First Impression: The Zombies of Los Meurte High

By W. Eric Martin
March 8, 2007

Publisher: Robot Martini
Designers: Gavin Schmitt
Artist: David Lovejoy
Players: 3-5
Playing Time: 15-20 Minutes
Rules Languages: English

Game Played: Final Version
Number of Plays: Twice with 4 players, once with 5 players

New publisher Robot Martini has entered the game market in ways both large and small: the large comes from the number of titles released—seven in the first two months of 2007—and the small from the size of the games.

Each of the company’s initial releases is a small card game, inexpensively produced and selling for $4-6. As you might expect from the low prices, the game components are bare bones: black-and-white, somewhat crude illustrations on uncoated card stock that’s a pain to shuffle. Despite the quality of the components, though, Zombies of Los Meurte High is a decent bidding game that (with only four players) packs interesting decisions into a short playing time.

The idea behind the game is that zombies have invaded a high school, and you and the other players are trying to use items found in your lockers to convince other students to sign on to your zombie-fighting plan. If you manage to complete your plan while also having the highest popularity score, then you win the game. (No word on whether or not the zombies are defeated.)

Each player starts by randomly choosing a set of four items; sets not chosen are removed from the game. Each item has a number from 1-20, and each set includes numbers both high and low. (One set, for example, has numbers 5, 9, 12, and 16. Note that the content of these cards, with images of skin mags, pills and pot, might offend some people.)

Players use these items to bid on cards from an encounter deck. Most of the cards in the encounter deck are students, and students depict a gender (male/female), a popularity score (-2 to 5), and a number of school affiliations (J, N, O, ?). The school affiliations and genders come into play because those elements help players complete their secret plan. At the start of the game, each player is dealt one of six secret plans. The plans show collections of symbols, such as three males, or two Js and two Ns. A player must collect students that match the symbols on his plan or else he automatically loses.

Regretably, the encounter deck also includes four zombies, each of which contains some negative condition, such as requiring a player to collect an extra O to complete his plan.

Once players have their items and secret plan in hand, the encounter deck is shuffled and three of the cards are removed from the game. Two cards are then placed face-up. Each player chooses an item card in his hand, then players reveal these cards simultaneously. The highest bidder discards his item and takes one of the two encounter cards; the next highest bidder keeps his item and takes the remaining card. The other bidders return their items to their hands. Two more encounter cards are revealed, and the process is repeated. In the final round, three encounter cards are available, and the highest three bidders each claim a card. (If a player discards all of his items, then he’s done for the game.)

Whenever a player “wins” a zombie, he has a choice: Keep the zombie and suffer its negative consequences, or feed the zombie one of the students in front of him and give the zombie to another player, who now faces the same choice. Eventually the zombie will find a permanent owner.

Once all of the encounter cards have been claimed, players reveal their plans. Anyone who hasn’t completed his plan is out; everyone else totals the popularity scores of all the students on his side, and the player with the highest total wins.

Zombies of Los Meurte High plays a bit like Raj and numerous other blind bidding games in that you want to judge what otherp layers might play and adjust your bid accordingly. You start with only four bids, though, so your choices are (thankfully) limited. Placing second in a round is usually ideal because you keep your item and collect an encounter card, which is both good for points and symbols and not in someone else’s collection. The zombies can make second a dubious place to be, and players either play extremely high or low to win the round or else dodge the whole mess.

I preferred the game with four players over five as with five players the game seemed to devolve into everyone playing their highest numbers each round as the two encounter cards almost always offer something for everyone and you have fewer chances of grabbing cards due to the increased competition. The game might be even more enjoyable with only three players since only 12 items total will be in the game, giving you more opportunities to play under someone meaningfully. Hardcore players might even want to use a second set of tokens numbered 1-20 so that everyone can see which cards opponents still hold during the bidding.

Zombies isn’t a deep title, but it’s fun and well worth the low cost. Ideally the success of this game, along with Stephen Glenn’s Jetsetters and other titles, will enable Robot Martini to reissue these games in a quality format later.

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