocre zombie games the last few years I feel you're severely limiting what you can come up with. Sadly, many new "projects" are doomed to the same fate because those in the video game industry... simply don't know what they are doing.

For example, if a zombie related game comes out I ask the following question

"How do you survive the zombie apocalypse in your game?"

I usually get the answer :

"Shoot zombies with guns."

Seriously? Is that it? We can't do better than this in this day and age?

I think people who create these type of games forget about "What makes zombies scary" and if you think that zombies are scary because they're gory undead half-rotting cannibals... then I'm sorry, you're wrong.

Zombies are all about subversion.

Zombies are like a form of really aggressive cancer and just as cancer subverts healthy cells and corrupts their normal function, so too do zombies subvert healthy humans. It might be with a bite or a scratch or maybe it's by dint of death itself, so that when one's demise comes it never truly comes. This is the subversion of sickness, of disease. Zombies are scary in the way that Ebola or HIV are scary. Zombies are the black plague of monsters - get too close, drop your guard, and they will do more than just kill you. They will infect you.

And you become one of them.

This subversion is what makes the zombie unique and game developers simply aren't taking advantage of it.

Stop thinking of zombies like monsters and start thinking of them like a corrupted force of nature. The zombie menace is like an earthquake, a flood, a plague of locusts. It is an unthinking, unintelligent violation of nature. The zombie apocalypse cannot be stopped with a pair of Desert Eagles in the same way that you cannot use a fire axe to stop a tsunami or a Molotov cocktail to countermand a nuclear winter.

As you may note, this rarely, if ever, shows up in zombie-themed video games. For the most part, zombies in games are scary only as a constant physical threat. They stomp, shuffle or run at you. Then you shoot them. Light them on fire. Blow them up. Or decapitate them with a machete. Or some other ridiculous way the developer thinks is "funny".

We rarely are we confronted with the fear of becoming them.

We're always "immune". Always... "special".

Enough!

Second question. "What is the true threat in a zombie apocalypse?"

If you said zombies.... wrong!

When zombies walk the earth, humanity's most basic needs are threatened. It's harder suddenly to find and procure food, shelter, ammo, allies. Soon society crumbles at its foundation and the bare necessities of survival are thrown into contention.

Then emerges is the true threat in a zombie apocalypse: other humans.

Do we see this in games? Not so much. Mostly, it's wave after wave of stumbling dead. Where's the human sniper who's territory I went in without knowing and wants to kill me? Where's the drunken survivor who accidentally leaves the back door unlocked and lets the zombie menace into the farmhouse where we've been holed up for the last three weeks? Where's the out-of-control military commander who won't let me and my family through to the "safe zone" because he's out of test kits and the zombies are coming after me?

Here's how to create a really good zombie game :

Firstly, there must be a scarcity in terms of tools, ammunition, food and other apocalypse-essential supplies. This will add to the feeling of isolation that such survival games need to instill in the player, coupled with a lack of information on what’s happening on a big scale. Since the zombie apocalypse is bigger than merely a small national or international crisis and it doesn’t stop until every single one of us has joined the ranks of the walking dead. The less we know, the better.

Secondly, the zombies must be portrayed accurately to achieve the right dread an apocalyptic survival game needs. To achieve that terror, one must first understand why zombies are frightening. The key to this fear stems from two factors: the zombies likeness to human beings, and their endless, mindless push forward in the hunt for brains, flesh or whatever they crave. The first factor is crucial, as it reminds us that these creatures are only human husks, the result of what happens when you remove the human conscience (and add an insatiable hunger). There’s still a shard of humanity left. Except, they are moving carcasses, with possible things to collect, if you dare. Perhaps have knives stuck into them, or matches in their pockets... or they look almost normal without a scratch on them... then they bite you and infect you.

To achieve the second factor, the zombies must have a sufficient unstopping, invisible drive to them and they will bang away at something unless they are deterred otherwise until they are unable to. That the noise, unless stopped will attract more until you can't go to sleep as your character feeling of danger is always present.

Thirdly, an apocalyptic game must feel expansive and free. Ideally, every object should be usable by the players in their quest for survival. The players must be free to approach the situations they experience how they see fit and possibly fail, rather than have glowing arrows pointing to the correct manner of doing so. Also, linearity is useful when creating narrative-based game the grander plot becomes more open world. Hints at what caused the apocalypse may be left around but the player shouldn’t be involved in the grander plot of things. This is terror in suburbia, not a power fantasy where teenage boy saves the world. The small stories are what’s important, whether it’s rescuing your neighbor from the hordes or witnessing someone close to you be infected. This is what matters.

I'd really like the ability to play with others in a constructive manner, if I wished to do so. Left 4 Dead is possibly the most successful zombie-themed game released in years was not even a true zombie game in my mind. The L4D experience was excellent however since this team-based shooter relied on effective communication and cooperation if the players were to survive the stages. Any stragglers who run off on their own will quickly be killed off by the undead and the team will have one less gun in that next firefight. I liked that.

We want this. Only in a huge sandbox world to enjoy.

As sad as the state of affairs is... hope remains as there are some games are in the horizon.... like Dead State, Class 3 and 4 and Dead Lingers who feet that their games are not about the zombies rather it is about a world in crisis, it’s about survival, it’s about the ugly truth of human behavior. Screenshots have looked interesting to state the least.

I know some people will state Day Z. I don't like Day Z. Simply because it's far too much what I called "PVP with a side order of zombies".

What say you? How do you feel about this?


*Kindly note some portions of this rant comes from outside, very accurately done sources.

Actually, in that new Zombie game for the WiiU, when you die, you have to roll a new character and your old character becomes one of the zombies in the game. I thought that ws an interesting twist.

I will think of more to say, but for now: Jay that was a masterpiece of a post. Thank you.

yeah we need more zombie things in games

Charlie Don't Surf said:

yeah we need more zombie things in games

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He's not calling for "more," he's calling for "better."

Charlie doesn't even play games.

Biggest pet peeve in a zombie game? Unlimited ammo fro the basic weapon.

I like to be able to take a count of my bullets and pick my shots.... particularly if shooting a zombie should only be a last resort.... unless I want to draw more zombies onto me and my group.

One of the things that I think Dead Island did right is that they made Melee weapons preferable for the most part to firearms.

Yes, Dead Island had interesting melee mechanics however, it failed miserably on so many other levels.

I still think there should be a zombie MMO where you start as a PC and when you die you become a zombie. As a PC you get more points for surviving (the lower the number of survivors means higher points for those still alive). As a zombie you get points for killing the living. The lower the number of surviving humans the higher the points for finding/killing one. As zombies get kills they can be given additional abilities like speedups or advanced human detection.

Humans have advantages and disadvantages as follows:

Advantages:

• Can use weapons and things like body armor.
• Faster than zombies.
• Can open doors or bash them in.
• Can use more complex tools/structures.

Disadvantages:

• Will lose health without food/water.
• Must sleep. Sleeping characters are persistent in the world and happens when the player is offline. Better find a safe place.
• Can be detected by zombies if they are close enough.

Zombies have the following advantages/disadvantages:
Advantages:

• Does not need to sleep, eat or drink. When the player is offline the zombie will shamble aimlessly but not attack.
• Stronger than humans. they can bash down doors and other objects with enough time.
• SLIGHT (read 5 meters or so) human detection. Call it "brain sense" or whatever. It doesn't necessarily give them direction as much as "Whoa! You smell those brains?"

Disadvantages:

• Slow.
• Can not use tools or weapons. If died wearing armor, that armor will still be on the body.
• Can not open doors but can bash them noisily.

Zombies who die are reborn as a 0 point zombies with no abilities.
When there are no human players left alive, the world is reset. Scores are kept so that people can see who survived and who was the most badass zombie.
This is the zombie game I'd play.

My sentiments about zombies in the video game industry are a little more direct.

"OK, we get it, ENOUGH ALREADY!"

Actually, you can extend that to all forms of media nowadays. And I used to love zombies so much, too.

The fundamental problem is that too many people are willing to pay money for sub-par games featuring zombies. If people would stop buying all the fucking shovelware that comes out with zombies attached to it, we could get back to high-quality zombie games. So until you convince all the 12-year-olds out there to stop bugging mom and dad to get them "EA Presents: Zombie Stuff 2013" we're going to keep having this problem. The game designers are just making what will sell.

Tress said:

The fundamental problem is that too many people are willing to pay money for sub-par games featuring zombies. If people would stop buying all the fucking shovelware that comes out with zombies attached to it, we could get back to high-quality zombie games. So until you convince all the 12-year-olds out there to stop bugging mom and dad to get them "EA Presents: Zombie Stuff 2013" we're going to keep having this problem. The game designers are just making what will sell.

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Pretty much this. The dime a dozen "zombie" games and mods have completely saturated the market with sub-par games.

My biggest pet peeve in Zombie games? Default weapons (usually handguns) with unlimited ammo.

Fuck off.

Jay said:

My biggest pet peeve in Zombie games? Default weapons (usually handguns) with unlimited ammo.

Fuck off.

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I wonder if Jay likes unlimited ammo in zombie games.

I feel a lot of sources miss the underlying sense of pity your supposed to have when dealing with zombies. These are mere husks of humanity... they walk, they eat, they may even repeat some basic parts of their lives... but they will never get that back. They will never laugh or love or hate. They will never remember who they were or what their lives were like. They will merely keep going, like someone in a vegetative coma.

It gets lost in the nashing of teeth and mindless rush but your supposed to feel bad about killing zombies. The Horde isn't just what's between you and survival, it's also the shells of who used to be your friends and neighbors. Before you put a bullet in old Jed's head, your supposed to remember being at his daughter's christening. Before you slice Lacey in two, your supposed to remember the time you awkwardly asked her out and she said no.

It's because of this I feel like zombie games should have a sanity meter or something to gauge just how jaded and out of touch you've become with killing the undead horde. It should probably work both ways, with it also representing how your having trouble letting go of these people who are gone and how it's effecting your judgement. To influence the meter you could do things like looking through some old photos (to remember all the people you've lost and what they were like) or destroying old momentos (to re-enforce the fact that you've moved past those memories). Add in penalties for each end of the scale, like being slower to fire your gun if your too attached (because your hesitating) and having people react poorly to meeting you (because your acting less like a human being).

I think you can. It's not that hard and I think it takes far less effort than it would take to make a Mass Effect game.

Look at Mount & Blade and its amazing replay value. No voice acting almost, some text... awesome gameplay and combat mechanics.

Jay said:

I think you can. It's not that hard and I think it takes far less effort than it would take to make a Mass Effect game.

Look at Mount & Blade and its amazing replay value. No voice acting almost, some text... awesome gameplay and combat mechanics.

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Jay, I was referring to simulating attachement and humanity with respect to the zombie hordes. I don't think it can be done well because everyone will react differently in such a situation.

Also, Mount and Blade rules!

Anything is possible.

Jay said:

Anything is possible.

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Including a good ending to Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age 3 not sucking?

Azurephoenix said:

Including a good ending to Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age 3 not sucking?

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Not happening while it's Bioware/EA.

Dragon Age 3 has great chances of sucking a dick and is probably the last game Bioware will probably make before they get Westwooded.

On this topic, can I please point out how silly that it is that zombies want brains? That's probably the hardest organ to get to. Seriously. I don't even know how you'd eat someone's brain without some sort of crude weapons to break open a skull.

HowDroll said:

On this topic, can I please point out how silly that it is that zombies want brains? That's probably the hardest organ to get to. Seriously. I don't even know how you'd eat someone's brain without some sort of crude weapons to break open a skull.

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Not really. It takes no more effort than smashing open a watermelon (the human skull has about the same tensile strength) and you could do that barehanded by just smashing the melon onto the floor.

HowDroll said:

On this topic, can I please point out how silly that it is that zombies want brains? That's probably the hardest organ to get to. Seriously. I don't even know how you'd eat someone's brain without some sort of crude weapons to break open a skull.

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I the brains thing came from Return of the Living Dead series. I don't know why it stuck.

Traditionally, Zombies are just straight up cannibals. They don't care what part of the body they're eating.

You have to admit, zombies are great proponents of the organic food movement.

I always wondered.. in a video game where you are not immune, if they could create the whole 'try and pass off a bite and hope you survive' type scenario. Imagine if you as a player know if you got bit or not, but the other players dont know. Imagine if in this scenario permadeath was real and you would have to start another character from level 0. Now imagine that the longer you survive with a scratch, the more exp you got to keep for your new character if you die. The catch: you need to survive around other players. You can't just separate yourself and hope that you will survive the bite.. other survivors around are the difference between a 50% survival rate and a 5% survival rate.

Imagine the suspicion this might make: if you suddenly turn into an AI zombie in their midst if you fail your save. And the 'he's bit! Do we shoot him?' 'no he might survive!' 'but if he doesn't he might bite us before we down him!' 'lock him i hte spare room!' 'no! That'll cut his chance to survive down to 15%! He's as good as dead!' 'Then we shoot him!' 'no!' etc etc

That's what I'm talking about.

Is anyone else sick of virus zombies? Personally I feel the horse has been beaten. What I'd like if say there are zombies created by magic and the only way to truly kill them is by destroying every part of their body. I'd also like to see more curse based zombies like in the Evil Dead series, like maybe a Lich would come alive and start ressurecting corpses. And no matter how many times you take out a zombie it could still regenerate and try to kill you as long as the Lich is alive. Like right after you think you incerate one, the ashes will merge together and ressurect the zombie just as or maybe even MORE stronger than before. And right as you are at the Lich's castle and have escaped the regenerating zombies theres a whole SHIT load of zombies that pop up out no-where! Unexperienced gamers would probably die at first due to the massive ammount of regenezombies, and experienced gamers will respect the challenge. The fact that they can never truly be destroyed unless you beat the game will cause the player to keep moving, constantly thinking of new ways to survive, bringing the true element of horror.

I expect it to be a short download game. Short but hard as BALLS.

And in HARD mode new zombies would appear after every 2 minutes. So every time you'd dawdle about more zombies that can't be killed would appear. Also, in any mode- NO safe spots. There would be no magical spot where zombies just happen to ignore. No that would be a survival game.

But in this you would only have a shovel and a shot-gun that once your out of bullets YOU ARE OUT OF BULLETS! Ain't no magical power-ups that come out thin air coming to save the day. Unless that's also like in Nightmare mode in Doom 2(minus the shovel), than yes it is exactly like it.

Yoshimickster said:

But in this you would only have a shovel and a shot-gun that once your out of bullets YOU ARE OUT OF BULLETS! Ain't no magical power-ups that come out thin air coming to save the day. Unless that's also like in Nightmare mode in Doom 2(minus the shovel), than yes it is exactly like it.

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Also, you're claustrophobic and can't go inside places, allergic to sunlight so you can't be outdoors during daytime, and you have AIDS.

ZOMBIE AIDS.

Ravenpoe said:

Also, you're claustrophobic and can't go inside places, allergic to sunlight so you can't be outdoors during daytime, and you have AIDS.

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FUCK YEAH! NO ESCAPE! Even from your sexual past! Don't be a fool, protect your tool or else zombies will eat you. Though they'd probably get AIDS so they may not want to eat you, I don't know I don't know what zombies like to eat.

AshburnerX said:

ZOMBIE AIDS.

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Taking necrophelia to a whole new level.

LordRendar said:

Taking necrophelia to a whole new level.

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That has to be a tag-line to a zombie exploitation movie.

Didn't we discuss a movie like this in another thread? Something about a zombie who kills some girl's boyfriend and then starts feeling romantic feelings for her after absorbing the boyfriend's memories?

It looked awful!

Azurephoenix said:

Didn't we discuss a movie like this in another thread? Something about a zombie who kills some girl's boyfriend and then starts feeling romantic feelings for her after absorbing the boyfriend's memories?

It looked awful!

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Boy eats Girl? No wait, the zombie in that all-ready had feelings for the girl and was conscious the whole time. Didn't really care for it, could've been funnier.

You know what I want to see in a zombie game? Intelligent zombies that retain their memories and personalities, yet have to constantly fight against the cravings for living flesh. Imagine a game where you're working on a cure, or protecting a clean zone, or even including zombies in your party - complete with countdowns to feeding frenzies. Or imagine a game where these intelligent zombies somehow solve their own flesh-eating problem with massive livestock breeding or synthetic flesh. They form their own country, separate from the uninflected areas. Diplomacy with zombies? I can dig it. A zombie is basically a shambling biological weapon. A zombie country's army would be devastating, a walking apocalypse.

Set that to a Cold War backdrop, with both sides scrambling to win the zombie nation as an ally, with the prospect of a nuclear strike as soon as a side is picked. You could play as a force within any of the three factions, trying to keep the zombies neutral, knowing that failure could result in either a zombie apocalypse or nuclear winter. THAT would be a pretty fresh idea.

Zappit said:

You know what I want to see in a zombie game? Intelligent zombies that retain their memories and personalities, yet have to constantly fight against the cravings for living flesh. Imagine a game where you're working on a cure, or protecting a clean zone, or even including zombies in your party - complete with countdowns to feeding frenzies. Or imagine a game where these intelligent zombies somehow solve their own flesh-eating problem with massive livestock breeding or synthetic flesh. They form their own country, separate from the uninflected areas. Diplomacy with zombies? I can dig it. A zombie is basically a shambling biological weapon. A zombie country's army would be devastating, a walking apocalypse.

Set that to a Cold War backdrop, with both sides scrambling to win the zombie nation as an ally, with the prospect of a nuclear strike as soon as a side is picked. You could play as a force within any of the three factions, trying to keep the zombies neutral, knowing that failure could result in either a zombie apocalypse or nuclear winter. THAT would be a pretty fresh idea.

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I remember hearing in this game called something Green the zombies learned human skills and could use guns. Though I did hear it wasn't that good though.