Review – Plants vs Zombies (part 1)

Because it's obviously the biggest release of the century, both Will Anderson and Nometet have taken upon themselves the duty of reviewing Plants vs Zombies. In this part one, Will takes a look. (part two now online, here)

PopCap have done it again. Not content with creating the most addicting game ever (Peggle) they then had to make something new. But what? Well, everyone's favourite minigame a few months back was CoD:WaW's Nazi Zombies mode, which, as minigames go, wasn't bad. Clearly, PopCap needed a rival to this. You can imagine the conversation in the boardroom...

"Look guys, we have to create a game that will utterly crush CoD, but in a lighthearted, family-friendly way"

"Well, how about playing as the zombies?"

"No, too violent. And anyway, I'm liking the idea of defending against zombies"

"Well, how about we keep the house, right?"

"Right"

"And make it all cartoony"

"Go on..."

"But instead of a first person shooter, we can have a tower defense game type-thing, you know"

"I love it! So, the zombies are attacking your house, and you place your different types of humorous  guns-"

"-not guns, sir"

"Not guns? Well then what?"

"Um...plants"

"You're fired"

Let's face it - on pure premise, Plants vs Zombies stands out. It's plants...versus Zombies. Do I need to write more? Can't you just see that it's going to be awsome? Well, actually, I do need to write more, because a) this is a review, not an advert and b)that's what I'm (not) paid for.

So, then, the game. I shall outline the plot, in case you are not in the right mental state to work it out from the title. You have a house. There are zombies attacking your house. You must use your widely varied species of plants to defend your house. Of course, it isn't quite that simple. You only can plant a certain number of plant species per round, and you pick which ones before it. This in itself is a challenge as as the game progresses you unlock more and more species of plant, each with its own unique abilities (and quirky entry in your "Urban Almanac" - like a pokedex, but with plants and zombies). Also, these plants aren't free, but nor do they cost money. They cost "sun", which falls from the sky during the day. To supplement this, and to fight at night, you need sunflowers or sun-shrooms to produce sun for you. It is important, as in any strategy game, to balance sun production with defenses, thus my favourite strategy is the one below

See, sunflowers at the back. The odd brown things are wall-nuts, and the guns are the most basic - peashooters

This was taken at an early stage of the game - only the fourth level. After a while, you get this kind of thing going on, in one of the end-of-stage free for alls:

Oh yeah, utter carnage. That's what we like to see...

So. There are the basics of the game. There are also night stages, where it is easier to use mushrooms than plants due to the lack of sun.

There are many kinds of plants. Thus there are also many kinds of zombies. Some have newspapers, some screen-door shields, some ride dolphins, some ride the ice-rink cleaning things. But they all have one thing in common. They all want to eat your brains.

As well as the adventure mode, there are 20 minigames (such as using your wall-nuts as bowling balls against zombies...), progressively unlocked, and a puzzle mode, which I have to admit I have not played as I haven't unlocked it yet.

The whole game is really far more deep than you expect - but then it would have to be for PopCap to charge £14.95 for it. To be honest, I wasn't expecting much of this game, as it all looked like something you can play on the internet for free. However, PopCap have done it once again - it is truly awesome. This review has taken me absolutely ages to write, as I have to keep breaking off to play the game, just because it is so good.

I can't really find anything wrong with it - you could, if you were a fanboyish type person, condemn the graphics - but then it's an arcade game, not a real one. Though actually, that last sentence made me stop and think as I typed it. Why should Plants vs Zombies be called an arcade game? It hasn't been just knocked up by two bored teenagers using flash, it has been lovingly made brilliant in every way possible. It has a deep, rich plot (OK, I made that up) a huge cast of bizarre characters and plants fighting zombies. What more do you want. Buy this real game now.

Nometet.com says: