Zombies: Undeath and Destruction

ID:29769
 
Apr 20 2007, 11:30 am
Keywords: zombies
The first question that comes to mind when I start thinking about building a zombie game is this: how hard is it to kill a zombie, and how effective are various household objects as implements of zombie destruction?

A zombie was once a human, and so it has the properties of the human body: hard bones, thick flesh, joint cartilage, etc. So, the bodily toughness of the players and their undead assailants ought to be about the same. The primary question to be answered is what it takes to stop a zombie from being dangerous.

I ask these questions of myself: How much damage can a zombie really do to a person? At what point should a zombie stop being a threat? Should blowing a zombie's head off make the zombie stop attacking?


A zombie bites through the back of a victim's neck in order to sever their spinal cord.

I think zombies should be strong. They should not be able to move quite as fast or as agilely as the living, but they should move in a motivated fashion and desperately grab onto their victims once they are within distance. Once latched on, they should throw punches, bite, scratch, gouge eyes, and otherwise employ the worst of deadly fighting tactics to bring their opponent down. When zombies have beaten and surrounded a victim, they bash the living victim's head wide open so that they can gorge on brains and blood.

This is in contrast to the view of zombies that I have seen in some movies: slow-moving, unmotivated, launching ineffective attacks at opponents.

The next area I'm interested in deals with zombie destruction. It is a well-known fact that a shotgun is a good way to deal with zombies. However, some others seem questionable.

If you have a pistol, what is it going to do to a zombie? Against living foes, it's great - putting a hole in somebody is sure to mess up the bloodstream, and possibly cause an affected organ to fail. However, what if anything should it do to a zombie? Zombies don't need blood or a beating heart or a working brain, do they?

It seems to me that the ideal way to stop a zombie is to make him less dangerous, and less mobile. This starts Holy Grail-style by chopping off arms and legs. Removal or heavy damage to the zombie's head should disorient the zombie, either causing it to stall in action or causing it to charge and flail wildly in random directions.

A shotgun can blow off an arm or leg or head. This makes it a good zombie-killing tool. A big knife can remove limbs as well. I hate to ask, but does anybody have any idea how hard it is to remove a limb from a body? Can it be done in a hurry? A sword would be better yet. I personally believe that the ultimate zombie-killing weapon would be a katana, allowing its wielder to quickly remove limbs from attacking zombies. An automatic rifle might also be quite effective, allowing you to essentially rip a zombie in two.

So, where does that leave household items? Each house generally has a few big knives. A baseball bat could break bones or smash heads, doing a fair job at disabling zombies. Chairs and table legs can act as similar bludgeoning weapons. Many households have chainsaws, which while not being very easy to wield, can presumably dismember a zombie pretty well.

Reader, tell me what you would use to kill zombies if you were put in the situation. Tell me what you think it ought to take in terms of physical strength, time, and skill. Could you personally take on two zombies at once? How about five? Could your sister take on a zombie? How about your mom, or your grandpa? Do you think that each zombie after the first would get progressively easier to kill, given the practical experience that you would gain?

For martial artists in the audience: do you think that you could actually dismember a person if it came right down to it? Could you break so many bones that an assailant wouldn't be able to grasp you? Can you effectively break the legs of others using kicks that do not harm your own legs?

These things I want to know. Help me out here -- I want to make the most mechanically realistic damn zombie game BYOND (and the world!) has ever seen.

Creative Commons credit for zombie pic: j.lee43's Flickr photostream - picture here
Apr 20 2007, 11:37 am (Edited on Apr 20 2007, 11:46 am)
Limbs are pretty well connected. Doctors have to saw them off, so removing a limb would probably require a saw, or an extremely sharp blade. Which wouldn't stay sharp very long. Maybe a couple of swings with an axe. This would give both the cutting and driving force. It is probably easyer to take of a zombies head, than its arms or legs.

I think the best way to kill a zombie is with a cricket bat.

Also, can people become zombies in your game? In that picture, the zombie is trying to break the spinal column That would paralize a person, and I would think it would do the same to a zombie also. I tend to believe that if zombies were once human then they still operate basically the same way humans do. Meaning that the brain is still a vital part of their body. Also, can zombies be poisoned? How about feed them some bleach or something.

I don't know just random ideas.
Apr 20 2007, 11:46 am
Drumersl wrote:
Limbs are pretty well connected. Doctors have to saw them off, so removing a limb would probably require a saw, or an extremely sharp blade. Which wouldn't stay sharp very long. Maybe a couple of swings with an axe. This would give both the cutting and driving force. It is probably easyer to take of a zombies head, than its arms or legs.

I think the best way to kill a zombie is with a cricket bat.

I guess that all comes down to how old the corpse is. A 100-year old corpse will have rotten, half-deteriorated bones, which would be much much easier to break than those of a 10-day old corpse.

EDIT: Just do what Frank does in Dead Rising: slap a bucket on their heads.
Apr 20 2007, 11:48 am
And an older corpse would probably be slower and not as determined.
Apr 20 2007, 11:53 am
Bleach and household chemicals are an interesting idea. You might be able to take a zombie down by pouring Drain-O MAX Foam down its throat, no? An axe is also a pretty good consideration for a weapon. It provides lots of bludgeoning force at the least, and has cleaving potential beyond that.
Apr 20 2007, 12:02 pm
Well, it all depends on what type of zombie you're going for. The general belief is that they're dead, which means stiffening muscles (slows them down) and no cellular regeneration (and since muscles break down during usage...)

Now, the head is generally believed to the only remaining organ that functions while zombified, which is why people tend to stray toward blunt and accurate projectile weapons. They need a weak spot, otherwise it just doesn't make any sense. There should be some center of control (e.g. the brain) that tells the zombie "Hey! you're not actually dead. Now eat that person!" The only exception of this I could think of was that if the entirety of your insides are liquefied and turned into some kind of cell that handles both movement and thought.

If you want a Zombie game that follows somewhat of a more "logical" approach, I suggest you pick up a copy of The Zombie Survival Guide. (Check out "Know your Enemy" on the menu)

Also, sound effects are a must for the ambiance of horror (And not random ones that can just be shrugged off, they need to hint at your impending doom.)
Apr 20 2007, 12:26 pm
I think, for the most part, you should have different zombies, to mix it up a bit. You can have zombies with the same hp and speed as the player. You can have some zombies twice as fast as the player, but half the hp, ect. Also, you should make EVERYTHING be able to used as a weapon. From an automatic rifle, to blunt objects, to other items for comic reasons. Also, there should be different music that gets louder and scarier as the gravity of the situation increases. If there are only a few zombies in a 18 tile radious, theres quiet, mildly scary music. If theres a swarm of zombies, you have loud scary music. A bar that shows using text strings the amount of zombies around you. Notice I said text strings. A few zombies, you have a small blue bar, the rest of the bar is transparent, and it says "Pretty Safe", and eventually, when you have more than 40 zombies in an 18 tile radious, you have "OH SH*T!!!!", ect. There should also be doors that can lock and unlock, windows to be broken, and stuff that can be used, such as desks, that have their own hp value, to barricade stuff with... for a while. The zombies start attacking the stuff, and its hp decreases, and eventually breaks. There should also be a way to turn lights on and off, and have a small building close to the main area that has the main power supply to the building, that the zombies can get into and turn off the power if not guarded well enough. If your character is a SWAT member or someone sent to take care of the outbreak, you can have a radio that allows you to call a helicopter that is on standby, and you pay money for an item of your choice, and the helicopter drops it in a random spot in a 3 tile radius, and not on top of you, after a 15-30 second delay.
Apr 20 2007, 12:42 pm
I've always been a big fan of making zombies, skeletons, and other forms of the undead into things that can completely kick your ass. If you've ever seen the Palace Guards in The Mummy, that's one of my opinions.

Zombie movies are one thing, but in a medieval society, do you really think someone would go through the trouble of playing around with demons and giving up their mortal soul just so they could have shambling mounds of flesh that can do little more than groan like constipated old men? If you imagine just how much magic goes into raising the dead, it's not much of a stretch to imagine that that magic gives them extraordinary powers of mobility and strength, even beyond that of mortal men. Worse, because they are being controlled like puppets by hostile spirits instead of being directly possessed, they feel no pain and thus the only actual way to stop a zombie once and for all is to destroy the brain, because once the brain is destroyed, the puppeteer spirit has nowhere to link up to and the body slumps dead (for purposes of gameplay, I assume that the spinal cord can't be directly tapped -- that the puppeteer has to transmit "orders" to the brain and the brain then transmits nervous signals by interpreting those orders).

My idea of balance is that it should take at least three armed, trained soldiers to kill a single zombie. Half of that factor comes in because the zombie cannot be stopped by pain or injury. If you break a zombie's leg, it just keeps coming on its one good leg. The other half comes in because of the zombie's skillfulness and strength.
Apr 20 2007, 12:48 pm
Those are some interesting ideas, Spade486. However, they don't fit very well with my vision for the game.

I want it to be starkly realistic. No music, no SWAT technology, no helicopters on standby to deliver supplies to you.

Basically, here's how I want it to play out: your family is in your house when zombies attack. Your objective is to keep as many family member alive as possible and to evacuate them from the city. You get extra points for rescuing friends, pets, etc... but the longer you wait, the more numerous the zombies become, and the harder it will be to escape alive.
Apr 20 2007, 6:56 pm
The problem is zombies aren't realistic. Cool yes, but also completely antithetical to real biological and physical knowledge. The are pure fantasy- they combine primal fears of death and being devoured and put a human face on it. So, they have arbitrary limits.

In your game, zombies act as a sort of timer. Worrying too much about explanations isn't a big deal- just balance it out. So maybe knives are very common, but get you close to zombies and aren't terribly effective (better than bare hands!) whereas shotguns do great damage at fair range but require ammo.

JT: My view is that shambling dead make great fodder. Even better, they are limitless and seem to take little effort to raise. So a skilled necromancer can call up hordes of the dead, which are terrifying to most people (even if the dead have little actual combat prowess) and can subjugate even superior forces thanks to his inexhaustible minions. More powerful dead tend to exhibit more free will (vampires, ghosts, etc.) and so make good antagonists for hero types, but would be just as fussy to control as any other skilled individual (ambition, rivalries, questioning, etc.). Probably worse because they do not fear death!

A skilled soldier could probably kill a "typical" zombie in a well placed shot. But most people aren't skilled soldiers. And zombies don't tend to come one at a time. The whole terror isn't the individual threat, it's the endless horde. No matter how many you shoot, you will run out of bullets. No matter how hard you fight, you will tire. And they will be waiting for you.
Apr 21 2007, 5:21 pm
Here's my take: Zombies are basically just animated corpses, and by animated, I mean puppets of some external force. (in fantasy games, usually some sort of magic) I'm not such a fan of the whole "scientifically explained" deal when it comes to things like dragons, vampires, and zombies. To me, zombies aren't powered by their own bodies. The bodies provide the physical support, but if you blow a zombies head off, it's still got a body to attack you with. Likewise, if you hack it in two, that same force may still inhabit both pieces.

It all depends on how YOU want zombies to work, and you can factor how you want your game to play into that. From what I've gathered so far, the victory in your game is simply escaping alive, not "defeating the zombie menace". In this case, it might be better to just do the Quake thing "You cannot kill that which is already dead, but you can blow it to chunky kibbles". I think more of your gameplay and improvised items should focus more on blockading and retarding the zombies rather than "killing" them. The goal will be to get out.

Another thing you want to consider is how people became zombies, and what it takes for zombies to turn other people into more zombies. In a lot of movies, it's just a bite. In "Stubbs the Zombie" you actually had to eat their brain.

To go along with the theme of your game. You might consider other factors to include, like morale and energy. Just more things for people to keep track of in their effort to survive.

Anyways, it's late and I have a baby goat to take care of.
Apr 21 2007, 8:40 pm
Jmurph wrote:
JT: My view is that shambling dead make great fodder.

If you're making a zombie game, specifically, then yeah, zombies should be slow because that's the whole point of a zombie game -- a relentless horde. But in the case where there are plenty of other nasties to go around, such as in your typical Fantasy Journey Adventure Quest Game, I think the undead should be reserved for the rarest of rarities. There's a reason why zombies are only mentioned occasionally in classical literature, and usually only in books of the occult... if they were that easy to raise, we'd have many more accounts of them, in non-occult literature.

If you're looking for fodder-based enemies to throw at the player, I tend to look no further than the living human race. Bandits come by the bowlful and there are plenty of evil men who can be hired for any price.
Apr 22 2007, 1:06 pm
While reading your post, DerDragon, I got the idea that perhaps zombies that are knocked down should take a round or two to get back up. This makes heavy objects that can knock a zombie over or tactics that cause a charging zombie to trip and tumble quite useful, since it buys your group enough time to grab something useful and run.

I am averse to your idea of super-strong zombies, Jtgibson, because they basically give the poor guys of my game no chance for survival. In a different game, with many more resources available to the player, I would definitely consider making zombies really strong. I like the idea of monsters being very difficult for the average person to avoid.

I want to balance my game such that it is difficult almost to the point of impossibility to escape with all of your group still alive. I want to force the player to make difficult choices about who to save, etc. I think the horror will be greatly enhanced by having to make decisions like sacrificing your son to a horde of approaching zombies in order to save the rest of your family.
Apr 22 2007, 1:34 pm
In a "zombie game", zombies should have a lot in common with the Romero class of undead, because anything more than that would in fact be unsurvivable. There's a level of obvious gameplay balance which has to come into play. I was referring more to the general case, where you're playing a fantasy game or a game which doesn't feature zombies centrally... in those cases, I think zombies should be nothing but stone cold killers in both the literal and figurative sense.
Apr 22 2007, 3:59 pm
Zombies have the properties of the humans that made them except.

1) The brain survives as its own organism, the rest of the body is meaningless. This gives them unending stamina, they don't fatigue nor feel pain. The only way to kill a zombie is by destroying the brain.

2) Zombies speed is hindered, they move at roughly 1/4 MPH since the body is deceased. Zombies don't have eye-hand coordination so they cannot climb ladders or anything, and they don't think so they can't forumlate strategies or learn through trial and error. Think of a computer with one program (this case is to feed) and only that program on an infinite loop. They also cannot swim nor do they need to breathe.

If you want the info on making a zombie game, I suggest reading "The Zombie Survival Guide" by Max Brooks.
Apr 23 2007, 11:43 am
Well, that's only one opinion on zombies... and a cliché one at that. I'm just trying to broaden everyone's horizons. ;-)
May 4 2007, 2:00 pm
1. All weapons/items should be able to be modified in order to achieve greater effectiveness. Items could undergo different types of modifications to increase that effectiveness in different ways. The items would have a base damage that could be increased i.e putting a spike into a board. Similarly, they could be modified to make them more user-friendly to the players. A shotgun is a good anti-zombie weapon but it is also bulky and awkward to maneuver in tight quarters. The stock and/or barrel could be sawn off to make it a more compact weapon but it will have more drawbacks. With the lack of a stock, the gun may be more difficult to aim and fire. Also, with only half of a barrel, the shot will have a larger spread and will affect general accuracy and damage(because more pellets aren't hitting the target).

2. The players should have to worry not only about the zombie hordes trying to devour them, but also about other living people in their environment. Panicked people think less rationally than when they are calm and so they should act accordingly. The players' neighbor may kill one of your family members in order to save himself or a member of his own family.
May 4 2007, 8:16 pm
Pirate, you probably don't know this, but Basilar is Dave :)

I gave him a heads up on your idea, because I figured he could give some good ideas (which he did!).

Let me know if you have any further progress on this, I'm very interested.
May 12 2007, 5:00 pm
The >first< questoin is: What IS a zombie?
From there, you can define its attittude and conduct.

I personally believe I could take on a zombie, if I had a knife or something like that.

As the weapon, I'd obviously get some perfumes/whatever and some lighter, and throw flames at a zombie (assuming they DO feel pain). And, even if they don't feel pain, The rotten flesh (if it is rotten, of course. :P) would just... you know, "fall off" the body.

Also, another... "point": just how big is the damage made by the zombies? I've read PirateHead's post which said that he wanted players to make hard decisions and stuff like that. If I were to make a Zombie >SURVIVAL< game, I would make the virus easy to expand and affect players. That would make players alert 100% of the time, since the minimal mistake could infect you to death.

Anything else? Hum...
May 12 2007, 5:14 pm
Many Romero-style zombies feature some sort of premise where the actual zombification isn't explained -- it just happens and everyone is worse for wear because of it. Usually, however, infection is a big element of risk. If you get bitten by a zombie, you will die of the zombie virus and then come back as a zombie. If you die of other causes, you will get infected post mortem and come back as a zombie. The only solution is not to die. Easier said than done. =)