Plants vs. Zombies

Wow, another zombie game. The latest (and arguably greatest) from PopCap games, masters of all things casual, is a cute, wonderfully designed tower defense game with loads of extras, and quite a bit of replay value as this sort of thing goes.

In PvZ, a variety of zombies are trying to invade your home, and your only defense other than a series of lawnmowers are the rows of plants that you place in order to prevent passage. You collect a number of "seed packets" (which are basically cards) that allow you to place a specific plant on the "lawn" which is basically just a grid. Each plant has a specific purpose, cost, and downtime before they can be planted again, and the order and manner in which they are placed will pretty much determine success or failure. The sunflower, for example, is your only means of producing sufficient "sunshine" during the day--the points you have to collect in order "buy" a plant, so they are essential to success. They must be planted early, but they cannot defend themselves, so it is up to you to also set up some defense early on, in the form of a pea-shooter, etc. so you can defend the lawn, at the cost of not being able to plant as many sunflowers right away. There are also wallnuts, which are edible barriers that block encroaching zombies and buy you some time to set things up, but they don't last forever. Every plant in the game is useful, and it allows for a broad array of strategies, as there are only so many slots for the seed packets--you have to choose carefully.



There are at least six main levels in the game, consisting of 9 or more stages in each level, with at least two or three waves of zombies to survive in each. Some have great little twists on the game play thrown in here and there. Some levels don't allow you to pick seeds at all; instead, you are randomly tossed seed packets that you must plant as the zombies invade. These levels are hectic, as you have to adapt your strategy on the fly using whatever you are given. There's also zombie bowling, in which a swarm of zombies approaches as you try to take out as many as possible by throwing wallnuts down the rows.

Stages take place during day or night, sometimes with various weather effects, and play during the night is completely different than during the day, as all of the plants are different (it's a fungal theme), and so the flow of any given level changes. New challenges are also introduced, as graves rise from the ground and take up valuable grid space, as well as spawn more zombies during the final wave of each level. Fog will obscure at least half of grid at times, so you have to choose whether or not to use up a valuable card slot in order plant something that will push it back.



The art direction in the game is awesome: endearing and funny, with a wide variety of zombie types, each with different powers (though as my wife points out, there are no female zombies, which is weird), and a few will probably make you laugh. You can access a compendium of all plant and zombie types, and the descriptions are fun to read. The music is subtle, and there isn't a whole lot of variety, but it fits the theme well, and fills it's in the background nicely. There's almost no voice acting to speak of except for the occasional moan or cry for brains from an approaching zombie. But it's all good. The sound effects for the plants are enjoyable, especially during the later stages where you'll have several rows of different shooting plants, each with a different effect. It makes the craziness of it all seem more tangible.



After beating the game you open up dozens of challenge and puzzle levels, and in a lot of ways they're more enjoyable than the adventure mode itself. There's a survival mode, in which you must evolve your defense over a five day period under certain conditions (with at least 3 waves each day) in order to win. There's "I, Zombie", in which you play the zombies themselves, and you have to choose the right zombies in the right order to get through the plant defenses and make it to the sweet brains at the end. There's also a great assortment of puzzles that have you playing anything from Bejeweled with your plants as a zombie swarm approaches, to actually having zombies with plant heads shooting down your defenses. You also open up the zen garden, where you feed and nourish plants you find during the mini games or the second play through, and they give you cash or diamonds periodically, or you can sell them back after they're grown for chunks of money. Speaking of which, I'm on the second play though now, and it's a lot of fun. You have all the plants you've collected throughout the first run ( I still haven't seen all of the plants, or even all of the zombies), but the catch is that the game will automatically select three plants that you have to take with you, and this can often make the levels more challenging than before, as they often would not have been the seeds you would have liked.

Overall, this is probably the the best $9 I've spent on a game in a long time. The art style, the humor and game play are fun, and while the game isn't very hard overall, specific levels are quite challenging, especially towards the end. The main adventure mode will take you 4 or 5 hours to complete, but with the dozens of extra games lasting at least that long, and a worthwhile second play through, it's a lot of game for the price. You can also buy it through PopCap's sight as well, but it's twice what the Steam price is, but will probably have free content for download in the future.