Zombies infect UNC campus for the week

This week, the walking dead will infect campus — and not just those with an 8 a.m. class.

Today marks the start of the Urban Gaming Club’s “Humans vs. Zombies” weeklong game. The game itself resembles an unholy union between LARPing — live action role playing — and a “Resident Evil” video game.

Humans are signified by bandanas on their arms, while zombies sport theirs on their heads; potential survivors use NERF guns and socks to stun zombies, while the undead turn the living by touching them or their weapons.

First-year Mitchell Slentz, who attended the fall night game earlier in the semester, said participants were given objectives and missions during gameplay.

“So we just had to do tasks, like moving boxes of books and stuff like that, and we couldn’t get tagged by zombies,” he said. “We could shoot the zombies with NERF guns, and if we did, they were out for 10 minutes. And then I got tagged at one point, and I became a zombie, and my job was to tag other people and make them zombies.”

September’s night game boasted a theme based on current events: the zombies were led by presidential candidate Donald Trump.

“We just kind of pulled it out of our ass and said, ‘Oh, wouldn’t it be funny if there were zombies and their leader was Donald Trump?’” said senior Ali Schneider, Urban Gaming Club president.

This week’s event has an 80s theme, based on the poorly acted and plot-light films of the decade.

“We got our inspiration from Kung Fury, which was an indie film from YouTube,” said junior Kevin Zheng, an event planner and non-playing moderator.

As with any good geek culture event, the Humans vs. Zombies games have an intense following and surprisingly detailed mythos.

Schneider also said there are former players, like Luke Miller a.k.a. “Superman,” who live on in infamy.

“(Miller) holds the national record for most people tagged in a game. One time, he hid under a table for three hours, and he tagged like 6 people that way because they didn’t know he was under there,” she said.

Beyond the Trump-inspired escapades and the novelty of seeing students run around campus with bandanas and NERF guns, the event has a strong sense of community and inclusivity. Schneider said the close-knit alumni of the group are major resources for the club.

“A lot of players that have graduated and moved on to the real world donate theirs, plus some people buy the latest model from NERF and then donate the old ones.” she said. “The entire founding class graduated at once, so that was significant, but they all stayed in the area, and they helped out with stuff, and even the ones that weren’t stayed in contact.”

Zheng cites the event for helping build his social circle.

“I’ve been meeting a lot of friends and people I wouldn’t normally meet on an everyday basis.”

@rachelisbeyonce

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