Zombie Dice
2-99
10+
10+
Eat brains. Don't get shotgunned.
You are a zombie. You want braaains. More brains than any of your zombie buddies.
Zombie Dice is fun for any zombie fan (or the whole zombie family). The 13 custom dice are your victims. Push your luck to eat their brains, but stop before the shotgun blasts end your turn!
It's a great quick game. Play it at lunch (braaiiiiiins!) or while you're in line for a zombie movie . . . !
Two or more can play. Each game takes 10 to 20 minutes, and can be taught in a single round.
images © Steve Jackson Games
Add a Review for "Zombie Dice"
You must be logged in to add a review.
Zombie Dice, by Steve Jackson Games, is a push your luck dice rolling game in which the players are zombies attempting to munch down on some delicious, juicy brains! The only issue is that the owners of said brains aren’t too keen on donating to your lunch plans and are busy either running away or bearing shotguns to blow your rotting head from your zombie shoulders! The first player to gather and chew on 13 brains wins, but only if the dice are lucky for you!
The game comes with thirteen dice, six green, four yellow and three red each of which have three icon on them, in varying number.
Brains – Three on the green dice, two on the yellow and one on the red.
Feet – Two on the green dice, Two on the yellow and two on the red.
Gun shots – One on the green dice, two on the yellow and three on the red.
During a players turn you take three dice at random from the tube (or dice bag which we have found better, especially for those such as myself with dinner plate hands and sausage fingers!!!) and roll them. For each brain rolled the player puts those dice aside until the end of the turn, feet are kept and rolled again as the victim has run out of reach….. for now, and shotgun blasts are kept along with the brains. Any runners are gathered up and a new dice are taken to make up a hand of three and rolled again, and so on and so on until either three gunshots are collected whereby your head has been blown clean off and all brains rolled that turn are lost, the player decides to stop rolling and all brains are added to the players total or a player reaches 13 brains and stops thereby winning the game.
This is where the “push your luck” element of the game comes in. When faced with needing only two brains to win, but having two gunshots already, do you take the chance and roll again risking a shot and losing any brains not yet scored or do you take your brains and hope none of the other players get a lucky break?
This is a brilliant filler game and recommended for a cool down period between bigger games on a full gaming day, or simply as a quick gaming burst when time doesn’t allow larger games.
I give Zombie Dice a 10/10. For what it is, a filler game, it delivers gameplay and replay value in spades and anyone can learn it in seconds, so much so that both of my children have played and loved it!
EXPANSION TIME!!!!!
Zombie Dice 2 – Double Feature
This small expansion adds three dice to Zombie dice as replacements for the regular dice and come in two different flavours…..
Part 1 – Big Summer Action Movie.
Two new dice are added in place of two of the yellow dice, the Hunk is a new white dice featuring a double brain in place of a single and a double shot in place of a single.
The Hottie is a pink dice which has three feet (in heels) one shot and one brain, making her hard to catch than a regular victim.
The unique rule for these two victims is that if you have caught one of them and the other shoots you they can rescue each other and return to the bag!
Part 2 – Santa meets the Zombies.
Replacing a green dice this part adds a solid red die with new icons.
The dice represents Mr Claus himself and he is just as much a victim as any other person in the game, but he may survive yet as he also brings presents!
Along with a gunshot, feet and a brain (Santa’s own head candy!) we have a double brain as Santa has brought you a yummy double helping, an American football helmet making you a “Tough Zombie” which enables you to withstand an extra gunshot before falling and an energy drink which makes you a “Fast Zombie” and enabling you to convert any running feet into brains as they aren’t quite fast enough to avoid you now.
Out of the two expansions the “Santa meets the Zombies” is the better of the two as it adds more to the game as the hero and the hottie do but all in all they are a fantastic addition to a brilliant game and if you have, you need the other! The beard so declares!!
For pictures and more reviews visit beardplaysgames.blogspot.co.uk
Have you ever had 5 minutes of spare time and nothing to do? Of course you have! Now, with the help of these colorful dice, a score pad and pen and a friend (or more), you can become a brain devouring zombie! Let the fun begin!
Zombie Dice comes with a number of black dice with brains, star shaped shotgun bursts and a side showing a foot trail (in three different colors- red (rare), yellow(uncommon) and green(common)) . Each round, players roll three dice to try to get as many brains as possible. Brains are set to the left and shotgun bursts are set to the right. Get three shotgun bursts and your turn is over. The foot trails are humans escaping your Brain-eating wrath! After making your initial roll, provided you don’t roll all shotgun bursts, you get to roll again.
Now, here is the sneaky thing about Zombie dice – the game is basically a game of luck vs greed! Each roll, you get three dice at random from the cup. If you have luck on your side, you can amass a large number of brains quickly. To win the whole game, you only need 13 brains, so the tendency is to roll and keep rolling! Unfortunately, it’s really easy to roll three shotgun bursts! So easy, in fact, that you can have amassed a large number of brains only to have them all taken away by one unlucky roll of the dice!
There is a little bit of strategy here. Will you be slow and cautious, rolling until you have 4 or five brains and stop when it’s safe? Do you try to push the envelope and go for just one more roll? What is great luck one second can be undone a second later!
There are two expansions available for this game and this, the base game cost under $10.00 at my local Wal-Mart. There are also score pads, dice bags and even t-shirts for people who fall in love with the game!
So, how does it stack up to Cthulhu Dice? Personally, although I love Cthulhu games in general, Zombie Dice is faster, easier and better for multiple plays. My wife and I love two player games and although you can play Cthulhu Dice two player, each player has to play 2 hands which my wife doesn’t like. With Zombie Dice, you can easily play Best Out Of 5 games and you don’t feel like its time wasted! Overall, a great game with little time or monetary commitment!
Steve Jackson has a knack for making some really catchy and fun games. I’d include this game in that discussion. The game is simple and easy to learn, and you can play it in about 5-10 minutes.
In this game, you are a zombie hungry for tasty, juicy brains. The dice you roll are people you are chasing. Start the game by grabbing three dice from the cup. Roll them, and if any brain symbols appear, keep them to one side. If there are shotgun symbols, you get shot, and put that to the other side. If there are footprint symbols, keep them in front of you as well. If you want to roll again, that die will be re-rolled along with more dice from the cup (you always roll three dice).
The first person to eat at least 13 brains begins the final round. Everyone else has a chance to surpass the first person to reach 13 brains. The one with the most brains at the end of that round wins!
You can keep rolling dice until you decide to stop, but once you pull more dice from the cup, you have to roll, so be careful! If you decide to stop, count the number of brains you have and add them to your score. If you want to keep going and you total 3 shotgun symbols, your turn is over, and any brains you had collected do not count…bummer!
This game includes 13 dice – 6 green, 4 yellow, and 3 red – and a cup to store them. The colors represent the ‘difficulty’ of the die. Green is easy, red is hard. What differentiates the difficulty is that there are more shotgun symbols and less brain symbols on the red dice (3 shotgun, 1 brain) than on the green (3 brain, one shotgun). The yellow dice contain two shotgun symbols and two brain symbols. Every dice contains two footprint symbols.
Component-wise, there isn’t much to it, but the dice are very well made. They feel heavy and sturdy in your hand, and I’d go so far as to say that if you’re making a game with dice, this should be the quality of dice to use. The instructions are short and simple, and everything fits nicely into a cup. My biggest critique is that the cup is a bit small – it’s hard for me to get my hand down in there to fish out some dice. In the tips and strategies page for this game @kegdragon beat me to the punch and recommended using a dice bag instead of this cup, and I totally agree with him. So go on over to that page and give him some love by saying his tip was helpful.
Overall, this is a fun game that requires little to no thought and can be played very quickly. I’m pretty sure I would have thrown less hissy fits at restaurants when I was little if this game was around – it’s a great filler in all sorts of situations. I gave it the rating I did because this is not a go-to game for me. I don’t always think to play it, and it’s the same thing over and over again, and it can get boring after a while. But for what it is, it’s quite enjoyable! May you roll well!
Summary:
I was at my local gaming store to pick up some paints for my miniatures and I picked up Zombie Dice on an impulse waiting in line at the cash register.
I figured my children and might enjoy it.
So we played that night. The kids were excited to play a new game that had cool looking dice. They are young, so I didn’t explain to them the whole zombie thing and shot gun blasts were strikes.
We played several rounds; my wife was feeling left out, since she kept rolling 3 strikes every time she picked up the dice to roll.
My children liked the fact they could pick 3 dice and roll them, I put down a dice rolling tray, so dice where hot being thrown all over the place.
Overall everyone enjoyed this little distraction of a dice game with a neat little theme.
So on to the review…
Replay Value:
This is pretty straight forward, replay is huge. It can play with any number of people.
I think it would make a great party game…
Components:
– Rule book Are in a color, double sided little sheet of glossy paper that fits inside the stowage cup.
– Dice are black with cool engraved symbol representing Shot gun blast, brains, and foot prints. There are 13 dice. The breakdown of the dice is as follows.
– 6 Green dice with – 3 Brains, 2 Footprints and 1 Shotgun blast.
4 Yellow dice with – 2 Brains, 2 Footprints and 2 Shotgun blasts.
3 Red dice with – 1 Brain, 2 Footprints and 3 Shotgun blasts
(As you can see the odds are in the color of the dice)
– Stowage cup is a sturdy colorful card board tube with comic like zombies on the label. It has a plastic end with a tab to open it. The cup is also used to draw the dice out randomly.
Easy To Learn:
Super easy! Draw 3 dice roll them. Keep brains and shot gun blast aside. 3 shot gun blast ends your turn and you score no points. Your goal is to collect as many brains as you can before getting 3 shot gun blast. This make the game neat in that you have to decide if you want to keep pushing your LUCK and try to get the most brains before being blasted by the shotguns.
Now the thing is the last player has the advantage, but no biggie it’s a light fun game of brain eating!
Although the stowage/draw cup is cool, it gets a little taxing on the hand to draw the dice out of it, so I recommend that you put them in to draw from instead.
So overall this is an inexpensive little press your luck filler game that involves all the players on who will collect the most brains!
Zombie Dice is about as much of a niche game as you’ll find. This is primarily because there is very little game. That said, it can still be fun for short periods, in the right setting.
The game consists of three colors of dice, and a dice cup. You’re a zombie, and you’re trying to get the most brains. The dice represent the humans you’re chasing down, some of which are tougher than others.
You draw three dice to at random to start your turn, and roll them. Each die has three possible outcomes: (1) brain (2) shotgun blast (3) run away. After rolling, set aside any brains and shotgun blasts. Now decide if you want to roll again. If you do, take any feet (run away results) into your hand, and then draw from the cup enough dice to bring your hand to three, then roll. You can stop after any roll, with the total number of brains rolled as your score. Or, if ever you have three shotgun blasts, your turn ends with a score of zero.
Green dice are easiest (and there are the most of them). They have three brains and one shotgun.
Yellow dice are moderate, with two brains and two shotguns.
Red dice are the toughest, with one brain and three shotguns.
Zombie Dice is a push your luck game. Do you keep going to get closer to 13 brains, or take what you have for this round? The game plays in under ten minutes (more if there are many players). The maximum number of players is set by how many people you can convince to give it a try.
I’ve had the most luck with this game when playing in a very social environment, where people are primarily sitting around talking. As very little brain power is needed to play (even though brains are needed to win!), Zombie Dice doesn’t detract from conversations. It’s a quick filler that can serve as a warm-up game, or a way to pass the time while waiting for another table to finish scoring on the game their playing.
It’s small, it’s quick, it’s cheap, it’s easy to learn, and has the push your luck element. It won’t entertain you for the night, but it’s usually worth the ten minutes you put into it.
If you are looking for: an in depth strategy game, a game that keeps you interested for hours straight, or one that balances intriguing game moves with managing money or armies, this isn’t the game for you.
What Zombie dice does is fit its niche very well. Zombie dice is a quick game that can be pulled out and played at a table during a fast food meal, on a desk before class, sitting at a bus stop, pretty much anywhere where you have 5-25 minutes you want to kill. During that amount of time, so many other board games just aren’t feasible to set up start and play, but zombie dice easily fits the bill.
The gist of the game is to score the most points. Points are accumulated by collecting “brains.” Players roll dice which have one of three images per side (brains, footprints, shotgun blast) During a turn a player pulls three of the ten dice from the container and rolls them. Any brains or shotgun blasts he sets to the side. The brains count as points, the shotgun blasts take away life. The footprints represent a reroll. If the player set to the side any brains or shotgun blasts he replaces those dice with more from the container so that he is always rolling three dice. The player wants to accumulate as many brains as possible but his turn ends (and all points are lost) the moment he has rolled three shotgun blasts, so strategy is needed to figure out when to stop rolling pass the dice to the next player and “bank” those brains. The dice have different colors representing different difficulties. (Green, easy has only 1 shotgun blast on it, red, hard has 3 shotgun blasts that can be rolled)
Again this game is simple, can be played by children as young as 4-5, but still is a great laugher when you are trying to fill time with your friends.
For the price, its an easy game to acquire and I recommend you pick it up.
There’s something about zombies, brains, shotguns and running away that this game captures. I won’t go into the mechanics of the game — others have done that and it’s fairly trivial. So instead, I’ll tell you how to get maximum enjoyment from it.
1) Beer. That’s right, this isn’t a game where you need your wits about you and you’ll enjoy it much more if you’re in the proper state of, uh, mind. (Note: children can play this game and really enjoy it too, but giving them beer is bad — so don’t do it).
2) Brainzzz…. If you’re going to be a zombie go all out. It’s important that you satisfy that insatiable craving with (no, not more beer) BRAINS! Say it with lip smacking joy, say it with that belly bursting hunger you have, and say it with menace for those who are trying to take away what’s rightly yours. Drooling is OK too as long as you wipe up if you’re at a friend’s house.
3) Competition. This is key if you want to have any hope of winning. You need to intimidate your rivals and force them to expose themselves to be blasted by the shotguns by taking foolish risks, or make them wimp out and be too conservative — to be clear, a real zombie is never conservative if the brains are easy pickings.
4) Gloating. Finally, and perhaps most importantly after beer is mocking laughter and demeaning statements about the other players for their choices (-er dumb luck). Depending on your group, this can be difficult because some people may get their little feelings hurt if they’re made to feel like mindless idiots. If so, tell them to lighten up and enjoy themselves!
So yes, it’s a fast light game, incredibly easy to learn and probably only enjoyable if you’re in the right mood — but when you are, it can be loads of fun.
When there is no more room in ****, the dead shall walk the earth… and try to eat your brain, unless you can run away or blast them with a shotgun!
Zombie Dice is a quick to play ‘push your luck’ dice game for, well, any number of players (although I expect more than 4 or 5 would probably be a bit rubbish…). In it, you play a member of the undead horde out for lunch. You want to eat as many brains as you can, chasing down any humans who escape and hoping to avoid catching a shotgun blast to the chest!
Components
The game comes with 13 dice (6 green, 4 yellow, 3 red) and a tub to keep them all in (which can also be used as a dice shaker, if you so wish). Green dice have more brains than shotguns, red dice have more shotguns than brains and yellow are somewhere in the middle.
The quality of these dice is lovely – each are well made, and have brains, footsteps and shotgun blasts embossed on their sides. In short, they roll nicely and look good…not much else to say here!
The dice shaker/tub isn’t quite so nice. It’s just a cardboard tube after all, and the dice do make quite an annoying rattling sound when in it – if you plan to carry the game around with you it’s worth either jamming some cotton wool in there, or getting a wee dice bag to keep the dice in instead.
There’s also a rule sheet…which has the rules on it…
Gameplay
The rules and gameplay of Zombie Dice are incredibly simple – when it’s your turn, you randomly select 3 dice and roll them. Any brains or shotgun blasts rolled are kept and set aside, any footsteps are returned to your hand ready for re-rolling (these represent your victims escaping).
After each roll, you can decide if you want to ‘bank’ any brains you’ve rolled, or if you want to push your luck and keep rolling. If you want to continue, you take any dice which had footsteps and draw additional dice to ensure you have three in your hand – you then roll these.
Then wash, rinse, repeat – simple as that. If at any point you have 3 shotgun blasts it means your victims have got the better of you and your undead self is now all the way dead…so you lose any brains you had collected so far on that turn.
If you decide to stop before this happens, add however many brains you had to your running score and pass the dice to the next player. The game keeps going in this way until one player has reached the target of 13 brains (although once this happens everyone else gets one more roll to see if they can match/beat the score before the game ends and the winner is declared).
Play time
Zombie dice takes about 10 minutes to play, and with a small group it’s great fun. Each turn is over very quickly, so in small groups there’s not too much downtime. Being a quick-fire game it’s usually good for a two or three rounds of play before moving onto something else.
Summary
Zombie Dice is a fun game, that I like to keep in my bag to pull out if I find myself with a short amount of time to fill with friends, and it’s so simple absolutely anyone (well, pretty much…) can pick it up and play it.
I’ve pulled it out for quick plays at game sessions, on train rides and even at work to take a quick break, and it’s always gone down well.
Rating it is difficult – the score I’ve given it is based on it’s cost, simplicity and on the type of game it is…it’s certainly not comparable to a game like Battlestar Galactica, but I still think it’s worth a solid score as I think it’s great value for money (I paid £9.99 for my copy here in the UK) and a great fun wee filler game.
Games move fast and fly by, making this a great game to play either if you find yourself with 20 minutes to spare on a train ride, or whilst another game is being set up for play…and if someone pulls out a copy and you end up not enjoying it, well, it’ll be over in 10 minutes anyway!
Easy to play, roll 3 dice keep the brains and shots (shotgun blasts), runner dice allow you to roll again and add more dice to bring your rolling total back up to three. You may quit while you’re ahead and score your brains or push your luck when runner dice are present. Careful though 3 shot dice and you lose your brains for that turn!
Overall I was astounded by the sheer cheering from other players for the current player to get bad rolls & the amount of enthusiasm with the game in general. Obviously knowing the amount of dice left helps, 3 red, 4 yellow and 6 green. The dice are stacked in favor of more brains to even to less brains with more shots as you go from green to yellow to red.
A little bit of advice I learned from a friend that I have also put into the tips section:
I agree with previous posters about making a dice bag. It solves 2 issues, larger hands have a hard time grabbing dice from the cup & the cup is also very noisy.
I would also include another piece of cloth with the game to roll the dice on to save more noise – although the excited yelling of young kids (& adults too)may very well curb your noise reducing efforts!
A dice tray could work but that would take away from the travel size of the game.
Overall, I must say this game has great replay value since everyone reacts to the extreme dice rolls (good & bad) and all are very involved in what others roll as well. I will keep playing!
NOTICE: If you are looking for a strategy game in ANY way, shape, or form… this is NOT it! Close this review and DO NOT BUY! No need to read any further.
Hello, my little braineaters!
Today, we are going to talk about Zombie Dice.
Now, I see many have chosen to score this game on its complexity or lack thereof. To me, this ignores the true purpose of the game… it’s simplicity. Zombie dice is a Beer and Pretzels game… a few rules, some beer and pretzels, and a whole lot of fun.
How to Play…
The game comes in a cup full of 13 dice and a rules sheet. That’s it! It’s very portable, and ahs ZERO setup time. The dice come in three colors; yellow, green and red. Each dice has foot prints, shotgun and brains on them. Each color has more of one symbol than the other two…
The object of the game is to roll as many brains as you can without getting shot. The first player who collects 13 brains wins! Keep track using other dice, tokens, or a piece of paper and a pencil.
On your turn you roll three dice from the cup. Roll three shotguns… your turn is already over! If you roll a brain, you set the brain aside and any shotguns. You can keep rolling three dice at a time until you have three shotguns (lose your turn) or decide to stop on your own so you can add the brains you’ve collected to your total. Footprints do not get set aside, they are re-rolled… so the number of rolls you get is almost always different.
The only “strategy” to the game is paying attention to what dice are left in the cup. Green dice have more brains on them, and red dice have more shotguns. That’s it for strategy. 🙂
So… a turn goes like this:
1) Roll dice
2) Set aside brains and shotguns.
3) Decide if you want to roll again based on total number of shotguns and brains (and dice left)
4) Repeat, Die, or Stop
Remember, if you get three shotguns, you lose ALL your brains this turn. You only get to count your brains if you stop rolling before you get that third shotgun.
Conclusion…
Zombie Dice is barely a game. It’s a pastime in every sense of the word. It takes two to five minutes, and can support however many players you can get around the table. It’s theme is what you make of it. Don’t play if you are unwilling to moan and groan “brainssss” at least a few times per evening. It’s the perfect fun filler down at the bar, or between long games while waiting for friends, or with your kids. For a game about brains, it is brainless, and somewhat expensive for what you actually get. But, it’s extremely portable, and perfect for the right group. You just can’t expect more than a simple luck-fest from this one.
Happy Gaming!
Quick disclaimer: I have this rated at a “9” mostly because it is yet another non-Candy Land game that my 3 year old daughter will play happily with me. For adults, I would give it a “7”
Ah, Zombie Dice. Its like Yatzee of the Living Dead. You take the roll of a walking, rotting corpse. The dice represent your potential victims. Your goal is to rack up a victim count of 13 before your undead brethren can.
The game costs in the neighborhood of $12.00 – $15.00. You get a cup with with a prominent somewhat cartoony zombie missing part of an arm and the silhouette of others in the background, a two sided glossy piece of paper with the rules and 13 dice with various colored icons on them.
This is primarily a risk/reward scenario. To play, you shake the cup, pull out three random dice and roll them. The results indicate how things went with the three potential victims you were chasing. A brain indicates that you caught them and feasted upon their tasty gray matter, a burst indicates that the malcontent shot you and the footprints indicate they got away. Assuming you did not end up with three shotgun blasts, you have the option of either scoring the brains you rolled and ending your turn, or putting aside the shotgun blasts and brains you rolled, and reroll any footprint dice along with random dice from the cup for a total of three more. Rinse, lather and repeat until you either voluntarily end your turn and score the brains you ate or have your turn ended for you by three shotgun blasts, meaning you get nothing. Play continues in the direction of your choice.
The dice are green, yellow and red. The colors indicate the toughness of your prey. Green has more brains and less weaponfire, yellow even amount of both, and red more gunshots and less brains. If you have rolled all 6 greens and have 2 wounds, you know that reaching into the cup again is going to be pretty risky. If you end up rolling 12 dice and still can go on, you can make note of what you have on the table, toss them all back in and keep going.
The biggest draw for me is that it is a very simple premise that my daughter can easily grasp and at the same time it teaches her simple risk/reward concepts. Hearing her count her “brain,boom and feet results is also a hoot. The game is very portable so keeping her occupied at a restaurant or the DMV is easy as well. The dice are very good quality and will stand up longer then it will take to inevitably loose them. My daughter aside, it is a quick filler game with the older people you play with and as an added bonus I am sure you can make an enjoyable drinking game out of it if that is your thing.
If you have a young child you want to play games with and don’t mind the zombie motif, even a zombie’s victim can see this is a good buy. I certainly don’t explain the living dead to my daughter and the game plays just fine without her understanding why there are brains on the dice.
Even if you don’t have a small child, this is still in my opinion a good buy to fill time between longer, more complex games or when you have 10 minutes to kill.
Zombie Dice Details:
Publisher: Steve Jackson Games
No. of Players: 2 to any number
Time to Play: Depends on players (about 3-8 minutes per player)
Setup: Paper and Pen
Zombie Dice is a short-form play-almost-anywhere game of pushing your luck. The premise is you’re all zombies, competing to become the one true Zombie King.
The game comes in a short, reasonably sturdy tube (which doubles as a dice shaker) filled with 13 six-sided custom dice. One great thing is that the number of players is really only limited by the number of people you can persuade to play. Though from my experience 10 is about the practical limit.
There is limited strategy involved in the game, primarily limited to “should I push my luck?” The dice in the game come in 3 different colors, clearly indicating whether a die is likely to come out as favorable or not, and cunning players will obviously take account of how many favorable dice remain to be rolled. Since the game mechanics allow for only one winner, the way it’s played will change depending on how far ahead or behind you are from the other players. There can be only one Zombie King, so if one player is very close to getting the prerequisite 13 brains, other players should start to take risks just to catch up.
Is it FUN? Yes. While, I don’t think Zombie Dice will appeal to everyone, it’s a lot more fun if you get into the theme (putting on your best zombie drawl, pretending that 3 red dice are a group of survival nuts with double-barreled shotguns, etc.) Zombie dice is best played in a very casual setting, or as a filler between other games. It’s self-contained and doesn’t require much table real estate, so it’s perfectly suited to play anywhere. Zombie Dice has a pretty good chance of tagging along if I’m meeting up with a group of gamers. Remember, if you see me running… a Zombie is chasing me!
Zombie dice is a great, mini, filler game. Got fifteen minutes, or just want to have a laugh with a group of friends around the table? Then this “no brains”, push your luck game is a great fit. Personally, I like to call it “lunch time play”.
You’re a zombie and the goal (of the game) is to accumulate “brains” by rolling three random dice at a time. There are three possible facings to a dice: brains, runners, or shotgun. “Shotgun” is never good, it means a survivor you encountered shot you. “Runners” are those survivors who’ve kept up with their cardio in the apocalypse so you need to continue to chase them down (ie the dice does not resolve). “Brains” are the yummy center of the human lollipop, and you want 13 of them to win.
There are 13 dice total, all have the three facings, however, the chance for a particular facing depends on the color of the dice: Green – 50% brains, Yellow – 50% runner, Red – 50% shotgun. There are more Green dice then Yellow and more Yellow than Red. However, you must choose your three dice randomly from the game’s container and role to resolve. You can keep rolling, resolving, and rolling again until you resolve 13 brains or 3 shotguns, or anything in between.
Again, it’s a great filler game for all gamers. Family gamers might want to consider the theme prior to playing or purchasing. Definitely great to have around to fill in gaps in game nights or just for a laugh.
I’ve read mixed reviews of Zombie Dice, so I thought I’d add my own opinion to the mix. This can definitely be a fun little game as long as you don’t expect too much from it. It has a great theme; who doesn’t love the idea of being a zombie eating brains while avoiding the hated shotgun?
The components, what few there are, are top notch. The dice are heavy, fun to roll, and look great.
The game is easy to learn and simple to play. It’s about as straightforward as a push-your-luck-game can get. You roll the dice and decide if you want to risk rolling again. If you stop, you count the brains you’ve accumulated this turn, if you get a total of three shotgun blasts, you lose any brains you’ve earned during your turn. The first to get 13 brains wins, although everyone gets to go the same number of turns, so I’ve had games where someone thought they had won with 13, only to have the last person roll 8 in a row to win with 14. With the right group there can be lots of cheers and laughs as you slurp your way to victory or get splattered one brain away from a win.
This is definitely a short filler game. There isn’t a lot of strategy or particularly tough decisions to be made, but it can be a lot of fun. It’s relatively inexpensive, so I recommend it to anyone looking for a quick, brainless (pun intended) diversion while you’re setting up for the next big game or looking to kill some time.
Just when we had one dice game from Steve Jackson Games, another follows closely on its heels. Thus following on from Cthulhu Dice, we have Zombie Dice. This though, is not a “take that” game, but a “push your luck” game. Its rules are just as simple and easy to learn, it plays almost as fast, but it comes better packaged with its own means of storage. Designed for two or more players, aged ten and up, in Zombie Dice you are a zombie out for braiiinnsss…
The game comes in a short thick tube that also doubles as the rolling cup. Inside can be found the rules leaflet which takes a minute to read and just as long to teach – we had a quick game whilst Dave set up Battlestar Galactica for a two hour marathon. Also inside the tube are thirteen six-sided dice. These come in three colours and are marked with three symbols: “Brain,” “Shotgun (Blast),” and “Footprints.” Each die represents a human victim. Some dice represent harder victims and have more “Shotgun (Blast)” than “Brain” symbols on them – these are the red dice. The green dice have more “Brain” than “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols on and indicate easier victims. The yellow dice are more balanced, but all dice have two “Footprint” symbols.
When rolled the “Brain” symbol indicates the successful munching of a victim’s noggin. The “Shotgun (Blast)” indicates that he fought back and the “Footprints” that he got away from a zombie’s clutches.
On his turn a zombie rolls all thirteen dice in the cup and draws the first of three dice. He rolls these and puts aside any that roll “Brain” or “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols. If any “Footprints” symbols are rolled, the zombie he can top these dice back up to a total of three and re-roll them. He can keep doing this until he accumulates three “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols, in which case he is driven off and his turn is over. Accumulating three “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols also means that the zombie loses all of the “Brain” symbols rolled on his turn and he scores nothing! If after any dice have been rolled and counted and the zombie has less than three “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols before him, he can choose to end his turn and add any “Brain” symbols rolled to his total. Play passes to the next zombie with all of the dice returned to the cup.
Once a zombie has accumulated a score of thirteen brains, he wins.
Zombie Dice is not entirely luck based as a zombie can decide when to stop rolling, based on either his number of “Shotgun (Blast)” symbols or the dice colours already rolled. It does lack mechanical interaction, but the personal interaction comes from watching or egging your fellow zombies in to pushing their luck and rolling more dice. From its rules Zombie Dice is obviously simple enough, but that it is more fun the rules suggest is a surprise. Zombie Dice is a fun filler.
Zombie Dice is a fun game at a cheap price. The dice are well made, the art is appealing and the zombie concept makes it more enjoyable, but Zombie Dice is an occasional game. It’s a super simple game that takes no time to learn, but also no time to play. Not saying it’s not fun, but it will get old quick.
By being so simple though it does lend it’s self to house rules very well. This often adds a great deal of enjoyment by just testing out what works and what doesn’t. If you enjoy making up new rules or tweaking the old ones Zombie Dice has a bonus for you.
The dice, the cup and a set of rules. Thats all thats in the package, but honestly thats all you need. The standard rules are straight forward but produce a quick game that is fun. You probably won’t play it often, but when you do, you will be right into the action in no time eating brains and getting shot in the face.
Pros:
-Zombies
-Easy to learn
-Affordable
-Fun occasional game
Cons:
-Very simple. Probably won’t have enough to keep you coming back often
Conclusion:
If you like games, if you like zombies, and you like dice, pick up Zombie Dice. Keep in mind this probably isn’t going to be a main game by any means. Break out the game, play for about 10 mins then move on to the next thing. It’s fun while it lasted and it will be fun when you come back to it, but it’s not going to be a main gaming piece, but it wasn’t meant to be.
Background
I received this game as a present, and had seen it played on the show “tabletop”(youtube).
Impressions
The game comes in a nicely decorated cardboard cup with ALL the game components! Now, those components may only include a handful of differently colored dice, but still, very nice.
Gameplay
This is a push-your-luck dice game, where the goal is to score 13 points. You score points by eating brains. Thus, when it is your turn:
1) shake the cup, and…
2) randomly pick 3 dice out of the cup
3) roll these 3 dice.
4) if the dice show:
a. brain: save these. these are your points so far.
b. shot!: you were shot. You stash these along with the brains, and don’t re-roll them. if at any point you have 3 shot-dice, you are killed and lose the points you have collected so far! the trick is to decide whether you want to risk rolling again or just collect the points you have so far.
c. feet: these victims escaped! re-roll these dice if you continue to roll.
5) after your first roll, you may choose to re-roll. If you choose to, you must collect the dice showing the feet-symbol (if any) and draw new di(c)e adding up to a total number of 3 dice.
6) repeat from step 3.
There are 12 dice, each being one of 3 colors; green, yellow or red. All this means is that; red dice have 3 sides showing a shot-symbol, yellow has 2 sides, and green has 1 side with a shot.
Verdict
The game is short and fun, and fits great in between bigger games on game-night. Also, I have found that making a drinking game of it (the player rolling must drink on every shot, AND drink again for each shot if he gets 3 or more shots) is tons of fun if you’re into that. overall great value!
Zombie Dice is a really quick and easy game to learn. There are 13 dice colored dice (green, red, and yellow), and each side has either a brain (good), a gunshot (bad), or running feet (neutral). Green die have more brain sides, red die have more gunshot sides, and yellow die are in between.
Setup
There is none! Just grab your cup and get started.
To play
1. Shake the cup, remove three dice (without looking- no fishing out the easy green ones!) and roll them.
2. Set aside any brains or gunshots. You always roll three dice at a time, and you must re-roll any feet you rolled previously.
3. Remove enough dice from the cup to have a total of three dice each time, and roll again.
4. Continue until you have 13 brains or you choose to stop for that round.
5. If you get three gunshots, you’re dead and lose all your brains from that round. Put all the dice back in the cup- your turn is over.
6. If you choose to stop before three gunshots, count the number of brains you have and make a note. Put all the dice back in the cup- your turn is over.
7. Repeat these steps until someone has at least 13 brains.
8. After someone gets to 13 (or more), everyone else gets one last turn to get to more than that player. Then the game is over.
Thoughts
This game plays really fast, especially with only a couple people. You can easily play this game with 2 people or as many as you like really. It’s a fun little game to use as a filler between other games or to just kill some time. If you like zombies, then you’ll love the theme, but it’s equally fun for anyone who isn’t into zombies.
Extras
There are a couple expansions you can get for this game, and a free app as well. I haven’t played any of them myself, so I can’t elaborate.
I’ll get the negative out off the way first – the cup will break down quickly (protect by wrapping it with packing tape, or use a dice bag) and is way too noisy. If you are turned off by “simple” luck driven games, don’t like “press-your-luck” dice games, and/or don’t like Zombies, your mileage may vary.
Otherwise, this is an almost perfect filler game. You can play a round in 10 minutes, it’s easy to teach to anyone instantly. It could be argued that it’s not even as deep as Yahtzee, but the dice and gameplay fit with the theme (you are a zombie trying to catch people and eat their brains, but watch out for their shotgun blasts). It’s even been useful in motivating my daughter to get ready for school quickly, so that she can play a game or two.
It’s quick, easy to learn, fun theme, and inexpensive – everything needed for a great compact filler game. It can play with two people, or a larger group (turns are fast enough that no one is left out for too long). I never turn down a game or two, and I always take it with me.
EDIT: Zombie Dice 2 adds a nice extra bit of gameplay. Adding all 3 of the expansion dice in, gives you a chance at eating the hunk or hottie brains, but increase the risk as well (hottie runs away more often, hunk shotguns and double shotguns). The dice also “combo”, allowing the hunk to save the hottie, and vice versa. The Santa die allows “Gifts” which act as bonuses, giving a helmet allows 4 shotguns instead of 3. Energy Drinks allow you to turn feet into brains (Catch the runners). Santa also has a double brain gift! I highly recommend this inexpensive add-on. We never play without it anymore.
Me and Zombie Dice
Like probably many of you, I found out about Zombie Dice trough Wil Wheaton’s TableTop. They made so simple game look so fun that I just had to get it, partly because of my gaming collection missing a light filler game to play between those longer games like Arkham Horror or Twilight Struggle. I also wanted some simple game to play with my girlfriend and this game fit the criteria.
The premise
You are a hungry zombie out to grab a meal and by meal I mean brains. The more brains you get the happier your zombie is. It isn’t all fun and games though, because the owner of your meal isn’t very happy with your eating habits. That means he either tries to run away from you or shoot you, which isn’t very kind behavior. After all, you ain’t asking for much.
Out of the box
This game isn’t packing much. You got 13 dice and a rules sheet in a carton cylinder. That’s all you get for your money. The variation lies in the dice, which are color coded in three different ways representing different meals/survivors (green, yellow, red). That’s also the difficulty of “catching” that survivor.
The 13 custom dice are fun, but nothing special really. The carton cylinder seems like it might start showing the signs of wear pretty fast. Also the lids won’t stay in place very well, so if you are shaking the dice hard in the cylinder, try to keep them shut with your hands.
Actual gameplay
This game is so simple that even a zombie could play it. You take three dice every turn and throw them, then take note of the results. The beauty of the game is the risk management, will you push your luck or are you satisfied with the amount of food you’ve gotten. It can be fun, involving lots of laughter and lighthearted disappointment when you lose all your lunch. Ultimately it’s very repetitive though.
Final words
Zombie Dice can be fun and can be taught very easily to a group of people. It’s also transportable, so you can take it with you everywhere if you have any kind of carrying equipment with you. You can also play it almost anywhere, be it a cafe or outside on a picnic.
This game doesn’t stand many plays without getting boring. That’s why I recommend you only use it occasionally. Don’t rely this on being the one filler game, get others as well.