A cosy game, with zombies?!
Cosy games are big business.
There are those that have been enjoying farming sims since the days of Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons, but it’s fair to say the majority of players jumped on the bandwagon during COVID and with Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
But now there is a game that combines a more recent gaming trend with a classic gaming trend: zombies. But do the undead make a cosy game more uncomfortable?
ZombFarm is the name of the game, and from that alone it should be immediately obvious what it combines. Zombies and farms, farms and zombies. You won’t be farming zombies per se, nor will you be zombifying farms.

You know the story by now though; you inherit a farm from a family member and must turn it around to make a profit. The difference here is that the farm you inherit is already quite well built up with all sorts of farmyard animals living there. Pigs, sheep, chickens, cows and a dog; your main focus is on selling their produce alongside growing crops.
Get your objectives done
You have a week to do that. Every Sunday a pickup truck will arrive in the nearby town and you will have four objectives to complete and deliver. These can vary week to week. Sometimes you will be required to deliver a specific number of eggs, other times it may be flowers or sheep’s wool. There may even be an objective for killing a certain number of zombies.
The other main aspect of ZombFarm is the zombies themselves. Between you and the town is a forest that has various different layouts, overrun by zombies. They will never intrude on your farm, but there is a benefit to killing them. It turns out, and I am not sure how this was discovered, but zombie flesh makes for an excellent fertiliser. So much so, that if you have enough, any plants you have planted can be instantaneously harvested with the flesh. But be warned, if they kill you, your day will end abruptly and you will reawaken back at your farm. And the town is the only way you can stock up on animal feed and seeds for planting. I say the town, but rather the same pickup truck you need to drop-off also acts as the shop. There is a pretty looking town area, but it cannot be explored unfortunately.
Missing a delivery on Sunday isn’t an instant failure, but ZombFarm acts on a three strikes and you’re out policy. This goes too for neglecting your animals. They will need to be fed, watered, cleaned, defleaed and kept generally happy. Because if any are unhappy come Sunday night, that is another strike too.
You can check an animal’s welfare on the next screen from where your objectives are shown. Happier animals such as horses and cows can even have offspring, but this appears to be down to luck rather than exact science.

The art of defleaing a chicken
Gathering your produce is done by a series of fun, if simple minigames. Defleaing animals – even chickens – has you moving a pair of tweezers over tufts of fur to pick up the fleas, and collecting eggs or wool has you catching them in a basket as they fall from the sky. Some animals like cows have their own unique minigame; you’ll be able to go milking them by mashing the appropriate button. There is even a lake where you can do a spot of fishing, but this never came up as an objective for me when playing.
Whilst these minigames are short and fun, they do highlight the shallowness of ZombFarm. Your farm is already built up, and aside from buying a couple of new fields, there is very little to upgrade. Same goes for the town; with all business being conducted through the pickup, there is nothing to explore. The shop only sells four items too. And if you complete your delivery on Sunday, your only rewards are more money and the chance to do it all again the following week. Aside from a couple of varying objectives, it plays out the exact same.
Even when fighting zombies, it feels shallow. Your character has no weapons or armour and all you’ll do is launch an unconnected melee attack in front of the sprite and after a couple of hits, the zombie disappears. You could probably even sleep the first few days away and still comfortably get the objectives finished in time. After completing one week, there is nothing more that ZombFarm offers.
But by then, you will have probably already got all the Achievements and can move on…

A Shallow Harvest with Limited Appeal
There is a reason why farming simulators tend to have starting from scratch. As ZombFarm proves, inheriting an established farm is actually quite boring. There is no progression to speak of, and by the time the end of the week comes by, you will have already exhausted the shallow gameplay. Whilst the gathering minigames can be fun, there is little else here to back them up. Even the act of slaying zombies feels shallow, and is a good indicator that cosy games and zombies should be kept well apart.
Your Undead Links
What Happens When Zombies Meet Farming? Find Out in ZombFarm – https://www.thexboxhub.com/what-happens-when-zombies-meet-farming-find-out-in-zombfarm/
ZombFarm is on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/zombfarm/9NSG5RD2QX30