Zombie Carnaval Review

Too many games these days put players in the shoes of terrified human survivors slowly making their way through a zombie apocalypse. Zombie Carnaval flips the script and chooses to show just how much frantic fun there is to be had playing as the zombie horde itself. What's most impressive though is that this fun is far from brain-dead.

At its core, Zombie Carnaval is a platformer in the style of Canabalt where levels are infinite and survival is the goal. Each run starts with the player in control of one zombie but every time they encounter a hapless human refugee the horde grows. The controls smartly adjust for the ever-expanding zombie army by putting small delays in jumps to make sure everyone gets across a chasm. However, there are also plenty of other obstacles that threaten to shrink one’s numbers. It's a clever trick that makes the game less frustrating since individual zombies are disposable and does a good job at making the player actually feel like they are in control of this marauding swarm of the undead.

On top of all this is a plethora of extra features. The game has a robust achievement system that rewards players for doing anything from having a horde big enough to flip a bus to falling down the first hole. There is a marketplace where players can make their zombies stronger or just give them new hats. During runs themselves players will find occasional power-ups like zombie-spawning UFOs and flying Chinese dragons. Heck, for everyone 100 brains a player converts they are rewarded with a random lottery ticket. The basic mechanics may be a little shallow but the game is so rich with content that it does not really matter.

Beyond that the game looks and sounds great too. The visuals are cute yet kind of twisted in a way not unlike a 90s Nickelodeon cartoon. Meanwhile, the music perfectly conveys the sense of fast, fun madness the game itself is going for. That's really Zombie Carnaval in a nutshell. It's fun madness, emphasis on fun.