Is there anyone alive out there?
If you've been keeping your finger on the video game pulse recently you'll have noticed a growing lack of hot-blooded bodies, as the common gun-touting NPC is slowly replaced with a staggering (and, erm, staggering) selection of brain-dead flesh-chewers.
The zombie fetish, of course, originally chomped down on the world of video games thanks to the likes of Resident Evil - a series which has managed to maintain the sport of zombie hunting for the best part of 14 years.
While real Resi fans will hark back to darker, scarier incarnations for their classic zombie fix, the undead managed to transcend genres and take a bite out of modern-day FPS gamers when zombies with a certain Nazi bent stumbled into Call of Duty.
Now with a zombie-themed DLC well on its way in Red Dead Redemption and a shock zombie twist for the Yakuza series, we're scratching our exposed skulls. Can another zombie fix really stand out from the horde?
Maybe they'll groan "Brains", maybe they'll walk with horizontal arms, but apart from some very limited superficial tinkering, there's not that much you can do with the formula.
It's been done time and time again across films, games and books for years. Surely there comes a point where we have to call time on entertaining the living dead.
Yet here we are and we have to admit that the Red Dead Redemption Undead Nightmare DLC pack is devilishly fun to play.
And we don't need to remind you how much of a spin Nazi Zombies put on FPS-heads - so much so that it's back by popular demand in Black Ops.
Sticking zombies in Yakuza: Of The End at first looked like another crowbarred effort get in on the cannibal cash cow but, yet again, our doubts have been allayed by an amazing Yakuza zombie trailer.
So, are zombies an inspired addition to any game or an insultingly obvious exploitation?
Will there come a point where you banish the brain-munchers back down below or will you always welcome a wave of zombies with open arms?
Show us you're full of life - by letting us know in the comments section below.
Comments
21 comments so far...
G_R7 on 19 Oct '10 said:
Anyone who says there are too many zombies in games need to have their brains eaten. If they had one.
laminated0 on 19 Oct '10 said:
I dont much care for the new breed of zombies that seem to be able to move at extreme speeds like in LFD, I much preferred the zombies in resi 2
. Too many fast zombies in games now, yes. lol
spaceman_DOUG on 20 Oct '10 said:
Dead Rising 2
Yakuza Zombies
Read Dead Undead
Blops (Black Ops that is, ahem) Zombie mode
I guess you got L4D2
Not that many really, especially since some of them aren't full games.
*Shrugs*
We need less generic bad guys, but zombies kind of go the other way, just dull most of the time, at least make them run and mutate a bit.
Where're those Serious Sam monsters when you need them for god's sake?
SkyBlueJukeBox on 20 Oct '10 said:
Like the poster above, I think the problem is too many fast zombies that can take too much punishmet. The Yazuka trailer at one point has a character with a minigun for an arm laying waste to hordes of zombies at a time.
Few zombies that can do more damage or are harder to take down is more scary than the mobs of L4D, so I think a return to the style of the original Resident Evils, where it was an "oh cr@p" moment, rather than just "let's kill more things that should be dead". Resi 4 got it's big scares from a dangerous and hard-to-kill zombie (the chainsaw guy, Dr something-or-other).
DirtyProdigy on 20 Oct '10 said:
Zombies are like girls. You literally can never have enough....
But I gotta say though, they both are clingy and bothersome.
Multiplayerking on 20 Oct '10 said:
And they always just want to eat you and never want to talk...
plightstar on 20 Oct '10 said:
I still want a sequel to Stubbs the Zombie was a great game from the other side of the coin. Or yet to see a proper open world Zombie game set in a city or an island (if Dead Island ever gets released) where your job is to survive, maybe as a MMO like UrbanDead browser game but with graphics.
TykerD3 on 20 Oct '10 said:
I love Zombie games. Especially the Dead Rising Series and Nazi Zombies in COD. I dont think you can ever have enough Zombies. I would like a series adventure zombie game. No much fighting but trying to survive a zombie holocaust.........can someone make this??
zombiesinmyhead on 20 Oct '10 said:
Meh, zombies-schmombies.
Mogs on 20 Oct '10 said:
It's just a symptom of a general, cynical attitude among developers and publishers that it's desirable to chase after trends. If other people are doing it, that means it's something you should be doing too.
That's how they think.
WWII, post-apocalypse, zombies. I don't know what will be next, but it's like most horror films - the first few are good but then by the tenth sequel you're so f**king sick of it that you end up resenting the whole series, which is not fair to the first few efforts.
zombiesinmyhead on 20 Oct '10 said:
Just kidding. While zombies are in danger of becoming a gimmick, I'd say there aren't any really good zombie games out there. As has already been pointed out, Nazi Zombies and the RDR DLC are really just bonus levels, great bonus levels but not really games in their own right. And I say that being really excited about the RDR DLC.
L4D is zombie themed, but its more about the co-op than anything else, there's no real story to drive the imagination or get absorbed in, fun though it is. Dead Rising is just a bit of a laugh, and doesn't really scratch my zombie itch.
In fact I'd go so far as to say the last time I said 'Holy crap, zombies!' was playing the RE:Make, when I got chased by a Crimson Head, which was a long time ago. I mean they are supposed to be scary. I'd like to see something a bit more substantial and interesting done with them in games, but it'd be hard to escape the shadow of RE. A straight zombie apocalypse adventure would be nice, a real survival horror game where the world has gone tits-up, something to bring the menace and the dread back to the genre, because lets face it, zombies are pretty f*cking horrible. They're just straight men at the moment, vehicles for something else that doesn't really capture the horror of a corpse getting up and trying to eat you. Remorseless, contagious, patient, unreasoning and looking to bite your face off, all wrapped up in a shambling, leering reminder of your final, inescapable fate.
In fact I'd say the only interesting thing being done with the genre as a whole is Robert Kirkman's 'The Walking Dead' comic. Watch out for the TV series in a couple of weeks, I have a sneaking feeling it'll be incredible.
Grapple on 20 Oct '10 said:
FIFA 11 Zombie DLC will have fast zombies in the wide positions
bazzatuk on 20 Oct '10 said:
I don't think zombies in games is a bad thing but we are at a point where developers are using zombies in games where there shouldn't really be zombies just because it's the current trend.
Were Nazi Zombies that great in World at War? Were they needed? I personally found the mode quite boring and didn't play it for long. It is stuff like that which makes me question the usage of zombies.
Another example is Red Dead Redemption. A zombie add-on. Makes me wonder if there is a need, whether it will be any good and besides Halloween why at all the Wild West is the correct setting for zombies.
I think games designed around zombies are ok on the whole, but there is a danger that we might have just too many in the future.
poot_evans on 20 Oct '10 said:
I remember the day when zombies HAD to be included in a game because of censors not wanting normal humans to be killed in a video game... Carmageddon.
Now it seems to be the thing to 'choose' to put in.
I don't have a problem with games having zombies if they are integral to the gameplay -
L4d series obviously requires it.
Zombie nazis didn't interest me, but an interesting add on.
Although normal humans are in Deadrising, I think it would be distasteful for the game not to have zombies at all and replace them with 'shoppers'.
But, zombies for zombies sake is starting to get annoying.
Uncharted 1 annoyed the hell out of me when the 'undead' came in needlessly mixing it up. That and the human enemies appearing in every underground tunnel you find that supposedly no-one else has been in for centuries.
I also wonder if developers see them as an easy out on their programming - they don't need to create normal humans doing realistic things (e.g. GTA) when they can easily programme zombies (e.g. Crackdown 2).
Possibly poor examples all over this post - but I should be working! Some food for thought I hope - or I'm going to get flamed!
Augustus_aka_AG on 20 Oct '10 said:
I'd like to play a Zombie game where you ARE the Zombie. The sole objective being to infect the whole world. Side missions such as finding Britney Spears, or any other untolerable 'Celebrity', and eating their brains would be a novel twist as well. Maybe you could bite an animal and it becomes your Zombie pet?
A game like this would breathe a bit more life into the Zombie genre.
DrRickDagless MD on 20 Oct '10 said:
The difference between zombies and any other enemy is that zombies only have one shoe. If you look at what they represent its just like any other enemy character for games. For example the way Resi 5 plays its just like Pac-Man. You run until you find health/ammo then you turn and attack like you'd just eaten a big yellow pill. Robotrons enemies are basically zombies. The horde in L4D is just like any scroll along shootem-up: point a to point b shooting anything you can, dodging what you can't.
The point is that if a game is fun then I don't care what im fighting against as long as it makes sense. You can also ask are there too many soliders, mechanical animals, ninjas (or other martial artists) and robots. My answer to all of those is no.
BeauBeau on 20 Oct '10 said:
Zombies are markedly less annoying than vampires. FACT.
erplore on 20 Oct '10 said:
I have no problem with zombies in games. I've been killing them for the last 20 years.
I think their popularity is mainly due to the fact that it's not classed as inhumane to do whatever you like to them without controversy. The cynic in me also thinks they're popular with developers as it tends to be easier to implement AI for them. It's not like they have to worry about cover, flanking or ranged weapons, just charging.
jtake9 on 20 Oct '10 said:
I welcome Zombies in games when they are used in context, when they are used as a selling tool i tend to think the developers have gone a little Brain Dead....
Richie_Lynot89 on 21 Oct '10 said:
What!? WHAT!?
Let's face it. Tom kinda has a point. Then again, he doesn't have a leg to stand on. Sure, zombies are fun, too fun at times, you kinda get sucked into the game and start rambling at the screen, laughing at their funny walking, their disfigured faces and of course, their cute and cuddly nature. Wait, scratch that. Nazi Zombies in WaW changed everything for me. Resident Evil and House of the Dead were epic in their own rights. FPS. Third person. It doesn't matter! I'd still be tearing through hordes of zombies with my trusty shotgun, watching their brains explode into chutney! I love the fact zombies are in games! They make it a great deal easier for me personally. Modern Warfare Online was harder than WaW Zombies in the respect that the enemies weren't leisurely strolling towards you, but I'd rather be blowing the undead to bits, wave after wave, than have a 12-year old American child shouting 'NooB' every 2 seconds and the ever so frequent, 'What the hell dudeeeeeee!?' on my microphone.
Red Dead is kinda clutching at straws for DLC. Great game. Fantastic. No doubt about it. Undead Nightmare might give the franchise a fresh new boost! See how important zombies are!? If you have a fantastic franchise and a game that doesn't give enough, well then add some freakmeats into the mix.
No-one, NO-ONE will ever get tired of zombies. The zombies will get tired before we do.
Richie_Lynot89 on 21 Oct '10 said:
This man is a genius. Make him President. I salute you sir.