Needs to happen.  Think about it.  Teams of players attempting to survive while battling off hoards of the undead (or the infected if you choose to go more Resident Evil).  Maybe even turn into a Zombie, and build an army to take out your friends who survived.  Yeah.  So many possibilities.  Start you off in a house with a kitchen knife or maybe a fire poker and say: Go!  Survive!

Especially if it weren't level based.  Sure, older characters get better skills and whatnot, but it'd be cool if a talented newbie could in theory, kill the same things as a not-so-great vet.  Maybe as characters survive in the world they get bonuses to awareness cause they know what to look for, or you become a better shot.  Hey, anyone with a shotgun can blow away a body, be it undead or alive, if it's withing ten feet, but shooting a shuffling corpse from a quarter mile away with an M2, not so easy.  Vets have fewer close calls.

Economy?  Well resources are food, water, heat/light giving items like wood, coal, and matches.  Not to mention batteries, radio parts, gasoline, clothing, shoes.  And what about shelter for that matter? That'd be important. 

Which brings us to the best part: advertising.  I know you're panicking right now, but this actually helps us.  Wouldn't it be cool to find a pack of actual Duracell batteries, or break open a Coke machine to get something to drink, or barricade yourself in a 7-11 surrounded by the cheap Poptarts and Hostess snack cakes you hope are going to keep you alive long enough to make it to the next secure location?  And all those products mean more money goes to the game, less money comes from us, and the producing company can hire more designers to make the game even better!  It's realism at it's capitalistic finest!

So, all you fine video-game-making corporations (all of whom I am sure will read this post) where is our Zombie Apocalypse?  I see this as a winning idea.

there is a halflife2 mod like this i don`t remember the name but the descripition soudet cool.as an mmo i don`t think you want to just kill zombies all day long.

Originally posted by marowit

there is a halflife2 mod like this i don`t remember the name but the descripition soudet cool.as an mmo i don`t think you want to just kill zombies all day long.

I agree on the zombie MMO. 

www.exanimusthegame.com/

Still in development... but someday maybe...

I know this definitely is not the first topic that popped up with the Zombie MMO ideals. I think I'll be the spoil sport and at least throw out the issues people came across thinking about this...

1. Death penalty in a zombie-infested world?

2. Varying zombie enemy types. (This became a problem because generally there are the dark-fantasy or infectious based zombie types, but in truth, they are all zombies. Kinda boring to some.)

3. Goals - Survival is fun, sure. But logging on every day just to survive 'til dinner time? Eh. Need incentive beyond finding a place to hide and farm all day, no?

4. [This kind of links to number 3.] Safe zones? Places to log off? Log off effects? NPC survivors?

5. [This is just a personal point I thought about with the advertising thing...] There are quite a few companies who wouldn't really want their product advertised via zombie-infested hell.  Quite the contrary.

But yea, I'm just statin' a few issues. Talk about'm! I want a Zombie MMO too, but gotta work out the quirks, no?

Have you looked at Fallen Earth? If its not vapor, it might be close to what you are looking for. Its not zombie centric but there are zombies and plenty of them.

Here is a movie. There is one with the opening tutorial out there that has all the zombies in it. Look around. Its main problem is its devs have been stalled for years.

www.youtube.com/watch

HGL?

While a zombie mmo would be concievably interesting, you run into a problem with the lack of variety in mobs.  As someone else pointed out, hacking away at zombies would only be fun for a short while before seeming repetive.  What is needed is some sort of controlling force similar to what the scourge in WOW (bear with me) have such that a greater variety of enemies could be present.  Perhaps necromancers of some sort trying to take over the world and creating progressively stronger and more disturbing forms of unlife.  It could function such that at higher lvls you encounter zombies are like 8 feet tall and look something like frankenstein with 2 heads,3 arms, and a mouth in the center of the stomach. 

As for economy, lets assume this is set in America, I doubt that the US dollar is going to have much value after a zombie apocalypse.  Chances are people will just look at it and say "thats just paper!  Do you have any water?"

Whatever economy is present will probably be centered around bartering rather than any straight currency.  Probably need crafting professions who can create generators, wire lighting, provide health care and so forth.  Maybe raids could be held on oil fields infested with zombies to try and get the fuel needed to power those things.  Has some interesting potential in that line of thought. 

Hmhmm,seems nice,XD.

It would definitely have a niche player base but it would probably end up being released with carebear content to attract more players.

To address some of the issues I see:

The same mobs repeated over and over: what about mutating zombies?  Storyline wise say the longer they are zombies, the more twisted they become until you truly get monsters.  Also, zombies needn't be human exclusive.  That undead/infected/necro elephant is going to be a pain to take down. Everything is still zombies, but you have plenty of variation.

About what you would do other than survive:  Okay, personal preference, I hate the grinding-to-get-to-the-end-game part of MMOs.  So start it at the end game.  I'd like to see the zombies as a back drop to a game that was much more about PvP and players warring for control of the limited resources and safe zones than a game primarily about exterminating zombies.  Sure zombies need to be killed to get your hands on said goods, but it's more interesting when there's a human on the other end of the connection.  Think... third person role playing shooter with bonuses that stay with your character over time?

They could do something interesting with corps retrival. Such as your corps turns into an NPC zombie which walks around killing your friends. there is so much you could do with that.