ZombieMUD has a lot to offer in terms of playing the way you want to play. So many unique races and guilds that you can mix and match for strategic value or because you think its awesome to be a dwarven ranger with your animal companion to assist you. Or so many other role playing choices with 47 races to chose from who each have their own strengths and weakness and 16 primary guilds with more sub-guilds and secondaries that all vastly affect how you play. E.g., your a vampire samurai with your summoned sword who has a spirit of its own and in the midst your rain of shurikens the sun breaks over the horizon in a new dawn and scorches your skin forcing you to shroud yourself in darkness. Or your a skeleton fighter, given the exposed and hollowed state of your body you suffer damage while in the throws of combat, you finish off your opponent with your onslaught of slashes and then repair yourself with the fresh corpse you have just taken from the living. Or you're a mind flayer psionicist, crushing the minds of your enemies and indulging your greedy nature on their brains for satiation... and cause its fun!

Races have different homelands and back stories that you can interact in/with and develop witch in turn helps develop your character to make you stronger or to add more depth to your choices. The guilds are just as diverse with newbie friendly options to more advanced combinations i.e., some guilds require lots more game time before they are even available. Additionally there are mastery systems, the more you play the stronger you are. Furthermore there is a reincarnation system so you can always try something new!

Then there is the world to explore, what does the website say? 15000+ rooms, well its big! And you get experience from exploring and I've been playing since 1997 and its telling me I've only explored 35% of the game! (that might just be because I'm, how is it? Special?). If that is your thing there is even an explorers board identifying the greatest explores in the MUD (I think they are around 95%). Some areas are straight forward, no need to look any deeper, but then there are a lot of in-dept descriptions where you need to analyze your surroundings and interact with objects and watch out for traps to find secrets that will end up saving a captured pixie princess or looting an orc treasure vault or so many other events.

This game also has a gigantic equipment list. Anything from newbie gear that gives you some slight spell point regen to legendary items that sell for millions to and from other players and require eq parties to acquire with carefully planned out strategies. Characters have equipment slots from head to toe. Additionally the equipment can be 'bound' to you or enchanted, or even have shards applied to enhance this equipment more.

Also there are other players to interact with for advice, role-play with or partying together, partying is encouraged because there is more you can accomplish together, but not required. There is a newbie channel dedicated to answering questions and the uncensored mud channel where you can say whatever you want (of course its monitored to a degree)

I could keep going, but if I wrote about every detail I think this would just turn into a giant mob of text that should have an eq drop and experience rewarded (maybe I should keep going), but maybe you are not prepared :p

In closing I enjoy this game the most for the freedom of choices and adventurous options that are available for solo, partying, exploring, role-playing, eq gathering, complicated strategy building, race guild matching, or some easy exp by annihilating well known mobs. Or just enjoy chatting with other role-players or normal people (whoever they are). Remember everything isn't just skin deep here, not everything that is available is written here or is on ZombieMUD's website, if you keep digging you will keep discovering. So, enjoy!

Well i was very expectant of this mud. So,i signed up. The mud is big, with a plentiful amount of players. Very well detailed, and in depth as well. But, as a newbie i discovered the hard way that the help files are too convoluted to be of any real aid. They bombard you with at least THREE pages of information at a time expecting you to remember it all. You do get a skull guide, but he almost constantly spams your screen with the same information over and over again, which also adds to the annoyance of figuring out the files.

And this mud has a tendency to leave a newbie stranded, entering a room with no exit expecting the new player to remember the long paragraph that was presented to them in the beginning in order to use an object to escape.

Now about the 'newbie friendly' part... I found out that to be a complete fallacy. There were over 100 players on and only 1-2 people would even offer aid to me, and yes, i did ask for it (and i even received a few insults because of it).

So all in all i would say that if the Help Files were reduced into manageable formats, commands for objects included in said help files and the veteran players actually 'newbie friendly' and not judgmental of a new (possibly confused) player, i would highly suggest this mud. But unfortunately it is not so. This unfortunately will be my first and last time playing this mud. I might try it again to see if things have changed, and if they have not i'm afraid that i would just quit again.

Zombie is a mud which has the many different characters and styles you can expect from a mud that has been developed and running for 10 years. I've played the game myself for about 8 years now, and have come to make a lot of friends, some for life. Besides the social aspect, the most important part is of course the very well-made game itself.

newbies : Starting out has been made a lot easier over the years, and there's plenty of quick starts, and detailed information for the options of new players.

If you're considering trying out the game, consider spending about 30-60 minutes reading the most basic newbie files, before actually playing. The knowledge gained this way will be well spent!

gameplay : For me personally, great satisfaction is gained from 4 things .. - partying with friends - exploring - trying new and old equipment-monsters - improving my character's abilities with xp and 'masteries'

Zombie allows for parties with up to 8 people, which can be a mix of anyone you want, giving you the ability to explore areas and defeat monsters that would be impossible alone. Some areas and monsters are what we call 'xp'-mobs, since they give your character more experience, with which to improve your character with levels, skills, and/or spells. Other options are to fight monsters that give special equipment, a way to improve your character oftentimes impossible with plain xp.

Not to forget, beyond these ordinary ways to develop yourself, a big chunk of character development is also the varied and sometimese huge task of permanantly improving your knowledge of a guild's abilities by using its skills and spells, also known as 'masteries'. Zombie is definitely one of the best muds I know and have played, and is still my favourite.

-Dubbeltje