Zombies, zombies and more zombies
There’s no shortage of zombie-related apps available on the iTunes store — at least 180 or so, and many of them want to eat your brains. My favorites are Zombie Farm and Plants vs. Zombies, as I talked about in my Get App-y column today.
To fully enjoy zombies live, you had to have been in New York City today to witness a march of them on the Brooklyn Bridge and in Madison Gardens. These zombies paraded in order to promote Sunday night’s premier of AMC’s new television series, “The Walking Dead.”
But if you weren’t there, and you can’t wait to see the show on Sunday, then check out some of these mobile apps on your iPhone or iPod Touch:
Zombies invade your lawn, looking for brains, and plants help fight them in Plants vs. Zombies app for the iPod Touch or iPhone.
I understand the appeal of this top-rated game with strong graphics, good writing and interesting strategy. Each zombie and each plant have a great story, like this one: “Despite Grave Buster’s fearsome appearance, he wants everyone to know that he loves kittens and spends his off hours volunteering at a local zombie rehabilitation center.” Zombies approach, and you pick the plants that you’re going to need to plant in your garden to defend your home. You have to pick the right combination of plants that shoot zombies, provide sunlight and more to win each level. The more you play, the more types of zombies attack and the more plants you can use to blow them up, shoot them, freeze them or squash them.
• Zombie Farm (free, The PlayForge). Like We Rule and Farmville, you plant crops, earn money and build your farm. The twist is you can also plant different types of zombies and go invading. If you don’t harvest in time, your crops, including the zombies, wither. Although it’s free, you’re going to be tempted to spend real money to buy more brains to be able to do more things, but it’s fun at the free level, too.
ZombieSmash, an app for iPhones and iPod Touches, pits one survivor against cartoon-y zombies.
• ZombieSmash ($1.99, Gamedoctors): I haven’t tried this one, but creators describe it as “an undead-themed castle defense game for the iPhone and iPod Touch that casts players as Joey, a lone survivor pit against a herd of writhing, unrelenting zombies. To defeat the undead masses, players must use their fingers to flick and smash them until they’re un-undead.” It’s graphics include cartoon blood and gore and “ragdoll physics” and it looks like it has enough to keep you entertained for awhile.
• Vuvuzela vs. Zombies (free, Undergames, also known as Undercoders): You use the South African vuvuzela instrument, complete with the noise that became famous during last summer’s World Cup, to fight the zombies that attack as they march across a soccer field. The vuvzela noise blows off their head with a little cartoon-y blood. Vuvuzelas. Zombies. There’s not much more to say about this cute game that doesn’t take itself too seriously.
• Zombie Duck Hunt (free, W3 Innovations): The ducks (and geese, bats and quail) are the zombies, and you use rifles to shoot them. The idea behind it is more fun than the execution, although there’s enough help built into the app to figure it out if you want to take the time. Plus, you can download it now with a “Halloween edition.”
• Zombie Shock (full app for $1.99, lite version for free, Blue Wind): It looks like this one has the gore that the others are missing. The app tells its story in graphic novel format, and it’s an action-adventure format with zombie chases, weapons and more. I downloaded it but didn’t try it out — it’s a little too serious for me, and I’ve been stuck on Plants vs. Zombies and Zombie Farm.
• Cat-Nabbin’ Zombies (free, IronBright software): The zombies are after your cats in this game, but my finger kept hitting the ads instead of the gun, which got annoying very quickly. But it’s free.
• Zombie Uprising (free, Zimusoft) . This game feels like a developer’s first effort. It’s simple, but the pace is good. See how many days you can survive against the zombie attack before you’re infected. Not bad, but wait to see what this developer comes up with next.
• Angry Zombies ($1.99 with a free lite version, Si-Yeon Kim) In this game, the zombies are killing the humans, which makes me like zombies even less.
Grow your zombies and your crops in Zombie Farm, then take a photo of it that you can e-mail your friends.
There are so many zombie apps in the iTunes store that there’s one bound to appeal to you. But if you really live in a world where these creatures are real, there’s an audio book that you can download for $17.95: “The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection From the Living Dead,” by Max Brooks, apparently the son of funnyman Mel Brooks.
And with that, I will bury the zombies for good and hope they don’t come back to haunt me this Halloween.
If you have any favorite zombie or Halloween apps, leave a comment below. Check this blog throughout the week for more of the scary and fun.
~ Lillie-Beth (lbrinkman@opubco.com)
