In my opinion, you can never have too many video games with zombies. Usually, you are spending all your time shooting them in the head, severing their limbs and trying to figure out how to stop the outbreak from spreading. We spend all this time destroying them, but what about the people who create and control them?

Give your zombies increased mobility with wheelchairs

Zombie Tycoon pits you as a budding ZEO (Zombie Executive Officer). You are given access to three zombie units with which you will terrorize the streets, destroying buildings and eating brains as you plan your global domination. Each of the game’s ten levels boasts a new map with various obstacles and items to collect. With the over 100 items, you can arm your zombie minions to the teeth, equipping them with items such as balloons to lift them over crevasses or gas masks to keep them safe from the toxic fumes people are defending certain buildings with. Capturing hospitals will give you tokens allowing you to increase the size of your respective armies. Each group can be controlled separately using the respective Square, Triangle or Circle buttons, or by using the X button to tell them all to attack the same target.

Find replacement limbs to replace severed ones

If you think it’s going to be easy to blast through, then you better be a strategy genius. Eventually the humans decide to fight back, as well as rebuilding hospitals giving them back control. You really need to keep on top of where your zombies are and make sure they aren’t being killed off by someone wielding a chainsaw while you have them attacking a building. You must have your squad near a hospital in order to use the tokens, and if a whole unit falls, you must find a token to revive them before you can build more of that particular group. Sometimes it is best to barrel through, while other times you should venture out a little, regroup, then move out a bit further.

For $8, Zombie Tycoon is well worth the money, as it provides great strategy and a healthy amount of game time.

Zombies are kindof a big deal. It seems that any book, movie, or video game that features zombies is an instant hit. Well that is what industry Veteran Jeff Strain is banking on with his new development studio, Undead Labs in Seattle. The studio’s sole focus will be on creating a massively multiplayer online zombie game for console gamers.

Strain knows the mmo space as he left NCsoft last summer to create Undead Labs. He also worked at Blizzard Entertainment on Starcraft and Diablo.

“Every time I see a good zombie movie with friends, we spend days debating our strategies for surviving the zombie apocalypse,” said Strain. “The police station, or the supermarket? Garden rake, or staple gun? Bach, or the White Stripes? I’m a game developer, so I’d probably be useless for anything other than ghoul bait, but I’m excited to have the opportunity to build an MMOZ that lets us put those strategies to the test and find out for sure.”

Follow Undead Labs on Twitter to watch for future details.

The Walking Dead
Writer-Robert Kirkman
Artist-Tony Moore and Charlie Adlard

After being injured in the line of duty, Rick Grimes awakens from a coma to find himself in an abandon hospital. He soon learned the reason why it is abandon. Zombies have taken over. Throughout the book, however, they are referred to as “roamers” and “biters”, but very rarely “zombies”. Leaving the hospital, Rick soon learns that civilization has changed drastically. After traveling for a bit, Rick is reunited with his wife, Laurie and son, Carl. He also meets the people they have been staying with. Food is scarce, staying in one place to long is dangerous and people aren’t always what they seem. Kirkman does a good job of keeping us on our toes and providing cliff hangers at the end of almost every chapter. As time goes on our characters run into more problems than just zombies; groups not so willing to share, people looking to take advantage, cannibals (yes, cannibals) and eventually fighting and not trusting each other. The last thing I will say is if you read this, don’t get too attached to a character, no matter how “main” they seem to be.

Tony Moore draws in black and white. This, I believe, works very well for this graphic novel. I think it fits with the atmosphere. Also, for black and white, the inking and shading provides a more dark mood. In issue 7 Tony Moore was replaced by Charlie Adlard. It is jarring how different these two artists are. The big difference is, characters are easier to tell apart.

The 11th trade, Fear the Hunters, which will collect issues 61-66 is set for release in Dec of 2009.

GamingAngels love their zombies. We’ve written about games, books and movies. Zombieland is the latest Woody Harrelson movie and looks very promising. He avoided zombies on the red carpet earlier this week at the premier. Perhaps he got his fill during the movie.

You can have a chance to see Zombieland for free! In 5 cities, you can sign up to join the Zombiewalk and get into the movie for free. You can check the locations and sign up here.

Zombieland comes to theaters October 2.

Zombieland takes place in a post-apocalyptic US where we are introduced to Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), who is a bit of a wuss albeit a smart one with some great rules for surviving in Zombieland; and Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), an ass-kicking zombie killer who is on a mission to get a Twinkie. Columbus and Tallahassee eventually run into Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) who they then have to decide if they want to trust and stick out the zombie apocalypse with or to go their separate ways.

WARNING: There may be spoilers below so DO NOT READ FURTHER if you don’t want to be spoiled!

You have been warned!

We first meet Columbus, who is also our narrator, as he tells us about some of the rules of surviving in Zombieland. These pop up in the film throughout the movie as 3D text (think the opening montage of Watchmen) that also becomes a part of the movie being splattered with blood, broken, or knocked over. This really adds to the all around nature of the movie, which overall has some perfect comedic timing. Comedy aside, Zombieland is also quite graphic with bone crunching, gut eating zombie goodness.

There is a backing story that explains how zombies came to be (Mad Cow evolved to infect humans),  the tale of a quiet teen who has to go into the real world once the zombies arrive, and of course some teenage romance. But the movie never lingers too much on these smaller details and you still see tons of zombie killing mixed in with some scenes that will leave you laughing. One of the best scenes takes place after the four make it to LA and decide to seek refuge in style at a mansion of Tallahassee’s choosing.  This leads to probably the best cameo apperance of an actor I’ve seen so far this year in a movie. I warned about spoilers but I can’t even spoil this part, it’s just too fantastic and you’ll probably be glad I didn’t mention it. Needless to say the whole theatre I was in erupted into cheers and applause the minute he appeared on the screen!

Now, this movie does have fast zombies. I’m normally a staunch believer that fast animated corpses = infected. Not zombies. But for some reason this didn’t bother me in Zombieland. Maybe it was the endearing way they growled and screamed, or the charming way that black goo dripped from their mouths, but these felt like good zombies for me. Granted there still may be those who will complain about how zombies aren’t supposed to be fast, but I say put that aside and at least check out the movie.

The acting is fantastic in the movie as well. I think that Eisenberg plays the awkward teen a lot better than Michael Cera, and Harrelson does not disappoint as Tallahassee. There are some great one liners that will come out of this movie as well. I know I’ve already used “Double Tap” a few times as well as the main tagline “Nut up or shut up!”

All in all I had a blast watching this movie, and I could tell that the rest of the people in the theatre did as well. Zombieland just seems to get everything right from the zombies, to the zombie killing to the comedy, everything just falls into place. It’s gory and violent and everything that a zombie movie should be. You’ll be cheering on the humans while wishing that you could go home and watch it again. I will for sure be seeing this movie again come opening night!

Disclaimer: This review is based on the review build that was sent out. The final version of the game may have some slight differences and tweaking of gameplay.

I haven’t played a good hack and slash game in a very long time. So when you tell me about a game that incorporates zombies into it…. well, I’m sold! Tecmo Games has done just that, with a great new game for the PSP – Undead Knights.

The story is a simple one: the King, influenced by his hot and busty young new wife, has decided that the House of Blood (a family who has long serviced the throne) should be wiped out. Little did the King know that his daughter had just married into the family, and the House Leader Romulus, the princess Sylvia and her new husband Remus were slaughtered on their way to share the joyous news with her father. The House of Blood has powerful blood pumping through its veins, and so in death, the three are reborn, commanding forces of the living dead as they systematically destroy those who were behind their murders.

Let’s begin with choosing which character is right for you!

Romulus: The most balanced of the three, Romulus wields a decent blade and has decent recovery time between hits. He is good for the beginner player.

Remus: Speed makes up for his weaker rapier attacks.

Sylvia: Her scythe attacks do heavy damage, but her slow movements leave her vulnerable to attacks.

Characters are chosen at the start of each chapter, so if you find one isn’t working out for you in a particular chapter, you can always chose another when you restart. You will also choose your difficulty level for each chapter, thus allowing yourself to face tougher challenges.

There are 20 chapters in Undead Knights, providing you with tons of zombie minions to clear the way for you. Turning zombies is relatively easy. Hold the Circle button to perform a choke hold on the enemy. As you progress through the game, you will find that some enemies need to be grabbed twice as they become stronger than earlier levels. Another way to turn zombies is by activating a powerful Wrath move that will instantly kill and turn any enemies caught in its wake. Sometimes you need to stun the soldier before you can grab him. Using the Triangle and Square buttons you can attack your enemies and weaken them.

There are several things you can do with your newly turned minions. They can climb on top of each other to build bridges, take down structures for you, and you can throw them at larger enemies to stun and distract them. The most important command you want to give them is to attack the enemies. By stringing together attacks you will increase the amount of White Souls you earn at the end of the chapter.

On the topic of souls, green ones will replenish some health, and red souls will help fill your Wrath bar quicker. Red souls are generally found in giant chests hidden in each level, while green souls comes from destructible vases and other such items.

At the end of each chapter you will be ranked on Souls Earned and Clear Time. The combination of the two ranks will then give you an overall rank and determine the amount of Dark Energy you have earned for customization. Upgrading your character is key in this game. By doing so you will be able to increase your strength and the destructive power of your weapons. Keep in mind that Dark Energy is shared between all three characters, so upgrade accordingly.

As you progress through the game you will also notice that you unlock Revenge Titles at the end of chapters. You can check which Titles you have gained in the Records of Revenge. You can also see your chapter records from this section as well.

Ad-hoc mode will let you hook up with friends for various multiplayer matches. Survival Race, King Battle and Undead Battle. Unfortunately I was not able to try out these mode for the review, but I bet they are a blast.

Fans of metal music will love the soundtrack to the game. There are three metal groups who have music featured in the game: Lightning Swords of Death, Endless Blizzard, and Valdur.

Overall Opinion: As far as hack & slash games go, this one ranks right up there for me. I normally don’t enjoy these titles too much, or at least I haven’t since the original Devil May Cry. (The sequels just weren’t fun for me at all.) It also was another reason to charge up my PSP and use the thing again. There isn’t a whole lot of dialogue in the game, but for what there is, the voice acting was just the right amount of cheesiness. If this was ever to get the movie makeover, it would have to have Bruce Campbell star in it.

I really enjoyed the game, although I did run into a couple instances that I am 100% sure will be fixed for the retail release. You can just pick it up and play a couple levels at a time then come back to it later on or play it through in a sitting. Sylvia was my Anti-Hero of choice, and I loved every minute I spent swinging that enormous scythe around the screen. And while not a big metal fan, I did find that the soundtrack was extremely fitting for the game. I am so glad that I was able to enjoy this title earlier than I originally expected to.

Fort Zombie

Another game announced at PAX today is from Paradox Interactive. They announced Fort Zombie which includes…can you guess…zombies.

In Fort Zombie, players have to get through hordes of zombies that have invaded the small town.

“For the few remaining citizens of Piety, each new day brings more fear. Only the most prepared citizens of Piety will stand a chance against the zombie infestation. Choose from a variety of daily tasks and efficiently build up your characters stats and skills as you battle blood-thirsty invaders and attempt to avoid total infestation. But the most important thing of all is that you build up your Fort if anyone is to have any hope of surviving your last, big stand-off against the coming undead swarm.

This autumn, stay alive and be prepared for the fight of your lives in Fort Zombie!”

No other details were announced as far as date price or where we can buy it. We’ll see if Cherith gets a hands on during her visit at PAX.

Panda Cake raises Your Pet Zombie from the grave on the App Store today. If you had a Tamagotchi (or if you didn’t but always wanted one… or even if you are saying right now, “what’s a Tamagotchi?”), it’s time to revisit the taking care of a digital pet phenomenon.

Feed it brains every day (or else it may starve and die…again. Take care of it, don’t get him too fat (or he will be too tired to chase the humans), buy him a puppy, find him a girlfriend, watch him Tweet (and answer his trivia questions for a chance to win Apple gift cards), shop in the Brain Shop, and rain down the Zombie Apocalypse. The higher the body count, the better.

Watch for a “Zombie Lovers” expansion pack featuring Anti-Survival and Fantasy modes, Thrilling new clothes, new items and abilities, and little magical creatures!

“All this and more, plus a steady stream of planned and user-requested updates – for half the price of something that costs $2!”

Learn More here!
Open iTunes and get yours today here!

A graveyard now exists in Playstation Home in the new Burn Zombie Burn! Playstation Home Space. The new space has the cartoony art style of the game and has visitors wandering through the graveyard, crypts and a maze.

There are goodies and extras in the two crypts if you’re brave enough to go in. I’m probably not. They aren’t saying what the third crypt has inside.

DEAD MEAT follows the stories of Gavin and Benny, two survivors of the town of River’s Edge which has been beseiged by a zombie infestation. The destruction of River’s Edge begins with an influx of rodents and “rabies” cases leading to a quarantine of the city. The remaining citizens of River’s Edge are attacked and fed upon by the zombies, or “bees” and Gavin and Benny nickname them. Unknowing of the conditions outside of the town, Gavin and Benny do their best to survive and try to escape the town to find sanctuary from the infestation.

New chapters are posted every Sunday, and there are already 11 chapters plus a prologue available to read. Begin the journey here!