Last Night on Earth: The Zombie Game Analysis
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This week my group has been playing through Last Night on Earth: The Zombie Game. A cooperative and competitive experience where one player controls the walking dead and the others attempt to complete their objectives as survivors while staying alive. Random factors contributes to the outcome, both for good and ill, in the form of card decks (Hero and Zombie decks respectively). Strengths and Weaknesses
The game’s weaker points would in general be the balancing of the survivors and zombie forces. When playing, it became difficult to have a well balanced session when we were less than five players as the undead player could always have a dozen undead at his command which made it much more easy for him to corner the living players due to sheer numerical superiority. Even if the survivors could hold the restless horde off they were unable to achieve much in terms of their main objective. In short, due to the low player amount the zombies could overwhelm and keep the survivors restrained because of being able to distribute larger forces to just a pair of players even if spread out. This isn’t an issue when there are more player involved which ensures that the survivor team can still get things done even if some of them are hounded by the restless hordes. However there would seem to be a lack of flexibility when it comes to being able to have a balanced game session with varying amounts of players. The Core System
The game’s core system is made up of the tile based environments through which the players traverse along with their respective miniatures that provide physical representation of their actions. This enables a gameplay that is at its core a movement based system where considering the environment and your surroundings can be critical for your success. It creates a tactical depth with the need to manoeuvre either away from the walking dead or to trap a survivor in a situation where he has no choice but to risk his life. With the use of dices players determine the distance they’re able to traverse as well as their starting positions in the game which can vary greatly. Depending on where you start you might be at an advantage or disadvantage considering the amount of zombies on the map and their current location. While the survivors can move across a great number of tiles the zombies are usually limited to a single tile advancement at a time (with the exception of zombified survivors and special modifier cards). System of Most Interest
The most interesting system of Last Night on Earth is, I’d argue, the character cards and their interaction with the event/item card decks. This functions as a sort of roleplaying element as each survivor is given a Character Badge which basically functions like a profile or character sheet. Each have their own distinct statistics such as a unique amount of Hit Points and special modifiers like voluntary healing. Another contributing factor is the Hero and Zombie deck that have the potential of affecting the characters as it can with the overall game world such as causing a house to be overrun and unusable by the survivors or a particularly potent weapon that can enable a survivor to hold his own against uneven odds. Likewise the Zombie player can greatly benefit from the use of his own deck of cards, with things such as increased combat dices or numerous scenarios that lead to the other players being either wounded, incapacitated or even being turned into the undead thus effectively giving the zombie player a character to control himself. It can however be a double-edged sword at times, as there are certain event cards that cause great inconvenience to the zombies such as severe entropy causing a large portion of his forces to wither away and be discarded. It certainly helps with creating an ever present tension as you’re not certain if the next card you draw will help you or work against you. The fact that many of these cards must be activated immediately doesn’t mitigate this, though it is rather ingenious as it ensures that game-changing events will always occur with or without the player’s approval. Thus keeping everyone on their toes due to the uncertainty made by not letting them have complete control over these events. In a way it’s as if they had a life of their own. This is what in the end makes the game stand out with a great number of scenarios and flavouring to the gameplay. The various characters have their own unique abilities and advantages. This combined with fortunate or unlucky draws from either the Hero Deck or the Zombie Deck can create a significant amount of interesting situations as the players try to get the upper hand by utilising their cards to the maximum effect or revealing hidden ones to catch the opponent(s) off guard. While the character badges provide the basis for the experience, something for each respective player to anchor them into the experience with a character with a distinct playstyle and representation the decks contributes another element of chance into the gameplay. The way this is executed allows for many exciting situations where no one legitimately knows what will happen next, but still giving them enough info so that they aren’t simply stumbling about in the dark. Without these elements balanced between control and chance the game would have just been a movement-based boardgame with some amount of tactical input, but hardly enough to keep you engaged for more than a few rounds. The implementation of personalised characters and modifier cards brings it very distinct, dynamic gameplay. Target Audience Last Night on Earth, while seemingly daunting at first glance, is surprisingly user friendly with a well balanced learning curve that is easily understood after just a few minutes of play. The map gives direct feedback to player actions and the various modifier cards and character badges are simple and easy to understand just by reading through them as you play. The players quickly learn how the decks and badges help enrich the experience rather than complicate things. This game is easy to be picked up by people with little to no experience with conventional boardgames. The age limit may vary, from early teens and above if you want to be on the safe side. The setting and portrayal may not be suitable to minors, though whether or not they can handle such things is up to the respective parents or caretakers. There is no overt focus on gore or explicit imagery to the content beyond commonplace halloween practices, so it might even be served as a suitable family pass time during such holidays (again, up to parent discretion). Apart from that, anyone past their early teens should have an easy time learning the basics and utilise all its elements to the desired effect. It is very reliant on player interaction as well, so it is well suited as an activity during social gatherings of numerous sorts. Conclusion In summary, Last Night on Earth is a relatively simple game that most people shouldn’t have difficulty getting into (provided they aren’t scared away by the seemingly complex structure at first). The tools it provides the players are varying and helps contributing to engaging scenarios as the survivors struggle against the slow but inevitable tide of restless dead. The human element is taken advantage of to its fullest extent, as one player is pitted against the others by controlling the zombie horde. This creates an unpredictable nature to the gameplay further enhanced by the card decks that could alter the situation significantly for either side’s benefit. While in overall balanced, my experience with the game was somewhat mixed, as the first time I played as the undead horde I was basically curb stomped by the survivors who acquired an abundance of powerful weapons and abilities which hindered any advances that I made. It didn’t help that I drew the short straw on my own deck, rarely given anything that could aid me in hindering the other players. As we kept playing more sessions however I could see how the cards helped in keeping the game more tension-filled and providing an exciting twist on encounters without causing irritation. In short, while random factors such as what cards you might receive aren’t always fair they also ensure that everyone will have a chance to get a good streak of progress with the occasional misfortune. In simple terms Last Night on Earth manages to remain a mostly positive experience for the players without anyone having to bite the dust throughout the entire game which would be a very real risk without the random element of the decks. That’s all for now, until next time! Björn Erik Berndtsson. Graphics and Game Design. |
The game’s strengths is mainly seen in the character cards along with the respective hero and zombie decks. With these the player can interact with others in a variety of ways both with resources and combat. It gives the game sessions a great number of possible events and scenarios that can break away from the predictable outcomes in a second’s notice. The element of unpredictability this creates is undoubtedly the catalyst for emerging tension with every round. Both the survivors and the zombie player may have powerful boons that they might utilise at a critical time, which leads to an incentive to use long-term thinking trying to figure out the opponent(s) course of action over several rounds. The way in which the world and setting is presented is also done in a solid manner, with clearly defined tiles and textures that gives you all the necessary information instantly. The way in which it used is also a further contribution to the gameplay, as certain areas allow for starting locations for survivors or spawn points for zombies and depending on where the players end up on the map creates an interesting balance between the players constantly trying to manoeuvre out of the undead horde’s reach while the walking dead try to slowly corner some of them. The physical representation that the map provides help tremendously with visualisation and enables you to understand the context of various events all the more easily.
