Great account of CFC Media Lab's Project HoodiePlay: The First Rule of Zombieland: Cardio - ZER01 Blog

20 Sep 2010 • by tiffany

It is no secret that i am rather fond of those flesh-eating once-humans known as ZOMBIES.

Thus, when I received a text to meet in front of South Hall at 10:30pm for the Canadian Film Centre Media Lab’s Project HoodiePlay, I was more than excited to show up. This is a game designed by Rose Bianchini, Kathleen Climie and David McCallum while with CFC and the game is known more affectionately as ZombieTag.

The rules are simple. Each gamer is asked to wear a hoodie: all installed with lights and sensors. One person is ‘it’ and after 10 seconds chases the rest of the frantic gamers in a restricted area. When a person gets tagged by the zombie, one becomes “infected” and the lights on the hoodie will begin to flash. Then they are to join hands with the existing monster to terrorize the rest of the crowd in increasing mass as more and more gamers succumb to the disease.

Honestly, I had my doubts going into the game. Not only was I not the most athletic person, it was getting late into a rather long day, and I had just gotten into a bike accident the day before, with wounds still trying to heal.

Not like any of that was on my mind when the first yell of “GO!” ripped through the crowded air of the AbsoluteZero street festival that was going on at the same time. Bystanders turned to look as a group of hooded runners zipped past them in a desperate attempt to survive. Shouts of “no running!” followed soon after, but the adrenaline made us unstoppable. Laughing hysterically (that’s what I do when I get nervous), I begged attendees to get out of my way or else I was going to “die” and mumbling obscenities, I ran up and down the short block before fate intervened.

The game was an amazing amount of fun. However, nothing beat that instant camaraderie that came with surviving something bigger than all of us put together. All of a sudden, our zombie-selves had something in common, brought together by a seemingly simple game of tag.

Although there are no more games of ZombieTag scheduled for the duration of 01SJ, if you are into public games, Rockwell Group LAB’s Plug-in-Play is something you MUST go see at night at the San Jose City Hall.

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Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales