Review of Zombieees! In Santa’s Village, a kind of wholesome holiday horror mashup
Zombieees! In Santa’s Village is a rules lite TTRPG by Joie Yong that treads the line between grim and fun, dark and wholesome. Check it out for a whimsical zombie-themed family and friends game night opportunity that works well for the holidays or just because!
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Audience for Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
Despite the initial vibes on this, I found Zombieees! In Santa’s Village to be, surprisingly, all-ages friendly.
You’re playing zombies, but the circumstances around that are a bit silly, and you’re more going around investigating things (and hiding that you’re zombies) versus fighting or chasing NPCs for their brains.
There is a necromancer in the story, and your characters are undead, so there is that topic, but, if your players are OK with these two elements, the rest of the game is quite wholesome. You’ll explore Santa’s workshop, try to solve a bit of a mystery, maybe get some help from Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Rudolph, and then face off with the story’s villain! And that encounter has a pretty solid non-combat option for resolution alongside the combat choice.
Mechanics were also very easy to pick up and understand, with most of the game being story-driven, so there’s also very little mechanical barrier to play.
If you have a decent safety tools discussion before playing (i.e. we’re sentient zombies, not zombies from The Walking Dead) and your players are cool with playing undead characters, I’d say this is pretty all-ages. My 7yo was OK with it, and we just kind of played silly zombies.
Setting for Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
Zombieees! In Santa’s Village is set in, well, Santa’s Village! The story starts with you and the other players waking up as zombies after an NPC botched a necromancy ritual that was supposed to grant them special powers.
You and your friends will have to sneak about the North Pole’s winter wonderland to track down the runaway culprit and stop their quest for power… all while hiding the fact that the undead now walk amongst the pine trees!
There’s plenty of locations to explore, ranging from the workshop to the reindeer stables to the tree farm, and the game prompts and encourages players to add their own additional locations or scene elements for individual flair.
Characters in Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
Your character in Zombieees! In Santa’s Village is an elf who was, accidentally, turned into a zombie. Now, imbued with a new zombie power (like “smart” for keeping their brains or “stinky” for… being an undead elf), they must figure out how this happened and stop the one responsible.
You’ll also encounter some fun NPCs like Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Rudolph who may help you on your quest, if you can manage to meet their challenge rolls. These are special rolls + conditions that must be met to obtain aid or cooperation in your adventure.
The NPCs also have some fun additional information that can be very helpful in coming up with multiple solutions to the overall problem while providing a decent amount of fun flavor (i.e. Mrs. Claus REALLY wants to go on a vacation!!). The NPCs were well built and tied into both the mechanics and the story in a wonderfully concise and useful way.
Mechanics for Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
Zombieees! In Santa’s Village is rules-lite, with all rolls boiling down to a 1d6 or 2d6 success/fail and consequence/bonus style scale.
Any time there’s some kind of challenge, you’ll roll 1d6 to see what the outcome is based on a small chart of options. If you are using your special zombie ability (like having the “hungry” trait while trying to gnaw through a fence made of candy canes), you get an extra d6 to roll and can take the higher of the two results.
If you get a critical success (rolling a 6 on a d6), you can save up a point for later to help boost a roll out of fail-mode and keep your zombies head in the game in a pinch.
So, there’s a little bit of strategy in who from the group you send to do tasks so you can get their ability bonus, pushing for teamwork, and there’s a little bit of strategy in when to use your banked up zombie levels. Beyond this, it is all storytelling and letting the players (or consequences from dice rolls) push the story forward!
The mechanics were just enough to keep the game moving and interesting, and they were easy to understand, learn, and explain in just a few minutes, which, for me, is a good combo on days when we just want a silly and weird story to tell together.
Overall thoughts on Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
I really enjoyed Zombieees! In Santa’s Village, which, me being able to say that about something that falls under a winter horrorland game jam, is kind of cool. I, personally, have a lot of triggers about blood and gore and whatnot, so I often feel guilty if I need to ask folks not to include that if we’re playing a horror-themed game or someone has a horror-themed character (I know that it’s OK to state triggers, but the feeling is still there).
Because of that, I generally just opt out of anything that looks remotely like a horror game.
But I still do like creepy games and don’t mind if they get a little dark humor-ish!
This game had literally none of the triggers on my list. You can definitely add things in to vibe how you want, but it’s also comfortable to read through the game and not come across vivid art/descriptions that you have to edit out to accommodate folks who have triggers. Instead of it having the solid horror content in as default, it’s more of a flexible base where you can add what you want, instead of taking out what you want, which makes a big difference.
I thought it was a good balance of creepy and sensitivity, making it great for mixed age groups or collections of folks who have different tolerances for horror-themed content… but maybe still want something on the creepy side.
Find a copy of Zombieees! In Santa’s Village
You can find a copy of Zombieees! In Santa’s Village Joie Yong’s itchio page!
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