It’s not hard to notice that zombies have become a pretty big deal over these past few years, lumbering their way into almost every form of media. In movies, there was last year’s Zombieland, Resident Evil: After Life last month and a new George Romeo film slated to come out in spring. Video games have seen a massive spike in undead activity with two Left 4 Dead games out within consecutive years, and zombie-related add-ons having been released for everything from Red Dead Redemption to Borderlands. Even our classic fiction isn’t safe from infection with Seth Grahame-Smith’s Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, published in 2009, a movie version of which is due in 2011.
And now the zombie apocalypse has reached Conn, as our fifth semi-annual game of Humans vs. Zombies, or HvZ, began at noon on Sunday. Don’t be alarmed if you see your classmates sprinting across the green with a bandana tied around their arm and Nerf guns attached to their belt; it’s all part of the campus-wide game that has spread to colleges around the world.
For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, here’s a brief overview of HvZ: it’s an elaborate game of tag that takes place 24/7 across the entire campus. Players designated as zombies tag humans to infect them. Humans are marked by a bandana around their arm, zombies by a bandana around their head. The only defenses humans have against the zombies are to stun them with Nerf guns and socks, the latter of which are thrown at zombies.
Don’t worry about having to dodge stray Nerf bullets in classes or balled up socks during lunch – safe zones for humans include academic buildings, dining halls and dorm rooms. The game ends when either all the humans have been successfully infected or when all of the zombies have “starved.”
From these rules alone, HvZ might sound like total chaos with a potentially huge amount of students playing, but it’s an extremely organized chaos. The whole game is supervised by an administrator who runs the event through a website set up by HvZ’s original creators. Who’s a zombie, who’s not, a wiki and a more specific overview of the rules can all be found at conn.hvzsouce.com. Players even have a personal code that they have to give to zombies upon infection, which is then entered on the site to register kills.
Where did such a bizarre and ingenious game begin? It all started in 2005 at Baltimore’s Goucher College. Two students, Brad Sappington and Chris Weed, wanted a fun way to unite the campus, so they created a zombie outbreak. The game spread like wildfire as pictures and blog entries were posted on the Internet. Students who studied abroad used simple word-of-mouth to take HvZ across seas, and now it’s played in countries such as Brazil, Denmark, Australia, England and Canada. The game has since been covered by The Associated Press, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, ESPN Magazine, and was even listed as the number one threat on Steven Colbert’s “Threat Down.”
Yet even with all this exposure, many first time players aren’t sure what to expect. “I don’t know how crazy it’s going to get,” said Sarah Hitchcock ’14. “You’re supposed to register online, and not that many people have registered so far. But it’s such a cool thing that I think a ton of people will sign up last minute.”
Another freshman, John Dronzek, is more confident about the game’s intensity. “My whole dorm pretty much is playing, so once someone in my dorm is turned [into a zombie] it’ll get crazy,” he said. “I’m going to have to start watching myself just walking to the bathroom.”
When asked how involved he plans to be in the game, Dronzek replied, “I’m not sure. I think I’ll get pretty into it. I have three Nerf guns ready and I’ll definitely hunt people down if I become a zombie.”
Rich Spoehr ‘11, the administrator of this year’s game, who participated in the first ever HvZ at Conn three years ago, also had doubts before his first game. “I didn’t know what to think. I wasn’t sure how exciting an elaborate form of ‘Tag’ could be,” he said. “I thought it would be a sort of low-key thing with only a handful of people who would be really into it. I was wrong.”
Spoehr explained how the game was far better than he expected, and how it became a sort of bonding experience. “I found myself running around campus with my adrenaline pumping at all times… doing quasi-commando missions to help people who were besieged by zombies and escorting people from point A to point B. Plus I met a lot of new people. To put it simply: the game was fun.”
Registration is closed now, but even if you’re not playing, be sure to keep an eye out for the awesome moments that are sure to abound for those who really get into the game. Dan Whittington, a senior who’s helping moderate this year, described being head-butted to the ground after being shot with a Nerf dart during an ambush that he and two other zombie friends set up for a human walking alone to the library.
Spoehr had some choice moments of his own, such as one in which he had to hold out on the green with a small group of humans as they waited for rescue. “Needless to say, we managed to survive by enclosing our position with soccer nets while fighting off the zombie horde,” he explained.
According to Spoehr, the game is only as crazy as the players make it. HvZ adds an extra layer of stress and excitement as you walk from class to class, but it doesn’t have to consume your life. “The point is,” said Spoehr, “while it’s played at all points of the day, you can devote as much free time to it as you want and play at whatever intensity level you want.”
As of the writing of this article, there are over sixty players signed up, which is more than double what it was just two days ago, so it’s ramping up to what will hopefully be a pretty large game. As the week progresses, you may notice friends hopping from building to building, hiding in bushes or discussing strategy during lunch for the best route from South campus to the Plex.
Who will come out the winner? Only time will tell, but make sure to look carefully as you’re walking to class and you might be able to notice bandanas slowly shifting from arms to heads. That’s how you’ll know that the infection is spreading.
