Zombie Racers

Zombie Racers – Hillbilly driving and the undead, what more could you ask for?

If you enjoy racing but find that the normal tracks lack that little something, well you could be in for a bit of a treat. Zombie Racers is not quite your usual racing game. Rather than having zombies behind the wheels, the tracks are littered with the hapless and frightening fellows. Sadly zombies are not known for their intelligence (despite their huge appetite for brains), and they’ve not quite caught onto the fact that zombies tend to get squished and lose the odd limb (and head) when coming into contact with a speeding vehicle.

Although it is quite fun decapitating the hapless circuit invaders, it’s sometimes a bit of a distraction and you will need to get the balance right between clobbering all the zombies and finishing it first past the post – as after all it is a race!

In story mode you must finish first in every race to go onto the next circuit. If you succeed the points and carnage are totalled up and turned into cash which you can use to upgrade your car (steering, speed and acceleration) or even purchase a new vehicle entirely. Failing to finish first and you not only don’t get to progress to the next course but all those hard earned points and squished zombies don’t mean a thing! This means that on some circuits you will need to really push your driving skills to the limit as the other three drivers will do just about everything they can to stand between you and the finishing line.

If racing is not quite what you fancy doing, then you can compete with the other cars in a clash of splatting every zombie within the time limit. Although you don’t receive anything for your trouble other than the knowledge that you’re a zombie killer extraordinaire, it’s still a good stress buster – especially if you pick up some of the power ups (ranging from flame thrower, magnet, immobilise and so on). The best way to stay sharp I found was picturing the zombies as people I didn’t like, it really did help focus the mind and make every squelch sound more satisfying!

Looking beyond the rather sadistic pleasure this game provides, this game does have a few issues – none more so than the rather unresponsive controls and glitchy bugs (e.g. it would place me from 1^st to last or even believe I was going the wrong way and put me a lap behind when I had crossed the line). Also the car doesn’t have any braking options and even though you might not touch the curb you will still end up being slowed down. These problems don’t stop the game from being addictive and in a sick kind of way, make it quite retro and even more challenging.  

Positives

Addictive and very amusing

Challenging

Lots of courses

Negatives

Lots of glitches which can ruin the game

The Green Day-esque music is quite annoying after the 20^th time

Very repetitive

2.5 stars