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Foreword
What you are about to read is an analysis of a board game. The analysis will be structured in such a way that it will be easy to follow. It will begin with an introduction and then carry on with a basic look at what the game is followed with a listing of mechanics and explanations; then a list of the good and the bad followed by target audience and conclusions. Each subject matter that is touched on and explained in different parts of the text will be in bold letters.
Try to enjoy your read.
Introduction
We were assigned the task of analyzing a board game of our choice. The assignment requires us to take a look at, and explain, the core system and mechanics of the game.
Last Night on Earth
Last Night on Earth is a board game for up to six players in which the humans take on hordes of zombies in attempt to complete various objectives. The game ends if the humans have completed their objective or if the zombies stop them or if time runs out.
Let’s take a closer look at the mechanics.
Heroes
The players who are playing as humans are handed out Character Cards. These cards shows which character the player will play as, which type of character it is, how much health they have, their special abilities and their starting location.
Scenarios
The game offers multiple scenarios to mix up the game and possibly make it more challenging for both parties. The scenarios range from killing 15 zombies to saving the townsfolk and escape in a truck.
Zombies
The players who play zombies are handed a total of 14 zombies. Their job is to hinder the humans of reaching their goal. Unlike the humans the zombies can move through walls of buildings in order to surround the enemy.
Sun Track
The Sun Track is how you keep track on turns and when the game ends. The game can be as long as 20 turns but this completely depends on what scenario you are playing.
Hero Cards
The Hero Cards can be drawn by human players within buildings in the shape of a search action. These cards can house many different things the players may need in order to complete their objective. There are different types of Hero Cards and they are grouped up in two categories; item and ability. In the item category you may find weapons; ranged and melee, keys to unlock doors, gasoline, explosives, first aid kits etc. In the ability category you may find cards that will buff you or teammates, cards to cancel out zombie actions, cards to add more dices in to play etc.
Zombie Cards
The Zombie Cards are drawn at the start of each turn by the zombie players. These cards give the zombie players special abilities to ruin the human’s progression.
Game Space
The game board is divided into 5 pieces; a square middle piece and four L-shaped corner pieces. The middle piece can be a grass plane or a mansion; this depends on the scenario that is in play. The game is shipped with six L-shaped board pieces; these house different buildings which can be needed depending on which characters the players start with. On each L-shaped piece there is an X; this is the spawn points for the zombies. The game board is divided into a grid.
Movement
The zombies can only move one square per turn unless they play a card that says otherwise. They can move through walls to surround enemy players. The humans can move a D6 per turn. To move into buildings they must move through an open door.
Combat
When a human enters a square with a zombie or a zombie enters a square with a human combat will commence. The human player rolls two dice and the zombie player rolls one die for each zombie within the square. Highest roll wins. If the dice rolls are tied the zombie wins (unless the player has an item that overrides it); the human is wounded. If the human rolls the highest the human wins but nothing happens. If the human wins the roll and rolls two of the same the zombie will die.
Advanced Play
The game can be played in two different “settings”; Normal Play and Advanced Play. Advanced play adds more mechanics and cards to the decks.
Zombie Heroes
In Advanced Play the zombie players can play cards in order to turn a human hero into a zombie. The human heroes can move a D3 per turn. They also have as much health as the human hero had according to the Character Card. When a human hero is turned into a zombie a Zombie Hero token is placed under the hero’s game piece. If a zombie hero loses in a combat where a zombie usually dies he only loses one health.
A Turn
The Zombie players always begin the new turn.
Zombie Turn
At the beginning of each turn the player makes sure they have four zombie cards at hand. If they have more than four cards some cards must be discarded. After they have drawn new cards they roll two dice to see how many zombies they may spawn this turn. During the first turn at start of the game the player must place out the exact amount of zombies as the dice value describes. The following rounds the player must roll a higher value than the amount of zombies that are already in play in order to spawn new zombies; the player will spawn the difference. The zombies must be equally divided on all spawn points.
When the player moves their zombies they may only move them one square per turn. If a human player is in an adjacent square of the zombie the zombie must move into the same square.
At the end of the zombie turn combat takes place.
Human Turn
At the beginning of the human turn the player may choose to move or to search the room; they may roll a die to see how far they can move before they decide if they want to search or move. If the player decides to move and there is a zombie blocking their way they must deal with the zombie before moving on. If they, instead of moving, decide to search the room they may draw one Hero Card; if the player plays as Jake Cartwright they may draw an extra card and choose between the two.
After the move and search action the player may shoot a range weapon if they have one. At the end of their turn combat will take place.
The Good, the Bad and the Brrraaaainnnnssss
The Good
The game is quite easy to get a hang of and it only takes a few moments to almost fully understand the game play. The game is a lot of fun and I find it especially fun to play as zombies since you get so much freedom on where to move and how to play out your strategy. The game doesn’t take an awful long time to play and can frankly said end whenever depending on how much luck the players have in their card draws and dice rolls.
The game is shipped with a soundtrack CD.
The Bad
The zombies can feel a bit overpowered at times since they have cards that can, frankly said, completely screw the humans over.
The game is to a big part based on luck. You cannot really be good at rolling dice or draw cards.
The soundtrack is really bad.
Target Group
When it comes to gender and age groups a think this game is probably target towards boys at the age of 14 to the age of 25.
The game seems to be targeted towards people who like bad zombie B-movies and people who like zombies in general. The “zombie culture” is rather huge considering how many damn zombie survival games are available on the digital game market today.
Conclusion
Figuring out what the core mechanic or core system in this game was quite tricky since this game has so many different components that all need each other. After a lot of discussing and arguing and debating I think I have been able to pin it down. I would say that the core mechanic of this game is the relation between the dices and the hero- and zombie cards. I would argue that these two things are the heart of the game. These make the game interesting and they move the game forward.
What do you do on each turn? Well, you roll dice and draw and play cards. Everything relates to the dice and cards in some way. You roll dice to move. You roll dice to fight. You roll dice to make decisions. You draw cards to find items. You play cards to move forward. You play cards to roll dice. You roll dice to decide actions on cards. Everything comes down to the dice and cards no matter you turn it.
The most interesting system to me is the zombie movement system; this might be because I like to play Zombies so much. The zombie movement system allows for some quite interesting strategies and tactics with the ability to move through walls and being able to move in all the zombies on one player to give you a greater chance of winning; even though this also creates a higher risk to lose all the zombies if the player wins; high risk, high reward. This game can take the most amazing turns and even though it seems like the zombies are about to win the humans can strike out in luck and completely change the course of the game.
I would highly recommend this game to anyone and everyone because this is one of the most enjoyable games I have played in a long time.
Thanks for reading.
Tally-ho!
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