Zombie Driver's name caught my eye, and then the gameplay trailer we posted in October took said eye out and played with it for awhile. Looking very much like an old-school Grand Theft Auto title, Zombie Driver sees players driving through an undead-infected city, plowing through hordes of zombies as they race to rescue survivors of the apocalypse. As you play you buy and unlock new cars, upgrading them with various implements of destruction, such as flamethrowers, rocket launchers, or dual railguns.

EXOR could have very well just released a free-roaming zombie killing widget and I would have been completely satisfied, yet they've gone above and beyond, with 17 story missions with sub quests and bonus missions, just in case you get tired of mindlessly slaughtering the undead and wish to mindfully slaughter them. There's even a combo system to make the slaughter even more rewarding.

GamersGate currently has the game available for $9.95, while steam is selling it for $8.99 for a limited time. That seems like a ridiculously low price. The game unlocks on Steam in a couple of hours, so check out the screens and trailer to see if they make your heart sing as much as they did mine.

There's been post-apocalyptic MMO games in the past, but the apocalypse in those games has never been of an undead nature. Undead Labs is looking to fix that with the first MMOz, and the Z stands for zombies.

ArenaNet co-founder Jeff Strain, who's resume includes Blizzard and NCsoft, formed Undead Studios to build a new MMO game from the ground up for consoles. He assembled a crack team of zombie-loving developers in Seattle, Washington, and set about creating a game that quite frankly begs to be created.

"Every time I see a good zombie movie with friends, we spend days debating our strategies for surviving the zombie apocalypse," said Strain. "The police station, or the supermarket? Garden rake, or staple gun? Bach, or the White Stripes? I'm a game developer, so I'd probably be useless for anything other than ghoul bait, but I'm excited to have the opportunity to build an MMOZ that lets us put those strategies to the test and find out for sure."

This is the single best idea for an MMO game that I've heard in the history of the genre, and I've played a lot of MMO titles. To be able to work together with other players to survive a zombie apocalypse, without having to worry about the government simply nuking everything before the credits roll? That's love right there.

Undead Labs plans on being pretty transparent throughout the development process of the game, so you might want to keep an eye on the official website for further apocalyptic developments.

These shambling, staggering, crawling bastards look like outstanding cannon fodder, and I've got just the toolset for dealing with them - level 39 incendiary revolver and a level 37 shock SMG with a 10.9 fire rate. Should be like feeding mannequins into a woodchipper. Oh, wait, they've got wereskags in this, don't they ...

Borderlands Zombie DLC Video [Hot Blooded Gaming]

Attribute it to rampant zombie madness or just plain love. The second map pack for Call of Duty: World at War saw more than one million players forking over cash or points to download the four new maps to their PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. Of course they are counting the weekend as June 11th through the 14th, and my weekend certainly didn't start on a Thursday last week, but still, mighty impressive numbers.

So who here picked up the pack, and how many of you only did it for the new zombie map?

The cleverly-titled ARhrrrr is a concept demonstration for an augmented reality mobile phone game that pits players armed with guns and Skittles bombs against an invading army of zombies, all superimposed over a real-world map. Through the magic of the NVIDIA Tegra GPU, the map springs to full 3D life when viewed through the phone's camera, allowing the player to circle the map in his helicopter, shooting zombies, saving humans, and using different colored Skittles as explosives.

It's yet another intriguing example of augmented reality gaming at work, though we must ask...who wants to play a game associated with Skittles?

ARhrrrr! [Georgia Tech's Augmented Reality Lab - Thanks Tiago!]

Shi no Numa is the map that proves that Japanese World War II soldiers can be the living dead, as can dogs. Consider it the great equalizer. Everything dies; and everything can rise from the dead. This, along with three not nearly as interesting normal maps will be available tomorrow for $9.99 on the PlayStation Network and 800 Microsoft points via Xbox Live Marketplace.

Dead Rising. Left4 Dead. Nazi zombie mode in Call of Duty: World at War.

More Nazi zombies in the first World at War map pack.

And next, in June, Imperial Japanese zombies in a swamp shamble through he second map pack for World at War.

Gamers love their zombies, but maybe they've been smothered by one too many? Enough with the zombies?

At 6:56 seconds of the 5/12 Giant Bombcast gaming podcast, Treyarch community lead Josh Olin, who is hyping the June map pack, says:

"Out of fear of showing my zombie nerd-ism I will contend that zombies aren't saturated at all. I could play zombies for the rest of time. But people thought that about the World War II genre, right — that that was saturated? And I think that with World at War at least our hope was that we would come out with something that was new and different that people haven't been used to playing before. Hopefully that's been proven by the success of these map packs."

Zombies are forever?

05-12-2009 Giant Bombcast

At first the zombies in Call of Duty: World at War were merely a novelty, but the more I see of them the more I crave an entire game based off of the downed World War II zombie attack segment from the cult classic animated film Heavy Metal. Don't just tease us with the zombies, Treyarch. We want a series of history-spanning zombie war epics. The Civil War, the Revolutionary War, the Crusades...hell, I'd play a zombie version of the Cola Wars at this point. Coke, Pepsi, or Brains?

The folks in Stroudsburg have been putting together a five-part video series to fill people in on the events leading up to the zombie infestation of the Best Buy there.

Part one and two recently hit the site and show a doctor testing the virus on himself before heading to Stroudsburg.

If you're in the area make sure to check out what is shaping up to be the Resident Evil 5 launch event. The event takes place on March 13 at 12:01 a.m., so if you're going you'll want to show up Thursday night to get in line. Anyone under 17 will need to arrive with an adult to purchase the game or enter the haunted house.

In the meantime check out the viral videos at the Blood Red Carpet Event website.

Best Buy: Blood Red Carpet Event

I had no idea zombies could be considered livestock. Anyhow, this short, to-the-point timekiller just went up this weekend. You can challenge others to beat your scores via Facebook.

Zombie Herder [ArcadeLoco]

Answer: "99100 percent sure it is not." This kind of thing would have to go through Capcom HQ in Tokyo, and assuming the suits there could be convinced of such an idea, the fact it's also illegal would probably prevent it from even getting to that stage.

In a nutshell, last week some wit hacked into a roadside construction sign and programmed it to say "Caution! Zombies Ahead!" and advise motorists to seek cold climates. Funny, except this person broke a lock and then changed the password so that the sign kept cycling, requiring the manufacturer to reset it. That's vandalism, and the po-po ain't laughing.

Considering back in 2007 some viral marketers made the Boston cops and Homeland Security crap their britches over a couple Mooninites rendered in Lite Brite, I'd say any viral marketing that comes close to violating a law, even a class C misdemeanor, definitely wouldn't have any corporation's seal of approval on it. That said, I'm sure Capcom is appreciative of the residual publicity.

Besides, who's to say the zombies aren't in fact real. Midway did close a studio there.

Caution: Zombies Ahead [Poshdeluxe]
Austin Road Sign Warns Motorists of Zombies [Dallas Morning News]

The contest asked gamers to take a picture of themselves in front of one of their billboards in London, New York, Boston, Chicago, LA, Seattle or San Fran. The top 25 entries won a free copy of the game and the top winner, seen above, won a new gaming PC from AMD. Now about those tetanus shots.

Evil puzzle scientists PopCap - makers of Bejewelled, Bejewelled-Twist and Bejewelled-Just-One-More-Go-HAHAHAHA-We-Own-Your-Soul-Now - have decided that what the Zombie world needs is a dose of good old fashioned family values. And probably puzzles.

Quoth PR rep, Garth Chouteau:

It’ll be a few months, but our next new game will be worth the wait… “zombie apocalypse,” the PopCap way: no blood, no gore, but blood-curdlingly fun and addictive just the same.

PopCap’s next game to be a family friendly zombie apocalypse? [The BBPS]

It's all good stuff, but zombie games of late tend towards the more downbeat and scary end of things. What happened to a bit of old fashioned brain-eating monster fun?

Burn Zombie Burn! might be just what the insane anatomist with the drill ordered. Taking its cues from Smash TV and Chaos Engine rather than Left 4 Dead and similar grimfests, the game pits you against hordes of undead in a top-down bullets 'n' burnination extravaganza. It is due out on PSN in the new year.

Zombies!!! is a tile-based board game in which the object is to escape the growing zombie menace. The board is tile based and lends itself to expansion packs, making the game infinitely customizable and, also, increasing sales of the game and game-related stuff. Twilight Creations says the base set has sold more than 125,000 copies worldwide since it was released in 2001, and more than 300,000 units of Zombies!!!-related stuff altogether.

"Later releases may include the Nintendo DS and Wii systems," the news release says. Maybe they're shooting for the moon, but who knows. The full release is on the jump.

Zombies!!! to Become Video Game

The immensely popular Zombies!!!® Board Game is set to hit the video game world in 2009. Twilight Creations, Inc., the publishers of the game, has reached an agreement with Big Rooster, LLC, an entertainment software company, to develop the Zombies!!! board game into a video game property.

Initially the game will be developed for the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3 and the Steam online game distribution website according to Timothy Gerritsen, Executive Director of Big Rooster. Later releases may include the Nintendo DS and Wii systems.

“Zombies!!! is a perfect game for the Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation 3 Network,” said Mr. Gerritsen. “We were surprised that no one had seen the huge potential in the Zombies!!! property.”

Originally released in 2001, Zombies!!! has been a consistent seller and is considered one of the core products in the hobby-game industry. The base set has sold over 125,000 copies worldwide. It has also spawned many expansions and spin-offs. Combined, Zombies!!! products have sold in excess of 300,000 units.

In Zombies!!! players race around the board trying to find a way to escape the ever-growing zombie horde. The game is simple to play and extremely addictive according to its fans. The tile based board and the many expansions work to keep the game fresh and new each time you play it.

“We are tremendously excited,” said Twilight Creations’ President Todd Breitenstein adding, “This is a great opportunity for both of our companies. Zombies!!! is a great property and we really can’t wait to share it with a much broader audience.”

Twilight Creations, Inc., founded in 2002, is a Kentucky board game publisher based in the city of Cold Spring. In addition to the Zombies!!! line, Twilight Creations also publishes many successful lines such as the Haunting House series and ZombieTown.

Big Rooster, LLC is a videogame development company based in Madison Wisconsin and was founded in 2006 by a group of videogame industry veterans. Big Rooster develops games for the PC and for latest generation game systems, such as Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii.

Zombies!!! to Become Video Game [Twilight Creations via Joystiq]

Not content with infesting hundreds of video games of their own, the Zombie horde has slowly shuffled onto the back lot of the Gang-related sequel Saints Row 2 for a fully-3D mini game.

Pop into one of the game's many arcades and you should find a Zombie coin-op that uses the main game's 3D engine to pit you (actually, your avatar's avatar, I suppose) against an army of undead brain-chompers, like a Left 4 Dead-lite.

What could be better than this? Two things - first, if Rockstar take up the challenge and implement GTA IV in an in-game console in GTA V. Second, two words — Zombie Busey.

Saints Row 2 Hands-On - Story, Co-op, and Zombies [Gamespot]

Blood, mostly. Here, take a napkin, wipe it off ... These are 19 new screenshots of Left 4 Dead that NeoGAF put up earlier this week. Lots of dismemberment and bloodspatter, but I'm not seeing any mid-spew vomit money shots here. The full gallery is on the jump. NeoGAF has them at higher resolution.

New Left 4 Dead Screens [NeoGAF]

As for content, Newell told VideoGamer, "I don't know what the date is for release [of the demo] though. I think it's going to contain the first part of one of the campaigns. I think it'll probably be Hospital but I'm not sure."

Left 4 Dead is due to hit the shops at the end of November, but there is no word if the demo will be out first or will appear later to try and mop up any stragglers.

Newell confirms Left 4 Dead demo details [VideoGamer]