I guess it's hard to come up with ideas without knowing what type of Zombies they are...

There's the undead zombies, slow moving half decayed brain eating kind... yet somehow they don't eat each other. I always found that weird.

There's the infested, parasite, kind that can pretty much be anything. They can get their infestation from aliens, viruses, or the occult... or anything really if you start going into the fantasy world.

There's also the insane kind which isn't really a zombie, just makes you go mad. Sort of like 28 Days later... so they can still be fast runners if need be.

You could take the route of the bodysnatcher story. Let the zombies really be aliens, occult, or some other society that replaces people. After the realization that his happened, a war broke out but it quickly ended as most of the "zombies" won. (this could also just happen in an isolated area.) One last attempt by the remaining humans resulted in a decaying body state where the snatchers merely looked zombieish. Although, they could really be decaying which is why they constantly need new and fresh bodies to replenish themselves.

Or

you can go the route of a virus that has been let out, it didn't really turn people into zombies, but again, like the above, gave them the appearance and mindset of maybe at least the faster '28 days later' kind. They act like this as everyone is desperate for relief, the virus plays with their head a little bit. Meanwhile the "big organization" controls the small population that isn't infected or at least is "cured" as they control the cure to begin with. Can also lead the story into this corp is the one that purposely let the virus out, maybe at a time they didn't intend, but they indended to at some point.



Anyway, some thoughts.

This is a zombie story line I would love to see:
Before the game starts, the protagonist goes crazy and starts hallucinating that everyone are zombies (you don't know this until the end of the game).
Protagonist merrily goes about his way, killing all the "zombies" he finds, because zombies suck, right?
At the end of the game the protagonist realizes that hes just crazy, and that there are no zombies. And that he/she just killed an entire town full of innocent people, preferably with chainsaws and lots of other especially gruesome zombie game/movie cliches.

I think this would make a great game. Or maybe I just have issues.

Sadly every idea summing up the creation of zombies has been used at least 20 times. I do like the ideas where the zombies aren't actually undead, just crazed and zombie looking. They seem slightly more origanal than the parasite, virus infected, risen-from-the-dead ideas.

I remember an idea where the main character and his friend are hit with a mind influencing toxin. It makes them see everyone else as zombies and think they are infected while truthfully it is him. Don't know if you could put that into a video game though.

Oh and don't worry Driv3MeFar, we all want to play as someone crazy who kills innocents with gruesome weapons every once in a while. If we didn't why would the Grand Theft Autos sell so well.

Quote: Original post by Driv3MeFar
This is a zombie story line I would love to see:
Before the game starts, the protagonist goes crazy and starts hallucinating that everyone are zombies (you don't know this until the end of the game).
Protagonist merrily goes about his way, killing all the "zombies" he finds, because zombies suck, right?
At the end of the game the protagonist realizes that hes just crazy, and that there are no zombies. And that he/she just killed an entire town full of innocent people, preferably with chainsaws and lots of other especially gruesome zombie game/movie cliches.

I think this would make a great game. Or maybe I just have issues.

I had a dream of this exact event. The part where I realised I had just slaughted everyone I started to decend into madness. Thankfully at this point I woke up.

I do admit the scare factor of zombies has diminished somewhat. I don't believe that there have been many type 2 occult / possessed zombie movies or games lately so that could be a start.

My personal favourite zombies are the alien infection / The Flood or similar. I like the idea that they are acting in a way to spread the virus or infection and eventually they grow into something worse or the alien's true form.

Personally, I would like to see less of the science zombie (virus, mutation, experiment, etc) and more of the supernatural types which can't be killed except by burning to a crisp! At best you would slow them down by chopping/shooting and watch the severed hand or glop of flesh crawl towards you (or perhaps reform). That would make it more frightening, for me. Something unnatural controlling these zombies to seek out the living. Why not make them specific for humans and kill for malice against living people, not simply food? A few zombies walk by, they won't touch animals, just amber towards you.... creepy.

Ugh... the zombie genre is crowded, but here is my 2 cents....
You're the only uninfected person in a quarantined city full of crazed "zombie" like people. Luckily, youre also a top notch science guy and have been working on an antidote from your lab. You've found a cure! You're able to cure your smoking hot female assistant as a test and together you make as much of the antidote as possible from what you have on hand. You whip up a batch with enough doses to cure 50 people (I'll keep in in round numbers for sake of argument). Now you have to make your way out the city. Only you cant do it with just the 2 of you. You have neither the skills, the munitions, nor the knowlege you need to make it out alive. So you have to pick and choose carefully who you cure, for they may have a skill set or knowledge to help you escape, but they may also try to hinder your escape to save themselves (insert diabloical selfish plot point here!) The first few people you meet and cure are going to advise you on who is next that you are going to need to find and cure. There are also going to be people who are of no use to you at all the people who you get to kill. If cured, they will be gracious an maybe offer you some kind words, or cower in fear and go hide in a closet. You just wasted a dose. Basically, if you see 10 guys in white shirts and Randy the Mechanic in his red baseball cap and blue coveralls.... well, you'll more than likely cave in the heads of the fodder and cure Randy. Plus, not only do you have to find the infected people of interest, but you have to isolate them from the rest of the "Zombies" to cure them. Besides you and the assistant, you can take 4 other people with you as you search. That way you have to swap out people in order to complete certain tasks in a skill managemnet portion of the game. The rest stay at the "rendevous point", where ultimately, you and the rest of the people you cured will try to make an escape via the tour bus or some other escapee cliche'. All in all, if you get 50 doses, maybe you need 35 people of interest to finish the game easily, 25 will get it done, but not as easily, and maybe 15 as the magic low number of "primary" cure characters needed to complete the game. With this formula, its not, "Why are we here?", its "How do we get the hell out of here?", with some zombie smashing included in the mix.

[Edited by - AdamC on March 5, 2007 10:19:55 AM]

That seems like a very sweet idea, though it seems to deviate a lot from the OP's original intent. It seems like more of a strategic thinking game than a zombie survival horror game.

Quote: Original post by AdamC
Ugh... the zombie genre is crowded, but here is my 2 cents....
You're the only uninfected person in a quarantined city full of crazed "zombie" like people. Luckily, youre also a top notch science guy and have been working on an antidote from your lab. You've found a cure! You're able to cure your smoking hot female assistant as a test and together you make as much of the antidote as possible from what you have on hand. You whip up a batch with enough doses to cure 50 people (I'll keep in in round numbers for sake of argument). Now you have to make your way out the city. Only you cant do it with just the 2 of you. You have neither the skills, the munitions, nor the knowlege you need to make it out alive. So you have to pick and choose carefully who you cure, for they may have a skill set or knowledge to help you escape, but they may also try to hinder your escape to save themselves (insert diabloical selfish plot point here!) The first few people you meet and cure are going to advise you on who is next that you are going to need to find and cure. There are also going to be people who are of no use to you at all the people who you get to kill. If cured, they will be gracious an maybe offer you some kind words, or cower in fear and go hide in a closet. You just wasted a dose. Basically, if you see 10 guys in white shirts and Randy the Mechanic in his red baseball cap and blue coveralls.... well, you'll more than likely cave in the heads of the fodder and cure Randy. Plus, not only do you have to find the infected people of interest, but you have to isolate them from the rest of the "Zombies" to cure them. Besides you and the assistant, you can take 4 other people with you as you search. That way you have to swap out people in order to complete certain tasks in a skill managemnet portion of the game. The rest stay at the "rendevous point", where ultimately, you and the rest of the people you cured will try to make an escape via the tour bus or some other escapee cliche'. All in all, if you get 50 doses, maybe you need 35 people of interest to finish the game easily, 25 will get it done, but not as easily, and maybe 15 as the magic low number of "primary" cure characters needed to complete the game. With this formula, its not, "Why are we here?", its "How do we get the hell out of here?", with some zombie smashing included in the mix.

A similar idea was used in the shitty PS2 game Obscure. It's a pretty interresting idea though.

Make it so in fact the zombies are only an hallucination and at the end your character wakes up to this reality : he has been killing innocent people all the time and he suicide. Victoly!

The background story starts with you, accepting to test a new vaccine against some common virus (flu or AIDS or something).

One day you find the whole city infested by zombies (ack!). After a few levels or something like that of survival, you end up in the lab of the doctor who was testing you with an apparently harmless vaccine.

But when you read his notes, you find that he on intent was testing a new virus, that was tested on YOU. Through the game you find other notes (perhaps at the homes of his assistants?), and you find out that that which has turned people zombies, are yourself! But you find that the virus in contagious if something comes in contact with your raw flesh, so throwing yourself in the zombies won't work, and the game ends when you jump from a cliff, in front of a train or something like that, and the people are cured.

Perhaps then as a closing movie see a rat hanging out around your body, potential Game 2 :).

My suggestion.