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Max Miceli sprints away from
a chasing zombie, Nerf Blaster
in hand, in the war to stay
human.
website. That way we can keep track of all this and don’t
have to rely on the honor system.”
To make the game more elaborate, administrators often
design missions in which humans must achieve some complex
objective while the zombies attack. Traditionally, there
are three or four missions throughout the week and a final
mission on Friday evening.
“The Friday mission is the craziest event of Humans
Versus Zombies,” says Seligson. “It can last anywhere from
five to 30 minutes depending on how quickly the humans
get killed off. The humans don’t have to die but that’s the
idea. The premise is that they’re the last few standing after
the zombie apocalypse, so it’s not supposed to be easy.”
the game, as it was getting dark and we were about to leave,
a zombie was chasing a human up the steps. He tripped
and chipped his tooth. It was pretty bloody.”
Wolonick is careful to qualify, however, that there is
nothing uniquely dangerous about this game: “That could
have happened with any sport. Really, if you were doing
anything that involved running up those steps, it could
have happened. It wasn’t the game itself.”
“I haven’t heard of many injuries during this game,”
Seligson says. “We repeatedly stress safety. When we design
the missions, we make safety a huge factor. We don’t let
people play on staircases or in the street. Overall, it’s been
effective; injury isn’t much of a problem.”
Seligson, then a freshman, was one of the first students
to get involved.
“In my biology class, I sat next to this kid named Nick
Sinerth,” she says. “He and his friend Aubron Wood had
played Humans Versus Zombies at (North Carolina School
of Science and Mathematics) and really wanted to bring
it to UNC-CH. He asked me if I wanted to help and I
agreed, so I became a mod, which is basically a player who
enforces rules during the game.”
Seligson remained a mod during the spring of her freshman
year and planned to do so again in the fall of 2011.
Circumstances arose, however, that gave her more control
over the game.
“Our story line team needed help designing the game,
so I stepped in and administered for them. My friend Ben
Keilman and I ended up planning out all the missions,
texting each other constantly to make sure everything
worked out,” Seligson says. “After that, I felt like I had a
lot of experience, and I wanted this to be ‘my game’ for
a semester, so I asked the other organizers to put me in
charge, and they did.”
FROM HUMAN TO ZOMBIE
At the start of the giant game of tag, every player is
ostensibly human. A handful of Original Zombies (OZs)
are chosen to spread the plague among other players.
OZs are not marked as zombies and do not have to reveal
themselves until they have converted at least one human.
By the time all the OZs are revealed the zombie threat has
generally grown beyond containment.
“The administrators like to make it interesting,” says
freshman Jason Wolonick, a Humans Versus Zombies
enthusiast. “They like to put OZs deep within the groups
of humans and add creative twists to give them an initial
advantage. The humans would otherwise have a huge numerical
advantage, so this levels the playing field and makes
the game more fun.”
Once the zombies are out in the open, the humans
engage them in all-out warfare. If a zombie tags a human,
that human turns into a zombie. The humans, armed with
Nerf Blasters and rolled-up socks, can shoot the zombies,
rendering them temporarily stunned. This presents an
interesting contrast of advantages: unlike the zombies, the
humans can attack from long range, but human attacks
have only temporary effects, while zombie attacks are
permanent.
The only way to kill a zombie is to deprive it of food,
or humans. The rules vary by school, but, generally, if a
zombie goes for at least 48 hours without converting a human,
it dies and is no longer in the game. Kills are tracked
through the official Humans Versus Zombies website and
makes it easier to ensure that the game is played fairly.
“Every human holds an index card with a unique ID,”
Seligson says. “Once the human is killed, he or she must
give the card to the zombie. The zombie then registers that
on the site, and the human turns over to a zombie on the
SPREADING THE VIRUS
Humans Versus Zombies recruits players in much the
same way as other events, creating pages on Facebook and
soliciting students in the Pit. Prospective players learn
about the game from a variety of sources, often taking their
own initiative to get involved.
“I saw the event on Facebook,” says Wolonick, “and I
got together with a group of friends who all resolved to do
this. We went to Target, bought some guns and went out to
meet all the other HVZ people. It was that simple.”
“When I first got here, I was switched into Winston
(Dorm) on North Campus where a lot of other freshmen
ended up,” says freshman John Woltz, another Humans
Versus Zombies player. “It was really weird; almost half
my hall was freshmen. Two or three of us were really big
Nerf enthusiasts to start with, and they were talking about
HVZ nonstop. They had been preparing for years to play
this game and couldn’t wait to start. I had no interest in the
game at the beginning of the year, but, because I was in this
atmosphere, I started to want to get involved.”
While Humans Versus Zombies is generally seen as innocent
fun, it can be dangerous if players don’t take proper
safety precautions. Injuries have forced the administrators
to rethink the rules of the game, emphasizing safety and
setting certain areas off limits.
“We were running a mission at the Forest Theater,” says
Wolonick, “which has those stone steps. Right at the end of
STRUGGLE FOR SURVIVAL
In addition to the threat of injury, Humans Versus
Zombies faces opposition from portions of the student
body who believe the game is disruptive and immature.
“College is already a holding ground for people who
aren’t ready to be in the real world,” says Eric Scheier, a
sophomore. “There are enough ways to avoid growing up.”
“We don’t play this game to annoy people,” counters
Seligson. “We have rules in place so that we don’t bother
non-players. I hate that there’s this social stigma against
us. I wish everyone would try it once, because it’s a lot of
fun. It helps get students who wouldn’t normally interact
to come together. I’ve legitimately met Greek kids playing
alongside nerds, and they end up close friends like no one
would have expected. That’s what HVZ is about.”
Whatever other students may think of it, Humans
Versus Zombies is here to stay, at least for now. During the
two years since it arrived on campus, the game has built up
a loyal base of enthusiastic players, who will keep the game
going and recruit vigorously. The game will be played next
semester at least, and will likely continue far longer.
“When you play HVZ,” says Wolonick, “you have to
learn to take care of yourself and overcome obstacles that
we don’t deal with in ordinary society. This game returns
you to a state of animal instinct. It’s almost a vacation for
our minds: we stop thinking about what’s due tomorrow,
we forget our personal troubles and we struggle to survive.”
Jen Sposit shows
off her N-Strike
Nerf Blaster,
which is her first
line of defense
against a zombie
attack.
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10 CTOPS 2012 www.blueandwhitemag.com 11