I had heard a lot about PopCap’s Plants vs. Zombies in a LinkedIn discussion and I thought, "whoa, I had better check this game out." So here we are now after I’ve put in a few hours on it and I have to say, it’s pretty cool.

I don’t know that it’s all I thought it would be based on the hype as many people were raving about how great it was and that it should be casual game of 2009, but it’s certainly cool. Innovative? Not so much, but again games don’t always need to be groundbreaking, they just need to be entertaining.

Entertaining is certainly a word I would use to describe PvZ. In the game, you take control of, your lawn. Sounds silly I know, but it’s your last line of defense against the zombies. After all, if you can’t take pride in your lawn you might as well call it a day and throw yourself to those uncivilized flesh-eaters that are creeping about in the road.

Right, back to your lawn. Using some seeds you picked up at the nearby Zombie Defense Garden Center (I’d like one of them for the neighbors dogs) you plant a defensive line of vegetation that will entangle your zombie neighbors or blow them to pieces.

First up is the pea shooter, your basic, state-of-the-art, ranged plant and your most vital ally in the war on grass-stomping zombies. Along with that you’ll need some sunflowers, no not to eat the seeds (though they would have made awesome frag grenade plants) but to generate sunlight so that you can grow more plants of course. Who knew that sunflowers actually generated sunlight?!

I sure wish that Garden shop was local. After each level you gain something special, a shovel for allowing you to dig up plants, explosive potato seed mines, cherry bombs, zombie eating plants (Feed me Seymour!) and more!

The levels do get progressively more difficult, not only in the number of lanes the zombies approach in but also the number of zombie waves and types and of course, darkness descends eventually. There’s even an undead pole vaulter to leap over obstacles and a Michael Jackson moonwalking type. While the game play is pretty one-dimensional it’s still interesting enough to keep you coming back for more.

Plants vs. Zombies adheres to the strong quality that PopCap games have come to represent. All facets of the game - graphics, sound, gameplay and controls - work very well and I can see why people rave about the game. Just when I think it’s going to start being repetitive and boring, they throw in a curve ball, like lawn bowling with Walnuts, fighting at night (when you need sunlight to grow plants), and more. Plants vs. Zombies really is a shining example of addictive casual gameplay with excellent development values. It has a total of 49 plants, hordes of diverse zombies and different levels and gameplay (whack-a-zombie anyone?) all of which add up to a most excellent game. Heads, er, hats off to PopCap on PvZ.

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