In the wake the apocalypse few have survived, but the constant threat of zombies on your trail is alive and well. While banding together might seem smart, survivors also face the struggle of fighting one another over supplies and weapons …

We all know the story! The real question here is, would you be able to survive? Strategize to the best of your ability to gather points and outwit your opponents in The Walking Dead Something to Fear Card Game! Let’s take a closer look.

What Is It?

A card game where players must (somewhat) work together in order to survive 9 waves of walkers and villains.

Each round players secretly select a numbered character card to determine turn order and their ability for the round. They have to collectively keep enough damage points out of the mob, but must also fend for themselves in trying to collect the most valuable resources from the encounter deck.

At the end of the 9 rounds, players total up mob damage and personal damage and only score if they took less than 20 damage total, and thus survived.

Who Is It For?

I absolutely think fans of the comic/show will easily get into this one. The same goes for fans of the game’s mechanics (simultaneous action selection, set collection, take that).

I would also recommend it to bigger groups (at least 4 but probably most recommend at the full 6) as I feel it plays way better with more, and doesn’t offer as much with only 2-3 players.

Finally, I think the game is pretty simple, so really ages 10+ would be able to pick this one up with no problem, as long as they aren’t scared of the theme!

Contents and Quality

The components are very simple, just 118 cards (54 character cards, for 6 players, 63 encounter cards, labeled by player count, and 1 tie-breaker card) and a rule book. Oh, and a box that’s way too big for what’s in it, haha! But, it does make it easy to store, which is nice.

The cards are average quality, nothing special but not bad, and the character cards would definitely benefit from sleeving to avoid nicks that might give away what someone has chosen before the reveal. The rulebook is really well written, easy to follow, and includes helpful examples throughout!

PROS

  • Quick and easy to learn, teach, and play
  • Great with 4 to 6 players as it gives you a lot of meaningful choices to make with your character abilities
  • Good implementation of both theme and mechanics
  • “Advanced” variant puts everyone on equal footing

CONS

  • I don’t think I can recommend this at 2 at all. The distribution of mob damage on available cards is so high that there isn’t enough weapons to try and help you out of a tight situation. It felt like, in the multiple rounds at 2 that I played, you had to choose between sub-optimal moves to stay alive (and basically hand your opponent a win) or just tank the game to kill both players (which is a viable strategy, sure, but not a corner you want to be backed into almost every game)
  • The Jesus character card seems over-powered, especially since other characters can allow him to be played again if taken out of the discard pile.

Difficulty

I’d rate this low on the difficulty scale, a 2/5. It’s definitely an easy game in concept – just choose a character ability, do it, and secure a card to your stash. But, sometimes the decision of which character and encounter cards to choose can be tricky, so it does elevate it a little bit.

I will say though that the advanced variant is the way to go. It allows players to choose between all 9 character cards instead of from only 3, and I think it greatly improves the game by leveling the playing field.

Final Thoughts

Overall, a neat game! I wasn’t initially into it because it didn’t grab me at 2 players (which is usually the count I start all my plays at), but with a bigger group, it can be a lot of fun. You can get torn between what character to play when, what cards to secure, and who to steal from or wound, but those are all impactful decisions, which is what I like to see in games. It also has a nice flow round to round, and doesn’t really see opportunities to get bogged down by AP. If you’re into The Walking Dead, add this to your list to check out!

Happy Gaming~

Additional Information:
Designers – Derek Funkhouser, Lizzy Funkhouser
Artist – Justin Chan
Publisher – Skybound Games
BGG
BGA

*I was provided a copy of this game to do this review*

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