Dread Central Exclusive: Attila Juhasz Talks Zombie Squash, Working With George A. Romero, and Much More

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Zombie Squash is now available for free on iOS devices and stars the legendary George A. Romero as Dr. B.E. Vil, an evil scientist with plans to take over the world with some rowdy undead veggies!

We recently chatted with the game’s creator, Attila Juhasz, about bringing this undead project to life. Read on to learn more.

AMANDA DYAR: Tell us a little about yourself and ACW Games/Attila’s Creative Works LLC.

ATTILA JUHASZ: I’m creatively obsessed. (chuckles) I love to create and am most happy when I write, design, program, produce or compose. Having a jack-of-all-trades personality lead me to start ACW Games, a division of Attila’s Creative Works LLC, which I formed in 2005. All my passions culminate in the creation of a game.

I’m also a big fan of quality, fantastical horror movies. George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead is still my favorite genre film of all time. In 1995 I launched what many consider to be the first commercial horror website, horrormovies.com, which I sold in 1998 to a publicly traded entertainment company and took the role of Director of Internet Marketing, where I produced the world’s first Internet Séance. I also wrote for a few leading horror magazines.

AMANDA: How did Zombie Squash get started and what were the main inspirations for it?

ATTILA: Two years ago I was obsessed with trying to come up with an idea for a game that could conceptually have tremendous commercial appeal, entertain all ages, and be fun for someone with interests like I do. I also wanted to do something different with zombies. Like a flash, the name hit me out of nowhere, Zombie Squash. But then I needed an angle that would separate me from the thousands of zombie games on the market already, be okay for kids but make a guy like me happy. Minutes later squash went from a verb to a noun. That was my twist, make actual squash and vegetation become the zombies. I was so excited about the idea that I started singing in jingle style “zombie squash” and thus the theme song was instantly born as well. The name, game concept and theme song all happened in a snowball of events afternoon. In six months I created a crude beta PC demo on my own and released it on the web. The feedback was tremendous and it attracted some great talent including music producer Roy Z. and George A. Romero, the godfather of all zombies.

AMANDA: How did George A. Romero get involved on the project, and tell us a little about his character, Dr. Beau E. Vil.

ATTILA: I wanted to bring in a well-known name to the game and to me, no name in the zombie world is more important or iconic than George A. Romero. He read my Zombie Squash game document and character voice-over script, loved it and was on board. George came up with the character’s over-the-top accent and had a lot of fun recording it. The entire session was filmed. A few clips are in the Zombie Squash trailer.

Read the FULL interview at:  http://www.dreadcentral.com