Lurch! The Zombie Chess Game 2008

Lurch is a basic beer and pretzels game based on board games like chess. It uses a standard eight by eight square board and just about any miniature figures, pawns or markers, to denote the individual units. The Basic game is simple, and there are Advanced rules to increase the complexity for seasoned players. There are also over two dozen additional scenarios to add replayability and fun to the game. An additional section explains ways to use the game within your roleplaying game as well. This game is complete and includes Basic Game Rules, Advanced Game Rules, over two dozen Alphabetized Scenarios, dozens of paper miniatures and markers. The game is offered as a downloadable PDF file. As first glance Lurch! is a fairly simple game – ironically more so than mainstream chess – as all of the zombies (playing pieces) are identical, and each piece can only undertake one of four possible moves (though you can move up to three pieces per turn). There is a way to make your basic zombie into a clever zombie, which is the equivalent of getting a pawn turned into a queen, but that’s about it…except there's more.

If the above sounds simple, then rest assured that it is, but that’s also just the foundation of the game. The beauty of Lurch! is that it’s highly customizable, so much so that the book not only presents three different advanced rules, but also twenty-six “scenarios” each of which are also variant ways to play.