The change in quarters has brought on another infestation of the UW campus. That’s right, the zombies are back.

Due to last quarter’s success, students from the RSO Human vs. Zombies Tag (HvZT) plan to hold their second game, with perhaps as many as 600 students participating.

“It’s basically just a glorified game of tag,” said freshman Andy Fulton, HvZT overseer.

According to the rules, the game starts off with one original zombie who then tags humans to turn them into zombies. These new zombies then try to tag the remaining humans. In the end, the game is won by the zombies if a full zombie infestation occurs, or humans can win by “starving” the zombies off. This occurs when a zombie fails to tag a human within two days.

The tagging takes place all over campus, excluding residential and academic halls. And every player can tag, or be tagged, anytime until the game officially ends.

Chris Parker, a McCarty Hall residential adviser and former player, plans to participate again this quarter.

“Playing the game was unlike anything I’d ever done,” Parker said. “The paranoia and the strategy and careful planning involved just to get to ‘the 8’ was exhilarating.”

Students can sign up to be a part of the game today in Red Square from noon to 3 p.m. and will be required to pay a $2 fee, which includes an orange bandana, needed to differentiate between zombie and human.

Students who played in past games must keep their bandana in order to play without paying an additional fee.

Many students took part in the last game of HvZT.

“Our Facebook group, once the game actually started, went from 180 [members] to like 580 in a course of a week,” Fulton said.

However, many students were also hesitant to join the game last quarter, largely due to misconceptions, Fulton said.

“A lot of people are turned off because they assume it’ll be really time-consuming,” he said. “But most of the [game play] happens on the way to class. Last quarter, I spent only about 15 minutes a day, tops, actively playing.”

The idea for a UW HvZT game began when Fulton found out about the game’s popularity on other college campuses. The game started in a college in Massachusetts and continued to spread around the country. There are now six active leagues in Washington alone.

“I saw a couple of YouTube videos with a group of friends and realized how awesome it would be to start one here,” Fulton said.

He and his friends were successful in registering HvZT as a student organization, after getting permission from several groups, including the UW police.

The organizers plan to keep the game a UW tradition, with new administrators overseeing future games.

As for Parker, HvZT is more than just a game of tag; It’s also a great tool for meeting new faces on campus.

“There was this immediate sense of camaraderie amongst each side,” he said. “The game has done an excellent job of uniting people. I’m a junior at UW, and still I feel like UW is a large campus. But after playing HvZT, I’ve met some really cool people and hope to see them for the next game.”

Reach reporter Jenica Rhee at news@dailyuw.com.