Review of PopCap’s “Plants vs. Zombies”

PopCap sent us an early copy of their new game “Plants vs. Zombies,” and the staff at HvZ gave it a play. Here’s our reviews.

Max Temkin

It’s Finals Week, I just played about 4 hours of “Plants vs. Zombies,” and I’m ready for 4 more.

I don’t know what it is that the PopCap entertainment scientists do to make these games, but they deliver – and PvZ might be their best yet.

Plants vs. Zombies is deceptively simple – it starts out slow (slow enough that even my parents could get into it) but as it goes on, the complexity increases until each round becomes a desperate six-lane juggling act as you try to outlast a delightful horde of animated zombies.

PvZ could have just been another tower defense – I have 3 on my iPhone – but it rises above the rest. Seemingly minor strategic choices add up to make a uniquely challenging game. Acquiring towers in an RPG fashion, equipping only eight or nine per round, balancing the number of sunflowers with the number of defensive towers, and deciding which lanes to fortify first provide substantive dilemmas.

The zombie theme could be really corny and cliché`, but, here too, little details make this game so lovable – the Michael Jackson “Thriller” zombies, the zomboni, the backstories for each zombies, the hilarious voice acting for your crazy neighbor, the help screen from the main menu:

This game is funny, imaginative, challenging, and above all addictive. For $19.95, you won’t be disappointed.

I have about half the game left, plus whatever bonus content I manage to unlock for myself. If it continues to be as exciting with each new plant to use or zombie to contend with, I’m sure I’ll still be playing by this time tomorrow. Plants vs. Zombies is a time vampire.

Joe Sklover

After playing PvZ for 10 minutes, I had to play more. After 30 minutes, I was utterly addicted. The creators of Peggle, PopCap games has landed another hit. This tower defense game has the hilarity of Evil Dead II and the intensity of Insane Aquarium put together.

The rules are simple… in order to grow plants to protect your lawn from the zombies, you need light. There are varies ways to get light: sunflowers, certain types of mushrooms, and, of course, the sun.

Think of the first few levels as the tutorial. You start off with only one plant type, the pea shooter, and one strip of grass to protect. As you complete each level, you unlock more powerful weapons and utilities and must protect more strips of grass. You use these in turn to better protect your lawn. Every few minutes, larger waves of zombies come, and you need to be prepared.

During the beginning of the game, you are introduced to Crazy Dave, your experienced zombie slaying neighbour. He teaches you some strategy and sells you interesting tools to help protect your lawn.

My only quarrel is that after playing for an hour and a half, the music becomes repetitive. I wish it was as awesome as the trailer’s theme song. Out of 10 awesome points, I give it 8.4.

Trevor Moorman

We at HvZ got our hands on a press copy of Plants Vs Zombies put out by the people who made Peggle. You remember Peggle right? That game with the pretty colors you could get off of Steam?

Anyways, it’s a tower defense style game where you defend your lawn from a horde of zombies. It’s like you’re an old man and those damn kids with their roller skates and rock music are stompin’ on your grass, but instead of impotently shaking your fist and yelling, you have plants that shoot, freeze, explode, and devour those kids in order to protect your precious porch. It’s pretty fucking sweet.

Like any tower defense it can be repetitive, but PvZ does what it can to keep your attention from straying. As the game progresses not only do the zombies get harder and weirder, holding javelins and newspapers and the like, you unlock more weapons and gameplay becomes much more difficult. It keeps you on your toes, and gives you a satisfying feeling when you send a hail of peas down the lawn to pick off the encroaching horde. Check it out here (http://www.popcap.com/games/pvz) to play the demo or lay down $20 if you got the cash and want the full experience. It’s a good time all around.

Chris Weed

If you haven’t heard of Popcap or their previous titles (Bejeweled, Peggle, Insane Aquarium, etc) you probably don’t spend much time playing video games. That’s ok, nobody’s perfect, and there is still a pretty good chance you will enjoy their games. Popcap has become the industry standard for fun, lightweight, accessible games that steal hours of your life without mercy and Plants vs Zombies is no exception.

PvZ shares more similarities with a “certain other game” than just its name. The goal is to defend yourself from an encroaching horde of zombies, and lots of them. As you might have guessed, you do this with a bit of creative gardening. If that sounds strange to anyone, well, just wait until the moonwalking “thriller” zombie attacks you with his phantom backup dancers. Something tells me Popcap wasn’t going for realism with this title. I mean, the game is chock full of zombies being hit with projectiles and not once do they sit out for the allotted 15 minute stun time – craziness!

Just like Popcap’s other titles, this game bleeds cute. While far from revolutionary, the graphics are fun and do a good job of immersing you into a world where botany is an acceptable defense against the undead. You might even feel the pangs of guilt as your cartoon faced wall-nut (used to block the zombies from your more vulnerable plants) is chewed to death. Even the walking dead worm their way into your heart with their Zamboni-riding, scuba diving antics.

There is surprisingly deep gameplay hidden beneath the bright colors and bouncy music despite the family friendly packaging. The game starts out simple enough, requiring you to defend one strip of your yard. Zombies slowly shamble toward your house as you collect sunshine (by clicking it as it falls from the sky, duh) and use it to grow plants in their path. As you play through the game you gain access to an increasing number of quirky plants and (to get the bio majors off my back) fungi. Each plant has a unique and specific method of helping keep the zombies off of your lawn. Some plants help you build up more sunshine. Some are used to create a single explosion of rotting flesh and others keep shooting until the end of the level or until the zombies smash through your defenses. The zombies switch up their tactics as well. As you battle your way through the levels, the undead begin arming themselves with everything from newspapers, pole vaults, screen doors and balloons, each of which requiring a different response.

I’m sincerely impressed with the pacing of this game. The learning curve is gradual enough that I’m pretty sure my grandmother could grasp the basic concepts as they are introduced. Yet the game is challenging and fun enough to keep me, a self-proclaimed video game aficionado, interested. The minor changes and additions to the gameplay make pretty much every level fresh and interesting because they force you to constantly re-evaluate your strategy. By the time you are required to pick and choose which plants to use in a level, it feels like an honest-to-goodness strategy game. Yet not once does it feel overbearing or obtuse. Every new step is explained simply and clearly.

The only reason I would hesitate to tell you to go and download the demo right away is that I know a lot of you are in the middle of finals week. You will probably need the precious hours that this game is bound to steal from you. To everyone else who do not have finals: please go and download the demo right away. You will enjoy this game whether you have a pulse or not.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 5th, 2009 at 8:03 pm and is filed under CTF, Content.