Beers and Braaaains...

Today we returned to Redemption Alewerks in Fishers to play Zombie Dice.  Throughout the fall time, Redemption has added a pumpkin-spice flavor to their Reclamation vanilla porter which is fantastic!   Today however, I had the Schlafly Pumpkin Ale, and Claire had the New Day Johnny Chapman Cider, both of which were excellent and we highly recommend them!  On this segment, we are playing the role of the restless undead, and only hungry for one thing…braaaains!  Zombie Dice is a push-your-luck, dice rolling game in which you are trying to attain the most brains possible.  There's a problem though.  The living still want to keep their brains and they're armed with shotguns ready to defend themselves.

On these six-sided dice, you have three pictures.  One side may have a brain, one side may have footsteps, and another side may have a shotgun blast.  The active player shakes up the container of dice and randomly draws out three dice and rolls them.  If you roll any brains, you set aside those dice.  If you roll 1 or 2 shotgun blasts, set those aside.  If you roll any footsteps, you get to re-roll only those dice, supplementing with other dice from the container.  This is where the push-your-luck element comes in.  You can keep rolling dice until you get shot three times in one turn.  Say you rolled a lot of brains, but you decided to keep rolling, you would set all of those brains aside for your score until you decided enough was enough.  If you roll up to 2 shotguns in one turn, your level of risk is obviously highly increased, because if you roll three shotguns, you die and then you lose everything, including any brains that you could have scored for that turn.  If you choose to opt out before you roll three shotguns, then you will get to take your brains and add those to your score for that round. 

You need to consider the colors on the dice as well when considering your chances during your turn.  There are 6 green dice, 4 yellow dice, and 3 red dice.  The green dice are your most desired dice in this game to roll because they have 3 brains and 1 shotgun blast on them.  The yellow have 2 brains and 2 shotguns on them, and the reds are the worst with only one brain and three shotgun blasts on them.  Always consider your probability in this game as it will assist you in your turns.  From this picture to the left, I've rolled 5 brains, 2 shotguns, and one footsteps.  The issue is that there are still two more red dice inside of the container.  This is obviously much more risky since I already have two shotgun blasts.  Five brains is actually pretty decent for one turn, so given the situation, this is a pretty good time to end my turn and walk with 5 points.  We have both the double feature (2nd expansion) and the school bus (3rd expansion) for zombie dice.  Those dice significantly change the game, but I will not be going into those right now since we are only reviewing the base game of Zombie Dice in this segment.  Aside from the simplicity of this game, the portability and overall gameplay make it a great little party game!  The quality of the dice are very nice!  The pictures are not just painted on, but very precisely engraved on the dice which is another notable quality of this game.  Claire and I have played this game more times than we can remember and it never gets old to us.  We purchased this game back when it was only available in small game shops, but it has since become a mass market game and you can now find Zombie Dice in your local Target or Wal-mart.  Zombie Dice would make an excellent gift for anyone who is getting into TableTop games, or is already into TableTop gaming.  The constant dice rolling and push-your-luck elements make it a lot of fun for anyone, and definitely a party game that we'll be keeping in our collection.

Zombie Dice
Overall Pumpkin Rating: 6.5/10

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