Maybe it’s because I rarely leave the confines of my home for fear of being dragged into the problems of others, but a few days ago, when I was walking around the campus in the early evening, I spotted a strange little spectacle. I usually pay little attention to the goings-on of the general public, but when you happen upon a group of kids shooting Nerf guns at another group of kids who appear to be emulating zombies, you have to stop and think, “Wait … what?” I’m sure that some of you have seen or participated in this odd little event, appropriately referred to as “Humans vs. Zombies.”
I did some minimal research and discovered HvZ is actually a pretty popular little role-playing game played at a number of universities nationwide. The whole point is for the “zombie” team to tag humans — thus converting them to the ranks of the walking undead — and for the “human” team to murder the hell out of the zombie crew with fluorescent-colored Nerf weapons of death. While reading the rules online, it became pretty apparent these devoted participants don’t mess around with this shit, with rules such as “No artificial means of propulsion may be used to attack anyone. No skateboards, bikes, cars, rollerblades, parachutes or hang gliders.”
Now, I’ll admi,t on the long list of things to do in public that almost beg for you to be given a wedgie by an unnamed bully, running around with a bright orange foam sword and chasing around your buddy who is pretending to be a zombie is pretty high up there. Let’s face it: Live-action role-playing games have seldom gotten anyone laid in the past — if it has, that was some freaky bedroom action. But you know what, who cares? As strange and uncool as it may be, these kids have the balls to go out in public on a college campus and act like kids because it’s fun.
I’ll be the first to admit that although I watched these weirdos go at it and thought to myself, “That’s awesome,” I’m damn sure not going to be joining them anytime soon. The vast majority of us are simply too self-conscious about how we look in public to cut loose and just have some good, old-fashioned childish giggles with our friends. It’s the same reason I never dragged my fat ass up the rock climbing wall or why most of us stopped rubbing Testudo’s nose like a week into freshman year. We’re too afraid of looking like a goober, and thus, we stop having fun.
Whether or not you’re into killing zombies with sock grenades, the point is this: On a college campus with so many of us trying so hard to mesh with the general populous, it’s refreshing to see some craziness going down. Remember last year when we had that huge pillow fight? Or during the snowstorm when that campus-wide snowball fight broke out? Those seemed like silly ideas, but they both turned out to be totally awesome, right?
Real life is just around the corner, folks. On graduation day, if you want to grow up, go ahead. But for now, let’s all take some time while we’re here to just be kids for a while.
Mike DiMarco is a senior English major. He can be reached at dimarco at umdbk dot com.
