‘Unicorns and Zombies’ is Your New Gaming Addiction

Unicorns and Zombies is a new card based strategy game in the tradition of Magic the Gathering. The game currently supports 2-4 players who do battle in a with a combination of character-specific skills, gear, and battle actions. The cards, drawn by renowned illustrator BeeJay DeLong are whimsical and individual pieces of art  in and of themselves. There’s even a NSFW expansion pack that will have you howling with laughter. 

Gaynrd spoke to creator Jason Davis.

How did you get into gaming? I’ve been gaming as long as I can remember. Like most I started out playing Monopoly and that was interesting. I think it taught me to just always buy shit and try to sell it. But it got me hooked on games. The idea of being able to be something greater than you are in reality. 

But even moreso, gaming was an opportunity to get together with your friends and family and there’s nothing more exciting than getting competitive with them, getting extremely upset and flipping tables—and then doing all over again next round. 

It’s a good time. Especially if you add whiskey.

How did you settle on Unicorns and Zombies for the concept? The idea for UnZ came first, and  led to the foundation and mechanics of the game that I built the mechanics. Once I felt it was fun to play and kept people interested, I then introduced the art.

Was it always Unicorns and Zombies? Fuck yeah, is there anything else? Don’t get me wrong, there are more things coming! Mythical things. 

What goes into developinga game like this? That’s tough to answer concisely because there’s so many myriad aspects to the process. I’ve been playing Magic The Gathering since 1994 or thereabouts. Magic  was one of the first games that I felt fully immersed in—like when I played I stepped outside every day reality. I immediately began thinking of original spins on the games format. But to answer your question, I started developing the game about four years before I was ready to show it this year at LosAngeles Comic-Con. So like any labor of love, it takes time, and a lot of blood, sweat and tears to develop  a game like this—especially if you’re doing it independently and don’t have a major toy company behind you.

I had originally intended to draw the  whole thing myself until BeeJay got involved. He hit me up on social media and the minute I saw his art on his instagram page—I knew he was going to be integral to its success. We personally connected over a mutual love of comic book artist Skottie Young and his designs brought the game to life.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B3zu8tQHmwT/

The NSFW expansion pack is hilarious, was it always in the cards (pun intended) to create it or did the thought come after?With what goes on in my brain, yes the NSFW pack was always planned. In fact there are even more expansions that are being worked on right now. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/B2QN3MVn-3x/

You ran a successful Kickstarter crowd sourcing campaign that enabled you to execute your vision, what’s the key to a successful campaign? Well the first one failed and that’s a good thing because I learned a lot and because those missteps led to me assembling the strong team I have now. I will tell you that when you think you’re ready to go to KS with a project, You’re not. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlT_HDJjWAY/

But at the end of the day the real reward is seeing people have fun and enjoy each others company. I love that. I also love the feedback from our fans—they’re so thoughtful and the feed back is always contructive and never pejorative.  You need that feedback and peoples opinions. 

We have a Discord channel and on the website you can sign up for the forums and in there we are working on updating the rules, explaining the cards, and even working with others to help with their games! 

You can purchase the game here.