Plants vs. Zombies

[Unicron]

I recently got a copy of PopCap's latest addiction, and it's pretty darn fun. Plants vs. Zombies is their first stab at the tower defense genre, and it offers quite a lot of stuff for a game that's only $20-25 at your local store. In addition to the main adventure mode, you can unlock a slew of mini-games, puzzle mode (with two games, Vasebreaker and I, Zombie), and even create your own zen garden for making money. There's also a cool music video awarded for beating adventure mode the first time.

The premise is simple, though there's also a nice strategy element. You need to stop the zombies from entering your house and eating your brain, and to do that you have plants. They need sunlight to grow, provided by certain plants and for free in the daytime levels, and the plant's cost is proportional to its power. Some plants are designed specifically to defeat certain types of zombies. You will have to fight at night as well, which presents its own challenges, and defend the front and back yards (the latter has a pool) and the roof (where you have to plant defenses in pots). Your neighbor, Crazy Dave, will sell you upgrades out of his secret shop (i.e. his car).

There are about 50 different plants against about 30 types of zombie, and most of these are awarded as you progress through the levels. The ones on the last row are all upgrades for existing plants and come from the shop. You can only carry a limited number of plants per level, but you usually have the option of choosing those according to your own taste.



First row:

* Peashooter - basic weapon plant.

* Sunflower - produces sunlight.

* Cherry Bomb - blows up adjacent zombies.

* Wall-Nut - takes a long time to be eaten, making it a good defensive unit.

* Potato Mine - destroys zombies on contact, but needs time to arm.

* Snow Pea - similar to the Peashooter, shoots frozen peas that slow down the enemy. Torchwoods don't work as well here, as they melt the frozen peas into normal peas.

* Chomper - can swallow most zombies in one gulp, but takes a long time to swallow them.

* Repeater - twice as powerful as a Peashooter.

Second row:

* Puff-Shroom: Good for night attacks. Small and weak, but powerful in groups. And they're free!

* Sun-Shroom: produces sunlight, but initially will only produce mini suns until they grow, then whole suns as the Sunflowers do.

* Fume-Shroom: produces a toxic vapor, which can pass through the screen doors some zombies use to shield themselves.

* Grave Buster: Destroys graves on early night levels.

* Hypno-Shroom: Believes most zombies are really misunderstood and should be treated with kindness. Any zombie that touches it will turn and fight other zombies.

* Scaredy-Shroom: Very good at long range, but will hide if zombies get close to them.

* Ice-Shroom: Temporarily freezes all zombies onscreen.

* Doom-Shroom: Detonates explosively, taking zombies with it. However, these blasts leave temporary craters in which nothing can be planted.

Third row:

* Lily Pad: Used to support normal plants on pool levels.

* Squash: Will jump up and crush any zombie that gets close to it.

* Threepeater: spreads fire across multiple lanes, making it very powerful if you can afford the high cost of a few.

* Tangle Kelp: Drowns a water zombie that gets near it.

* Jalapeno: similar to the Cherry Bomb, but its attack kills all zombies in the same lane.

* Spikeweed: pops the tires of the Zombonis and also deals weaker damage to zombies that walk over them.

* Torchwood: Placed in front of Peashooter and his relations, its flames will turn the pea projectiles into flaming weapons and double their normal damage.

* Tall-Nut: Big brother of the Wall-Nut. Has even better defensive properties, and can't be jumped over.

Fourth row:

* Sea-Shroom: A cousin of the Puff-Shroom who can defend the pool at night.

* Plantern: Dispels fog on night pool levels, but has no defenses.

* Cactus: Shoots spikes that can hit both ground and air targets, good for defending against balloon zombies.

* Blover: Blows away fog and any nearby balloon zombies, but the fog dispersal is only temporary compared to a Plantern.

* Split Pea: Can fire in both directions on a lane. Useful for killing miner zombies.

* Starfruit: Shoots tiny star projectiles in five directions at once.

* Pumpkin: Can be placed over an existing plant, greatly enhancing its protection from zombie munching.

* Magnet-Shroom: Removes any metal objects the zombies use to aid them, such as buckets, helmets and pogo sticks.

Fifth row:

* Cabbage-Pult: Fires ranged cabbage projectiles at the zombies, useful on the sloped roof of your house.

* Flower Pot: Used for planting on roof levels.

* Kernel-Pult: shoots either hard kernels (normal damage) or butter which temporarily immobilizes the zombies. The choice is somewhat randomly determined at planting, though.

* Coffee Bean: Used on the nocturnal mushrooms to make them playable in the daytime levels.

* Garlic: Zombies hate garlic, and will change lanes to avoid it.

* Umbrella Leaf: Shields nearby plants from two of the worse roof zombies - bungee zombies and catapult zombies.

* Marigold: Has no tactical value. Produces money for you to buy things at the shop.

* Melon-Pult: Fairly expensive to plant, but deals heavy splash damage and is more powerful than the other catapult plants.

Sixth Row: These are upgrades to existing plants that make them more powerful.

* Gatling Pea: Doubles the power of the Repeater.

* Twin Sunflower: Doubles the usual sun production from the target.

* Gloom-Shroom: Enhances the Fume-Shroom to fire a heavy cloud of vapor.

* Cattail: Turns your Lily Pads into powerful weapons that can hit their entire lane. They can attack both ground and air targets.

* Winter Melon: Upgrades the Melon-Pult to deal cold damage that also slows zombies.

* Gold Magnet: Upgrades the Magnet-Shroom to collect money.

* Spikerock: Damages multiple tires and gives higher damage to walking zombies. Very effective in a certain mini-game.

* Cob Cannon: Shoots heavy corn barrages. Must be planted on two adjacent Kernel-Pults.

The Imitator seed appears as the little doodle at the top left, and must be purchased from the shop. It can duplicate the effects of any other seed and thereby give you an extra copy of that seed in your arsenal.

[Unicron]

I'm working my way through the mini-games, trying to earn money and unlock as many trophies as I can. Some of them are tougher than others. You receive a silver sunflower trophy for beating adventure mode the first time, and a gold version can be earned by beating it again (it's harder) and earning all of the other unlockables. I recently was playing Bobsled Bonanza, where you have to deal with a lot of Zombonis (which can lay down ice and drive over plants; you can't plant on the ice of course) and Bobsled Zombies (which attack on the ice in groups of four, and are easier to kill out of their bobsled). I came up with a pretty good defense with a little practice.



On some levels like this one, you have to survive multiple waves of zombies represented by the red flags. The lawnmowers and pool cleaners provide an extra layer of defense should the zombies make it that far, but they're only one use per level. Since you have to deal with the ice, it's good to lay down a few Sunflowers and Spikeweeds early on. Once you get some sun going, it's good to upgrade the Spikeweeds to Spikerocks ASAP - a single Spikerock lasts a long time and deals great damage compared to its weaker cousin. You also need some other defenses, and I found that Peashooters can be very useful because they're cheap and powerful in numbers. Setting up paired ones, along with uprating my Sunflowers, made a perfect choke defense for the mini-game. The water zombies aren't quite as troublesome as in other parts of the game, so I used a mix of Tangle Weeds and uprated my Lily Pads into Cattails. Because of the nice choke points you can make with the ground defenses, you can build up a lot of sunlight with twinned sunflowers, It makes it easier to afford the Cattails, and their darts are homing weapons. With a layer like the one here, you can deal a lot of damage against the zombies quite easily. I didn't actually twin them in this version, cause I need to buy an extra slot, but even with the normal ones you can get good sunlight collection.

[RJDiogenes]

"Zombonis." And Balloon Zombies? Bungee? Catapult? What are all the different Zombies?

This sounds pretty good. I'm going to see if it's available for Wii so I can get it for my Nephew.

[Unicron]

First row:

* Zombie (basic)
* Flag Zombie: These are normal zombies that carry flags, and which appear at the start of waves.

* Conehead Zombie: These wear traffic cones, making them about twice as tough as a normal zombie.

* Pole Vaulting Zombie: can jump over most types of plants and bypass your defenses. Tall-Nuts are their weakness. After they jump they have normal toughness.

* Buckethead Zombie: Three times as tough as normal zombie. Less of a threat if you have some Magnet-Shrooms handy.

Second row:

* Newspaper Zombie: Will get mad when his newspaper is destroyed. It acts as a sort of shield, and he will be more vulnerable without it. Liked sudoku in life.

* Screen Door Zombie: Has a fairly high defense unless you can get rid of the door (Magnet-Shrooms) or go through it (Fume-Shrooms)

* Football Zombie: Very high toughness, allowing him to go through most defenses fairly quickly. He's a lot weaker without his helmet though...

* Dancing Zombie: Any resemblance to a real performer is purely coincidental. Can summon backup dancer zombies (next frame), making him very deadly.

Third row:

* Ducky Tube Zombie: A basic undead that attacks the pool on back yard levels.

* Snorkel Zombie: Can swim under your defenses, but will eat them if able.

* Zomboni: Not actually a zombie, but a sort of space ogre often mistaken for one. Has a fairly high toughness and lays ice for the bobsled zombies. Spikeweeds and Spikerocks are their weakness, as they shred the tires and are too low for most other zombies to eat them.

* Zombie Bobsled Team: Attack in groups of four, with normal weakness. Their bobsleds provide a limited defense until they leave them, and they need Zombonis to lay ice first.

* Dolphin Rider Zombie: An aquatic version of the Pole Vaulting Zombie, has the same ability to jump over the first defensive line.

Fourth row:

* Jack-in-the-Box Zombie: Watch out for these guys. They can explode, taking out any nearby plants.

* Balloon Zombie: Can fly over most plant species, although level defenses (lawnmowers etc.) will still kill them if they get too close. You need Cacti, Blovers or Cattails to destroy Balloon Zombies.

* Digger Zombie: Can burrow under your plants and attack from the rear, unless you plant Split-Peas or have a handy one shot (Squash for example) available.

* Pogo Zombie: Can leap directly over your defenses, but has normal toughness. Use Magnet-Shrooms to steal his pogo stick, and he'll be a minor nuisance. Tall-Nuts can also block them.

* Zombie Yeti: Very rarely seen, it will try to run away after taking damage. But if you succeed in slaying it, it will drop five diamonds on the first appearance and four diamonds thereafter. Diamonds are worth $1000 apiece, so it's worth it to get a yeti pelt. It's worth noting too that, unlike the other zombies, the yeti is not visible on the seed selection screen. Therefore you can't know when it might appear.

Fifth row:

* Bungee Zombie: This annoying enemy appears on the roof and can steal plants in a vertical attack. You'll see a bullseye over the target several seconds in advance, and he'll take damage from any adjacent defenders, but Bungee Zombies are usually fast enough to get what they want. On some levels they also drop other zombies onto a lane instead of stealing a plant. Umbrella Leaves are the best defense for your allied plants.

* Ladder Zombie: Can climb over any plant, even Tall-Nuts, and his ladder makes a path for other zombies. Otherwise he's fairly normal in toughness, so Magnet-Shrooms can be useful for stealing his ladder.

* Catapult Zombie: Lobs basketballs at your from a distance, much like the Pult plants do. Umbrella Leaves are good here as well.

* Gargantuar: These behemoths are slow, but extremely tough. They can squash plants easily and also hurl the imps far into your lines. You'll need some serious firepower to get rid of them. Luckily they're relatively rare.

* Imp: The weakest zombie, they can only survive a couple of hits from most weapon plants. But the Gargantuars can throw them a long way, so be wary.

* Dr. Zomboss: Creator of the zombie race, he also invented a giant zombie mecha. He can place any type of zombie on the field, and will also periodically launch attacks that are either fire or ice based. These take the form of an elemental ball that can roll over your lines, and you need to destroy them with either Jalapenos or Ice-Shrooms.

[Unicron]

There are a few other variables to consider with the plants. The seeds have a recharge time between plantings, and ones like the shop upgraders take longer to recharge in addition to their sun cost. Whereas more basic ones like the Peashooter and Wall-Nut are fast rechargers and very economical. The zombies will devour any plant they can touch, and they'll die faster when the enemies come in waves. Therefore protection and heavy firepower are important when available. You can use the shovel to remove a specific plant, although normally this will only be if you want to plant something better in its place or keep it from being eaten, and potentially letting one of your yard defenses kill the intruders. Things like ice and graves take up valuable space that you could use to plant defenses, so it's good to take them out when your strategy allows for it. Zombies will also eat something placed in their current location, so sticking a Wall-Nut in place of a plant that was eaten can be a useful delaying tactic.

[RJDiogenes]

Hilarious. I especially like Newspaper Zombie. He liked sudoku in life. It's funny, yet oddly touching....

[Unicron]

Here's an image from the Last Stand mini-game. I was having some difficulty with it initially (and I'm still trying to solve some of them), so I looked on YouTube for advice. One poster came up with a solution I really like, and it's deviously effective.



Last Stand is simple. You have to survive five waves of zombies, and you get 5000 sunlight to start. You can instantly plant whatever you wish before you start the attack, but you can't use Sunflowers or Sun-Shrooms and you won't get any normal free sunlight. You'll get 250 sun per wave you survive, which you can use between attacks, but otherwise you have no resources. You can use any combination of plants you like.

This is a really great solution in terms of economy and effectiveness. Even better, it lets you farm money while you play the game. The main trick is to use garlic at the front to force the zombies into the defense rows, where you'll have massive firepower from paired Gatlings and supporting Torchwoods. The zombies will be bottlenecked into a single lane, and will be killed long before they can get close to your defenders. And while the artillery mops up the assault, the Marigolds will be free to pump out lots of coins for your Gold Magnets to collect, plus the coins dropped by some zombies. On average, this setup will yield about $5000-6000 per run! You should replace the garlic periodically as it's about the only plant that will take regular damage, and its cheap cost makes that pretty easy. Otherwise, you can largely sit back and let the defenses kick butt and make you rich.

[RJDiogenes]

The graphics are hilarious. The Sunflowers look so innocent.

[Unicron]

It's rather funny to see the zombies gag on the garlic. I've also been playing around with the Cob Cannons just to get familiar with them. Due to their high cost (500 + 200 for the Kernel-Pults, plus a recharge time if you're in the normal game), they're the rarest weapon to use. They have to be manually fired and take a while to reload, whereas most weapon plants are automatic. But they can hit any location on the screen and act like mortars, and they do a lot of damage. I'm toying around with them in Last Stand just to see what I can do.

[RJDiogenes]

Looks like it's not available for Wii, unfortunately. Seems to be only available for computers. Too bad....

[Unicron]

Here's a variation I tested out tonight on the Pogo Party minigame. I've completed all the minigames now, and plan to complete survival mode next. I still need to play around a bit with this one, but it will work well once the timing is set. It's based on a solution found on YouTube, which includes Magnet-Shrooms and Coffee Beans as a middle row to get rid of the pogo sticks. While that works, it's not necessarily a huge worry on this particular minigame since the Tall-Nuts serve as your first line and you can gather enough sun to get Winter Melons somewhat easily. The first few pogo zombies will trip your roof defenses while you plant Sunflowers, and that will buy you enough time to get a good starting setup. It's also key to have Crazy Dave's plant imitator on this level, as it allows you to plant two of the same seed type and thus deploy your Tall-Nuts much faster.



I created a defense based more on offense, trading the Magnet-Shrooms for Kernel-Pults (for extra damage and immobilization) coupled with Chompers in the second row, which can take a little heat off the Tall-Nuts and be well-protected by the artillery. You can also gather enough sun to upgrade most if not all of the Sunflowers to twins. Here is the completed layout.

[RJDiogenes]

I get a kick out of the random Zombie head lying there in the first pic.

[Unicron]

Been working on my Tree of Wisdom a bit with my earnings. Up to 160 feet! (Only 840 to go... )

[RJDiogenes]

16% isn't bad....

[Unicron]

Would you believe that it ultimately costs $2,500,000 to raise the Tree to full height? ($2,500 per food pack x 1,000 feet total, at a rate of 1 foot per pack). I've been tinkering with a new layout on Last Stand, but it's not done yet. Needs more work.