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For those of you new to this whole project, PHZ is a team-based zombie survival horror game designed to scale from one-on-one play to five against five, with one side playing the human survivors, and the other controlling the zombies. The game is massive, containing enough stuff for ten players, including 120 zombie playing pieces, player aides and 295 cards, each with unique artwork...
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And the kicker: This was a solo project from inception to finish. It's been two years from alpha to playtests to artwork to publication. And now that I've thoroughly earned this designer tag under my name, I'm writing this diary. The question is, what do I want to say?
Well, if you just want to read about the game and what you do in it, you'd be better off visiting the game page here on BGG. I don't have nearly enough space to detail the titanic task and all the little issues I've had to deal with, such as getting the Boss mechanism to work, designing the look of the H and Z cards, and finding an ever elusive box. Besides, I've already told that winding, long-winded tale in this thread over multiple posts.
So I'm going to take this opportunity to talk about my favorite parts of the game. The Top Five begins now!
1. Random characters and themes
Okay, this usually ends up first on everyone's list, and I'm no exception.
Posthumous Z has two distinct teams: the humans and the zombies. Players on both sides get three cards to make up their character or zombie theme. Humans get a YOU, WITH, and BUT card, generating something like "You are a beat cop" "with a gun" "but you have an alcohol problem," or "you are a hot waitress" "with a sweet ass" "but you have a stupid kid." Similarly, each zombie player has a THEY THAT and HUNGER card, making combinations such as "zombie ninjas" "that just appear" "and hunger for destruction" or "zombie cheerleaders" "that scream" "and hunger for control."
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So every game starts with its own randomly generated teams, with their own strengths, weaknesses, and amusing names. It adds an incredible amount of variety when compared to having, say, a list of characters. Additionally, the players (myself included) get more attached to their particular character or theme. Rather than forcing a pre-existing name and history onto the player, the player is naturally inclined to explain whatever combination he gets – sort of like a bad B-movie version of word association.
Making a random generation system that was thematically appropriate, balanced, and simple was a challenge, and I'm quite happy it turned out so well.
2. Distinct teams, but balanced
The human and zombie teams function completely different from one another, but all their elements are connected and ultimately balance.
The humans play sort of like an RPG: They get a single character, some starting gear, and a set amount of life, but must scavenge the town to get any more. The zombies play more like a strategy game. They don't start with much – just some zombies on the board – but they accumulate resources and numbers for free over time. The zombie players' perception quickly shifts from individual to one of time, opportunities, and hordes.
A lot of games get their balance by putting everyone in the same boat. Everyone has the same starting materials or pulls from the same pot or deck, with maybe a little push going to whoever gets to go first. Making two completely different kinds of teams balance was not simple; it took me a good year of dedicated work to make happen.
3. The cards all look like stuff
PHZ has 295 cards, which are used for character generation, plot twists, items, random events – well, just about everything. Each is unique, with its own artwork, and this is what took the other year.
The graphic design of each type of card looks like something. The YOU, WITH and BUT cards look like Polaroid shots with Post-it notes, while the THEY, THAT and HUNGER are various types of manila folders with a "secret government file" look to them. The items are all on flattened shipping boxes, the events are on scraps of a newspaper (appropriately titled "The Event", which is a great name for a newspaper), and so on.
The line between card art and the card's graphic design is blurred. For example the "BUT screwed everything up" is splattered with blood, covering the "art" area of the photo, plus dripping down and staining the "text" part of sticky note. Likewise, the "BUT you have a stupid kid" has a crinkled five-year-old style drawing of a stick figure kid, savior, and zombies taped over the photo itself.
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A couple of Z cards, themed as blood-splattered missing posters. The face side often has a composite photo or something busting through; the "On Fire" card is one of my favorites.
Many of the cards have little Easter eggs, for those OCD enough to look for them.
We could go into a big spiel about theme and immersion and other psycho-design babble, but let's just call it cool.
4. Low downtime
Nothing kills a game like downtime, especially a game designed to scale up to ten players. People get bored during downtime, pull out a smartphone or some other kind of apparatus, and dink around. When it finally gets to their turn, they're completely lost and have to spend more time catching up, then deciding, then acting – ballooning the downtime for all the other players, who then pull out their phones...
PHZ was designed to keep things moving. The game play is near simultaneous. The actions of a turn are quick, unfiddly physical movements, with most of the time being strategy discussions between the members of one team, while the other team watches closely for an opportunity to exploit.
One of many five-on-five games
There aren't time wasting elements such as deck searching, deck shuffling, "special" tokens that get used in only one particular instance (I'm looking at you, Fantasy Flight!), cards that make you draw a particular other card, etc. What's more, the game comes with a player aid, and the cards re-explain common terms to reinforce the rules and reduce the need to flip open the rulebook.
A big portion of that year of playtesting was spent watching – and timing – the people playing. If ever a rule, card, or other element caused confusion, slowed down the game, or was physically tedious – e.g., stacking three tokens and putting a playing piece on it to make a "big zombie" was a stupid idea – that element was reworked or culled.
The end result is fantastic – a fast-paced game that's easy to pick up and learn and that can have as much going as most "big" games have in six hours, while playing in only two.
5. I actually still enjoy playing it
On my journey, I studied and tried to learn from other designers. One thing I picked up as a common thread was that most designers, after finishing a game, are bored of it.
I've worked on this project for two years, and now finished, I'm taking it around to conventions and trying to show it off, which means I have to play it often. Heck, at the last convention, I ran 27 hours of games over three days.
Even after countless games, playtesting and demoing, the game still plays differently. Even if I'm not playing, I still set up, explain, and watch. And even in this passive role, the plot of the game ends up better than most horror movies.
I think it's pretty cool that even after the thousands of hours spent with this game it can still surprise and entertain its creator.
That said, I don't want to draw more zombies anytime soon. I've had my fill for a while.
for the love of the game
Nathan Little
This Is a Cow
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