I’m somewhat new to the board gaming culture, although I was a D&D player back in middle school long ago. I came across some pretty serious board gamers about a year ago, and knew I was ready to return to the world of gaming, particularly due to the interactions I might have. I joined those board game geeks (admittedly), and was introduced to Zombicide.

I only played one session with them, then moved (China to Hungary) before getting to play a second round. I ordered Zombicide the week I arrived in Hungary, and couldn’t wait to play it again, and maybe win (we lost that first time). Unfortunately, I didn’t have anyone to play with, and my wife didn’t seem interested.

Then one day, she simply asked if I’d like to play. I had explained it might not be that good of a game with only two players, but we could give it a try nonetheless. We put on some music, poured some drinks, and entered the apocalypse.

I write this because perfect conditions (6 players) can’t always be met, and you can actually learn quite a bit by walking through a game with a non-gamer, not to mention learning the different characters by playing several of them. As I taught my wife, I learned more as well. I also didn’t have all the rules down perfectly, and so teaching, learning, and playing under these less-than-ideal conditions not only forced me to familiarize myself better with Zombicide, but also allowed me to simply role up my sleeves and play. When we prepare to play a new game, we often get bogged down with the rules, trying desperately to remember all of them before digging in, which often leaves us hungry because we never make it to the table.

It’s not every day your wife agrees to play Zombicide, so I pounced on the opportunity regardless of my less-than-complete understanding. For example:

• We shot into crowds of zombies and survivors, but only killed the zombies. The rules clearly state that the survivors take the first ranged hits. But alas, I missed that while “missing” the survivors. Maybe that’s why we won.
• One character gets a free Search Action, so we gave him two searches per turn (not allowed). We found a lot of stuff! Maybe that’s why we won.
• We didn’t really understand what Slippery meant, but we won in spite of our ignorance.

The best thing about the experience, though it wasn’t played exactly as Guillotine Games had in mind, was that it was fun. My wife loved it!

I certainly understand the rules better now, not only by going through the process a bit ignorant, but also by watching the game played on YouTube. Does that make me a board game geek? Perhaps.