If you're watching "The Walking Dead" or "World War Z," the idea is to get rid of all the zombies.

But if you're the New Jersey Zombie Walk, the idea is actually to bring in as many as possible.

That's because, for the second time in three years this weekend, the Central Jersey group took the Guinness World Records crown for the largest gathering of zombies. The final count of the record-breaking undead numbered a massive 9,592 shufflers down the famous Asbury Park boardwalk.

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As one of the more popular records in the GWR database, the largest gathering of zombies has grown even more hotly contested in recent years, with the rising popularity of the genre. New Jersey Zombie Walk originally broke the record with 4,093 zombies in October 2010. After losing it to a number of 8,027 in October of last year, the Jersey undead came out in droves to top the record by more than 1,500.

"It's pretty amazing (to have our title back)," said Jason Meehan, creator/director of the New Jersey Zombie Walk. "It's really just the fans that drive this event showing how much they love it, how much they come back in bigger numbers every year. It's remarkable to say that we're one of the greatest events of our kind in the world."

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More than just attempting a record, one of the stated goals of the attempt was to demonstrate that the Jersey Shore could still thrive in its ongoing recovery march from Superstorm Sandy, which devasted the region a year earlier.

With signs draped up and down the boardwalk claiming that the "Jersey Shore Lives!" while another world record fell, the mission was more than accomplished.

"This is an amazing event," said Jackie Pappas, executive director of the Asbury Park Chamber of Commerce. "It's near and dear to the hearts of everyone. We wanted to show everyone that the Jersey Shore lives and we couldn't think of a better way to do that than with almost 10,000 zombies."