Zombie Master
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Zombie Master is a multiplayer Half-Life 2 modification centered around a zombie-apocalypse. Zombie Master incorporates Real-time Strategy elements for one "zombie master" player while the other players continue to use a First-person Shooter style of play. The goal of the modification is to introduce an innovative game style into the popular Survivors vs Zombies game genre.[1] Zombie Master is available as a free download to anyone owning a Source Engine based game. The first beta version was released on April 15, 2007. The latest version, beta 1.1.3, was released on July 23, 2007.
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[edit] History
Zombie Master was originally devised by Angry Lawyer, a developer for the mod. In its early stages Zombie Master was called Conquest: City 17 and had no real connection to zombies since the plan was to use Half-Life 2's Combine units and other units from the HL2 Universe for the RTS element. [2] Zombie Master came into development when Angry Lawyer decided to use zombie units for Conquest: City 17 and showed the code and idea to friends on halflife2.net. From there team members the GreenBunny and Pi|Mu|Rho joined the team to begin a new take on the FPS/RTS hybrid.[3]
[edit] The Zombie Master
The Zombie Master plays the game like a Real-Time Strategy game. The Zombie Master can spawn zombies at the designated spawn *points placed throughout the map. He can control where zombies move or give the zombies orders, and can move around the map freely. The Zombie Master can also use traps put in by the map maker, along with abilities such as explosion (which causes a blast that sends barricades flying, but does not harm players directly) and Night-vision (for dark maps).
In order to spawn zombies and use traps, the Zombie Master uses resources. These are limited, and gradually refill over time, but can be increased by killing survivors.
[edit] The Survivors
Every player except for one play as survivors. They play the game like a First-Person Shooter. The survivors use guns, melee weapons and barricades to stop zombies and fulfill mission objectives. They are faster than all zombies except the banshee, and can carry objects, jump, and crouch. In addition, survivors can only carry two guns at any time. There is no way to heal in the game, and once a person dies in-game, they are switched to spectator mode. The developers are working on a poltergeist system for the dead players which allows them to interact with the environment, either to help or hinder the players.
[edit] Zombie Units
Shambler: Shamblers cost the zombie master a small amount of resource points, and the shamblers are fairly frangible, but with a strong melee attack. These zombies are used in large hordes to clog objective points and corridors. They are the only zombies that can destroy barricades and hit nearby objects into survivors, causing damage.
Drifter: Drifters are floating charred corpses which spit blood at nearby survivors when at close range, confusing survivors by shaking their screen and causing low damage. Drifters are quite inexpensive, and when used with other zombie types they can be devastating, causing survivors to wander into the range of melee zombies.
Hulk: Hulks are colossal beasts which are fast, powerful and can take vast amounts of damage. They can take away half of a survivors health with a single hit and make fantasic assault troops. While useful in taking out survivors, it's expensive for the Zombie Master.
Banshee: Banshees are the fastest and most agile units in the game (faster than the players). They can leap great heights to anywhere on the map and can jump into survivors, causing low damage. They also have a close range attack which causes much more damage. They are often used to panic survivors and are currently the most expensive unit in the game. While quite weak, the banshee can hardly be hit when moving due to hitbox problems. This makes it the (perceived) hardest to kill zombie type.
Immolator: A thin, charred reanimated corpse, immolators scream and light themselves (and anything near them) on fire when they die or see a survivor. They then charge towards the survivor, causing large amounts of damage at close range. They are currently disabled due to animation problems, but will be present in the next release.
[edit] The Arsenal
While every map is different, a basic selection of weapons is available to the survivors.
[edit] Guns
- Pistol (resembles SIG P226): A weak semi-automatic pistol that can hold a maximum of of four, twenty round clips
- MAC-10: A support weapon that fires a series of low power shots at a high rate of fire. However, these quickly run out of ammo, but are useful in clearing out groups of Shamblers and Drifters.
- Shotgun: A gun with a devastating effect, canceling out the need for precise aiming in any case. Excellent at close range.
- Winchester Rifle: The rifle is used to shoot zombies off a distance. This sniper's weapon is slow to fire, slow to reload, but can hold large amounts of ammunition (but, however, it shoots 11 rounds.). Its firing rate means it is impractical for close-range use. To counter, it does the most damage of any gun in the game. To make the weapon even more powerful, it has a zoom function for shooting zombies at longer ranges.
[edit] Melee
- Fists: These are the default weapons at the start of a round. They have low damage.
- Crowbar: The crowbar has a relatively equal swing rate of the fists, but is slightly more powerful.
- Sledgehammer: The sledgehammer is the most powerful melee weapon in the game, but has the slowest swing rate.
[edit] Development Team
A complete and up-to-date list of developers and contributors can be found on the team page.[4]
[edit] Notable Mentions
- Zombie Master was featured on Steam News[5] via the Steam Client
- ModDB Review
- www.game-reviews.ca review
- June 2006 Interview with developers
- Mentioned in PC Zone UK and included on cover disc (#184 Sept 07)
