Addictive action and supercute visuals make Plants vs.
Zombies an enjoyable, engaging romp.
Plants and zombies aren't exactly what you'd
call natural enemies, given the latter's single-minded hunger for brains and
the former's complete lack thereof. Despite being brainless, plants apparently
appreciate the hand that waters them, so when zombie hordes come to eat your
brains, it's Plants vs. Zombies. To protect your own gray matter, you create
defensive fortifications around your house by cultivating a wide variety of
cute, combat-ready plants to handle the goofy varieties of zombie attackers. Plants
vs. Zombies is solidly rooted in the tower defense genre, but it grows and
branches in such a charming, accessible way that almost anyone can pick it up
and have a lot of fun. The basic gameplay is pleasantly engaging, but it will
take seasoned defenders a few hours before they can play legitimately
challenging levels. Fortunately, Plants vs. Zombies rolls out new units and
environments at a good pace, and the minigames, puzzles, and Survival mode
offer some clever and challenging diversions. It's a delightful game that is
both addictive and accessible, and you'll never look at your garden the same
way again.
The core action is quite simple. Your lawn is
divided into a grid, and each square can hold one plant. Zombies shamble up the
rows of the grid toward your house, and if they get past your defenses, well,
you know. At the top of the screen there are a number of slots that house the
various plants at your disposal. Setting a plant down in a square costs
sunlight, a resource that falls intermittently from the sky. However, you need
more sunlight than is freely available, so you have to plant sunflowers to
generate more sunlight. During the first minutes of a level, it's a measured
balancing act between building your sunflower ranks and laying down defenses to
deal with the first few zombies. Your basic attack units shoot peas down the
row that they are planted in, so you'll need one in each row before too long.
As the zombies become more numerous, you bolster your botanical battalion with
a growing variety of projectile launchers, defensive barriers, attack
amplifiers, and one-use weapons of zombie destruction. After you've survived
the final wave of zombies, you're rewarded with a new minigame, a new type of
plant, or perhaps just a hastily scrawled note from your would-be assailants.
Variety and creativity take this basic mission
structure and turn it into something special. Just when you've gotten your
daytime defense strategy down, the zombies decide to attack at night and you
have a whole new set of plants to manage. When you've taken care of the
nocturnal nasties, it's back to the daytime, only now a few of your rows are
taken up by your backyard pool (there are snorkel zombies). New units come
along that fit the new environments, and this steady trickle of new elements
helps keep the gentle difficulty curve from becoming dull. Still, tower defense
veterans will have to endure a lot of simple, familiar action in order to find
a real challenge, and the wait may prove too long for some. Fortunately, all of
the units are cleverly realized and adorably animated. Happy sunflowers bob
merrily as they fuel your defense efforts, and pole-vaulting zombies jog toward
your house with gangly athleticism. From angry jalapenos to spacy wall-nuts,
each unit has a great sense of personality, and the first time you watch a
dancing zombie moonwalk onto your lawn and summon his garishly dressed backup
dancers, you'll likely chuckle with amusement. The visual charm makes the game
a pleasure to look at, and it helps keep things feeling fresh.
Once you've completed the main adventure and
unlocked most of the units, the Survival mode offers a number of stages in
which you can seek a tougher challenge. Each Survival stage is basically a
bunch of increasingly difficult levels strung together. In both Adventure and
Survival mode, you get a preview of the zombie types to expect, so you can
array your defenses accordingly. Certain zombies can bypass certain defenses;
for example, the balloon zombie floats over normal projectiles, but you can
plant a cactus to shoot him down. In Survival mode, adjusting for these
midstage changes might mean that you have to uproot some of your plants to make
room for strategically crucial ones, or just push your established perimeter
out further toward the zombie invaders. Unlike in the Adventure mode, your
defenses are persistent throughout each level and you get the chance to change
your plant loadout periodically. Building on established defenses is an
interesting tactical twist and is a great opportunity to use some of the more
exotic species that you may not have used in your Adventure mode strategy. This
all adds up to make Survival mode surprisingly rewarding. It offers new tactical
challenges and a reason to play beyond the main adventure.
There are some other fun reasons to continue
playing after completing Adventure mode, namely puzzles and minigames. There
are two types of puzzle game: Vasebreaker and I, Zombie. In the first, you are
given a lawn with a number of nondescript vases on it. You have to break them
all to win, but you never know what will pop out. It might be a zombie, or it
might be a helpful plant. You have to dispatch all of the zombies to survive,
and doing so with improvised defenses is fun and hectic. I, Zombie turns the
tables and lets you deploy the zombies. Busting through each row of plant
defenses requires that you use your strategic knowledge for evil; and, in a
delightfully morbid twist, you'll actually enjoy the sound of zombies chewing
on plants. The minigames are a wacky assortment of one-off challenges that
further play with the basic dynamics of Plants vs. Zombies. Some games pit you
against modified enemies (zombies with plants for heads; invisible zombies),
whereas others mess with your planting strategy (planting entire columns at
once; mysterious portals that redirect your projectiles). With 20 levels of
puzzles and 20 different minigames, Plants vs. Zombies offers a lot of
entertaining ways to keep playing.
Of course, satisfaction for a well-defended lawn
isn't your only reward. You can earn money throughout every mode, which you can
then spend on a variety of items offered by your crazy neighbor, who sells
things out of the back of his car. Items range from defensive boosts, to
upgrades for your existing plants, to a wide variety of gardening implements to
help you cultivate your Zen gardens. These areas are simple greenhouses in
which you can grow your exotic plants in a zombie-free environment. The music
helps set the Zen vibe and is quite good across the board. It generally
consists of lighthearted, progressive loops that bop along at a good pace and
set a great tone for the action.
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