All unlocks are earnable through 'offline or online play'

The rumors were true and the Plants vs. Zombies universe is coming to Nintendo Switch. Well...

Battle for Neighborville, the third game in the Garden Warfare shooter sub-series, will officially be out for Switch on March 19 with an "ev??erything's included" Complete Edition. It's the system's first Frostbite engine title (co-developed by PopCap Vancouver and QLOC), which is wild to reflect on in 2021.

The Switch version of the ga?me will ??support motion controls if you're into that sorta thing.

The prior versions of Battle for Neighborville leaned into scheduled battle-pass-like Prize Maps to dole out rewards. Here on Switch, you can "unlock all characters and content from the PlayStation, Xbox, ??and PC Standard Editions, as well as post-launch content, directly through offline or online play."

In other words, you can earn every cosmetic item an??d class "without any premium store or currency."

This game has had an interesting rollout (including an early access phase), and while it's not my favorite Garden Warfare entry, it will surely find an eager young audience on the Switch. Even if you have no intention of facing off against other players, there's a lot to like as a PvE fan. I mostly played Battle for Neighborville as someone who enjoys tracking down trinkets and se??cret??s in hub worlds. Let me loose!

I would've liked to see a Switch port a?? while ?back, but March 2021 is better than never.

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GameFly listing points to March 19 release on Switch

Late ports aren't the most riveting things to play on Nintendo Switch, but if they're gonna happen?? – and let's be honest, they aren't slowing down – the Switch is my go-to platform f??or double-dips.

Several EA-published ports have trickled out lately, and there are a few more in store for the Switch. The next one might be Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville, the third game in PopCap's Garden Warfare spin-off series. A listing for a Nintendo Switch edition recently showed up on GameFly.

The listing was pulled down, but while it was visible, it offered a couple of noteworthy details. The release date is supposedly March 19?, 2021, and the Switch version is a "Complete Edition."

There's no such equivalent on PC, PS4, or Xbox One, so that's interesting. Battle for Neighborville leaned pretty far into cosmetic items; there are even battle-pass-like Prize Maps to power through. Having a lot of those unlocks accessible from the outse?t co??uld be a decent benefit for this Switch port.

The game didn't reach the same highs as Garden Warfare 1 or 2 (to the point where some fans would prefer a Switch port of either one of them instead), but it's still fairly unique in the shooter space. I'll always appreciate family-friendly multiplayer games with cool worlds like Garden Warfare and Splatoon.

I also can't help but wonder when EA Play will fit into the picture. I feel like these Switch ports make far more sense from a cost/time perspective when? viewed through the lens of a subscription service.

[Via ResetEra]

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Unlockable on the March 2020 Prize Map or with 500K coins

The zombies are finally getting a magical counterpart to Rose. In an update preview video for Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville, PopCap Va?ncouver confirmed the long-speculated Wizard Zombie character. He's not joining the game until March 2020,?? but you'll want to start saving your coins.

To unlock the Wizard Zombie, Battle for Neighborville players will either need to finish the Prize Map (the PvZ equivalent of a free battle pass) in March, or they'll need to fo??rk over 500,000 coins once the Luck o' t??he Zombie festival concludes at the end of the month. I can't say I'm surprised by that rollout.

Wizard Zombie Abilities

• Orbracadorbra – Hold [Fire] to charge your staff and release to cast a damaging aura.
• Zee-lixir – Throw a potion that temporarily makes allies immortal and stops enemy jumping and sprinting.
• Spell Disaster – Slam the ground with your staff to summon magical missiles that chase and damage nearby enemies.
• Co-Star – Hover above an ally as a star in an orb to provide extra firepower and grant them armor.

Up until now, the Prize Map model has mostly dealt with alternate outfits and other less-flashy cosmetic rewards, so this is an enticing incentive ??to k?eep plugging away at the game all month long.

As the video shows, PopCap has several other things lined up for Battle for Neighborville before the roster update. Throughout February, players can strive to unlock the Foodal Lord Draconius legendary costume for Kernel Corn, and there's a??lso a new Turf Takeover map, Preserve Pas??tures, to check out.

The Valenbrainz Prize Map has a gameplay-impacting reward up for grabs, too. Players can earn the Shogun-Gua?rd upgrade for Kernel Corn, which gives him a personal shield. The ability ?item will be "available for purchase in Rux's Emporium" starting March 2, 2020, according to the developers.

I've dropped off this game, but I have to imagine it's st????ill decently popular among families.

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The game's holiday update launched today

It's been December for not even two whole days and I've already watched my first traditional Christmas movie (Jingle All the Way – don't ask). There's no escaping it. Soon, holiday cheer will come?? for us? all.

Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville is getting into the spirit with a snowy present-filled makeover of Giddy Park, a social hub where plant ?and zombie players can mingle and duke it out. Alongside update 1.03, PopCap went ahead and booked Sir Patrick Stewart to recite a festive poem.

You don't need to love Plants vs. Zombies to get a kick out of this. The man has a way w??ith words!

In terms of new content, Battle for Neighborville has a multiplayer map – Oozevoir – that's full of pink goop. It's playable in Team Vanquish, Mix Modes, and Ops. Otherwise,?? the 1.03 update is cosmetic-centric. Rux's Emporium started selling outfits in exchange for a new type of currency, Rainbow Stars, that's purchasable with real money ($4.99 for 500 Stars) and earnable in-game. I'm not surprised.

At the high end, there's a bundle that costs $74.99 for 8,700 Rainbow Stars. This might be a good time for any parents in the room to double and then triple-check that their console ha??s parental controls.

The developers also made some PvE balance changes – most notably, activities like Bounty Hunts now come with a cooldown – and players aren't thrilled. Keeping up with ongoing challenges can be a grind. If you're still into Battle for Neighborville, the Feastivus Prize Map has begun and there are two big carrots on the stick: a Super Rare Abomina??ble Chomper and a Legendary Inspiratio??n Elf Engineer.

I'm here for the legendary Sir Patrick Stewart, the holiday-themed map redes?ign, and that's it.

Feastivus and Patch Notes are Coming?? to Neig?hborville [EA]

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PvP needs more thyme to blossom

It feels like a small miracle that the team-based shooter series Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare is now on its third game in five years. The latest, Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville, isn't a huge step forward as much as it is a continuation, but PopCap Vancouver has done ??a lot of streamlining.

And you know what? I'm perfectly fine with that! All three games have? their high points.

Some fans are always going to prefer the expertly-crafted map designs and purity of the original game, and I can sympathize. Others will forever cling to Garden Warfare 2's countless character class variants, which offered a tremendous sense of flexibility but contributed to long-term ba??lancing headaches.

I can also picture Battle for Neighborville winning over another subset of playe??rs: folks who love hanging out in PvE zones and scouring for collectibles and secrets w??ithout the pressure or stress of PvP.

Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville (PC, PS4 [reviewed], Xbox One)
Developer: PopCap Vancouver
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: October 18, 2019
MSRP: $39.99

The developers tried something different with Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville's release model, and overa??ll, I think it worked out well. The game was made available for purchase six weeks before launch in a cheaper, not-yet-complete Founding Neighbor edition. That's where I began.

Each week, PopCap doled out more game content, including multiplayer modes – like the new four-on-four Battle Arena – and multiple open-ended PvE story zones, like the We?irding Woods. This gradual rollout prevented me from burning through any single area too quickly, which I appreciated. It's also hopefully a sign of what's to come if post-launch content updates or ex?pansions are on the table.

As it stands today, you'll be able to hop into Battle for Neighborville without those early-access restrictions. Straight away, you can start poking around. The plants and zombies both have their own h?eadquarters, with an amusement park "social area" sandwiched between them, and these home bases are where you'll access everything from PvP and PvE gateways to cosmetic unlocks and even a couple of goofy mini-games. By default, you'll see other players, but you can form your own private lobby.

I had a love-hate relationship with the hubs at first. They're full of personality, which is one of the series' strongest suits, but until you memorize the layout, navigation is a bit of a chore. They're pretty densely packed. Thankfully, I figured out that certain actions – like team switching, cosmetic customization, and character upgrades – can be accessed from the start menu. That saves time.

Battle for Neighborville expands on the Backyard Battleground concept from Garden Warfare 2, a??nd dozens of hours in, that's where the bulk of m??y time has gone. PvE really feels like a focal point.

There are three distinct zones – Mount Steep (plants only), Weirding Woods (zombies only), and Town Center (plants and zombies) – each with their own missions, collectibles, rewards, and s??urprisingly intricate boss battles. You can play through all of this stuff as any of the characters, at any time, alone or with friends. It's fun to face AI troops and mini-bosses while you roam the maps, even if you're flying solo. The story quests themselves aren't anything too groundbreaking, but the new character designs and all-around silly vibes put a consistent smile on my face. This is such a good "podcast game."

I wouldn't have necessarily recommended Garden Warfare 2 to people who just wanted a solid PvE experience, but I'm much more inclined to make that case with Battle for Neighborville, particularly given its $40 price tag. The scope of free-roaming isn't on the same level as, say, patrolling through Destiny 2, but I've genuinely enjoyed it, and I hope PopCap will continue building. It's not an afte?rthought.

Just to be clear: this game is online-only. You won't make it past the main menu without a connection?.

As for PvP, to some extent, I'm still making up mind. In a lot of ways, the competitive side of Battle for Neighborville feels like more of the same, albeit streamlined with the removal of class variants and the piece-by-piece booster pack unlock system from before. As a quick aside, you no longer have to spend a single coin on pesky one-time-use consumable defensive items – those now run on cooldowns.

There are 20? characters, all told. Each side has three new classes, two of which are puny but can transform into more powerful forms and even team up with other players, Megazord style.

On the plant front, there's the stealthy Night Cap, the fire-breathing Snapdragon, and the Acorn, which can become a mighty cannon-firing Oak. On the zombie squad, there's the roller-skating Electric Slide, the bow-wielding 80s Action Hero, and the transformative Space Cadet. These fresh faces join the existing Garden Warfare 2 cast including the Foot Soldier, Peashooter, Imp, and ?Rose, and the whole gang can full-on ?sprint now. Sometimes, pinning down targets isn't enough. They're slippery.

Not everyone is fun to play as yet – I truly feel like game balance will be a constant tug-of-war again – but the potential i??s there. In place of wildly different class variants, every character has static abilities and equippable "upgrades." You can swap these in and out at will for bonuses like health regeneration for each vanquish, faster XP accumulation, and even? homing shots (depending on who you're playing as), but you only have so many slots and potent perks take up more space (and need to be unlocked).

This system is arguably more elegant, but it loses some of the impact. My hope is that with fewer variables to juggle, PopCap will be able to add more characters down the road, not unlike Overwatch. Heck, the character select screen is even divvied up with Attack, Defend, and Support categories.

In terms of modes, it's mostly a repeat with the objective-based 12v12 Turf Takeover, 8v8 Team Vanquish, smaller modes like Suburbination and Gnome Bomb, and a strategic new 4v4 Battle Arena mode in which players have one life per round a??nd they can't pick the same character twice.

If this is all sounding very samey, well, it kind of is! Again, Battle for Neighborville feels like a refresh, for better or worse. I'm not remotely tired of the fo?rmula yet, but I also think there'??s room to grow.

I don't have as much of a desire to level up the whole cast this time around – the "gotta catch 'em all" factor isn't as palpable without class variants – but the free battle-pass-esque Prize Map for unloc??king new seasonal rewards is interesting, at least in the early days. I'm also struggling somewhat with character movement and hit detection, neither of w??hich feel one hundred percent fine-tuned to me.

I don't doubt that the developers will try to stay on top of ongoing balance concerns, but I also worry that the power pendulum will swing too far in one team's favor week to week. We'll see how that goes.

That ?said, reviewing what's in front of me, I'm mostly h??appy right now. PvP just isn't quite there yet.

Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville doesn't go out of its way to surpass expectations, but it's a silly, strange, joyful game – one I'm glad was greenlit. If PopCap can continue what it started, this stands a fighting chance of becoming my favorite PvZ spin-off. I hope it gets that opportunity.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of ?the game provided by the publisher.]}

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Along with a PvE zone, Battle Arena mode, and Prize Map

I've been having an all-around good time carving my way through Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville, the mostly-there-but-not-quite-done successor to Garden Warfare. Today marked another milestone on the road to the game's ful??l release, and if you're a founder's edition player, it's time to hop back in. Along with the Battle Arena mode and another PvE story zone, there's a big patch.

Not to be confused with the general concept of battle royale, Battle Arena is actually a four-on-four PvP mode in which players can't pick the same character class twice. If you're taken down (and no one on your team takes enough pity to revive you), you're done for that round. The format leads to these tense moments where wins up front can come at the cost of the overall prize, and snowballing and tilting are a very real concern. It's much less chaotic than the typical higher-player-count PvP modes, and while not everyone is here for ?t??????????????????????????actical play, some people are bound to dig this more strategic structure.

The latest PvE zone isn't wholly new – it's the zombies' take on the previously plant-only Town Center area – but there are new story missions. I've only done one so far, a mission to root out the un-zombie infection, but as with the other Battle for Neighborville zones, I'm looking forward to the boss fight.

Battle for Neighborville also has the equivalent of a free battle pass now. As? you earn XP, you'll make progress along a track on a "prize map" with regularly scheduled cosmetic rewards. It's a more guided incentive than the existing random unlocks from the coin-eating prize machine. The first map, Lawn of Doom, runs for four more weeks. The top reward is a Super Scarab outfit for Super Brainz.

Then there's the patch itself,?? which brings balancin??g tweaks and some necessary new features.

• There's now a toggle to outline enemy players and teammates. Before, it was easy to lose track of your target in firefights, especially with multiple abilities popping off.
• "Added bullet drag to allow faster speeds from projectile launch and slow down projectiles as they get to max range." From my early experience, shooting feels noticeably better. I was struggling with hit detection before.
• The all-powerful Night Cap and Acorn were nerfed, while zombies like Soldier and All-Star were buffed. The balance definitely needs more fine-tuning (I'm still maining the Engineer for the foreseeable future), but this is a start. Watch out for Super Brainz.
• "Adjusted difficulty in several quests, gnome challenges, and hunts."
• "Fixed some exploits in Regions relating to using key items in split-screen."
• "Made improvements to split-screen stability."

Those are just my highlights. You can find the full patch notes here.

The founder's edition has two more weeks to go, and then Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville will hold its proper release on October 18. If you're just now thinking of coming in, you're a little too late to play – EA is no longer selling the early access Founding Neighbor ve??rsion. You'll have to wait.

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I'm really digging the PvE

What's the deal with Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville? Where do I begin!

The follow-up to PopCap's kooky team-based shooter series Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare isn't fully out yet – the launch is set for October 18 – but you can play Battle for Neighborville right here, right now, if you're willing to open up your wallet. The "Founder's Edition" is available across PC, PS4, and Xbox One, and it's essentially a brief early access rollout ??before the finished game lands.

The idea is to release new content on a weekly basis until launch, at which point the price tag will be bumped from $30 up to $40, and PopCap Vancouver will take things from there. We're currently two weeks into the six-week Founder's Edition roadmap, and after spending a dozen hours with Battle for Neighborville, I have some stray thoughts to share. Is it?? worth jumping in yet? It depends??.

As it stands, the main attractions are two PvE zones – the very on-brand Town Center, for plant players, and the camp-themed Weirding Woods for team zombie – along with a social hub, separate home bases for both sides, and a pair of PvP modes. Whether you're playing solo or teaming up to explore and take on tough AI bounties in one of the open-world levels, Battle for Neighborville is an online experience through and through. Back at base??, you can watch people spend their in-game currency to roll the dice on cosmetic unlocks, a concept I'm not thrilled about, even if it's been done before.

Garden Warfare 2 had open-ended spaces, but Battle for Neighborville feels like more of a conscious approach. It's attempting to scratch that Destiny Patrol itch, albeit without incremental loot.

There's an almost overwhelming amount of collectibles to suss out, from treasure chests to hidden gnomes to exercise tapes. (My inner Donkey Kong 64 fan is kind of in heaven.) As you poke around, you'll face AI-controlled foes at regular intervals, to say nothing of story quests with a few genuinely neat boss fights and optional missions that mirror some of the past Garden Warfare modes.

So while there may only be two PvE regions to mess with, there's a lot to sink your teeth into. 12 hours in, I still have a lot of secrets to uncover. Two more levels – the plant zone Mount Steep, and the zombie's spin on Town Center – are schedul??ed for September 24 and October 1, respectively.

If you're strictly into competitive multiplayer, heads up: you'll only have access to the objective-oriented Turf Takeover mode and Team Vanquish right now. Other PvP offerings, including the 4v4 Battle Arena mode, are yet to come. There's also the matter of game balance, something the previous titles struggled to consistently stay on top of. Battle for Neighborville is no except??ion – Night Cap, the new ninja class, is on just about everyone's shit list – but I'm cautiously optimistic about the future.

Garden Warfare 2 leaned heavily into variant classes (in short: you could have a Fire Pea or a Rock Pea or a Toxic Pea, and so on and so forth), but they're nowhere to be found in Battle for Neighborville. I liked the flexibility of that system,?? but the grind to unlock those sub-classes got out of hand, and I can only imagine what a nightmare it was to keep every variant of every charact??er in check.

The new concept is much simpler, for better or worse. Characters are classified as attackers, defenders, or support, and you'll equip perks to tailor them to your preferred playstyle. There's a finite amount of perk slots, with each "upgrade" costing a certain amount of points depending on its potency, and you can unlock new upgrades by leveling your troops in PvE or?? PvP. As a healer main (hey, someone's gotta!), I'm all about upgrades like Revive Reward and Vampire Flower that regenerate health when I revive teammates or deal damage. Some upgrades are general across-the-board buffs (one is a flat-out XP boost), while others affect individual abilities, allowing for a slight sense of personalization.

I'm not sure if this kind of approach will keep players engaged long-term, but if the trade-off is more characters and overall better game balance, I'm all for it. Speaking of which, the new roster feels at home in the Plants vs. Zombies universe. Characters like Acorn and Space Cadet can transform into powerful (but highly conspicuous) forms, and the fire-?breathing Snapdragon puts in work.

Aside from? certain characters (mostly on the zombie side) feeling weak and a tad underwhelming to play as, I've also noticed some hit-detection issues – or at least the illusion that shots aren't quite landing as they should. That haziness, combined with the all-around chaos of players slinging eye-catching abilities like there's no tomorrow, can make it hard to get a read on the action.

These should be fixable problems. I wouldn't recommend going for the Founder's Edition if you never quite got Garden Warfare, but if this series is two for two as far as you're concerned, by all means – save yourself ten bucks. Garden and Graveyard Ops are lined up for next week (September 17), and I feel like that'll be more of a turning point. That sai??d, there's already plenty of stuff to keep you occupied.

[Update: It's out of early access. Consult our Battle for Neighborville review for my expanded thoughts.]

_{[This impressions piece is based on the Founder's Edition build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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The final version will follow shortly on October 18

Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 3 is here! (Sort of.) PopCap and EA have announced Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville – the third game in their wacky multiplayer shooter series – and in a semi-surprising turn of events, it's playable today across PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. The current not-quite-finished Founder's Edition is $30 ahead of the game's full $40 launch on Octo?ber 18, 2019.

I heard chatter about Plants vs. Zombies trying its hand at "early access" this morning and recoiled a bit, but once I saw this gameplay trailer, those thoughts started to slip away. I am too mesmerized by Night Cap, the new ninja mushroom, to say nothing of the bow-firing '80s Action Hero zombie. There's also fun-sized characters like Acorn and Space Cadet, which can transform into a bulky Oak and Space Station, respectively, and even let other players hop aboard for tea??m-up attacks. This game looks wild.

PopCap has gone on record to say that Battle for Neighborville's "modes and features are already final," and this Founder's Edition run is about "polishing performance." This early-access version will only be purchasable until September 30, and over the next six weeks leading up to the October 18 launch, the game will get weekly co?ntent updates to flesh out PvP, PvE, and free-roam. Your progress carries over.

I've been vaguely anticipating the next game from the Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare team for a while now – this series is my jam, through and through – but I didn't expect Battle for Neighborville to make this good of a first impress?ion. Now they just need to avoid squandering that potential.

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George Fan speaks

You might not know George Fan, but odds are he knows you. As one of the brightest minds at PopCap Games, he's lived vicariously through all of your endless Insaniquarium sessions and Plants vs. Zombies runs.

Fan worked at the studio for eight long years before departing in 2012 due to issues with Plants vs. Zombies 2, and has since been enjoying life and sticking with his passion for game development. With the 10th anniversary of Plants vs. Zombies steadily approaching this weekend on May 5, we made some time to sit down with the ?legend himself.

After informing him that Insaniquarium does indeed "still slap" in 2019, things got off on the right foot. I used this shared love of that ?old classic to segue into how Fan manages to make his games so damn timeless.

His response echoes the mantra of many other gaming greats, like Blizzard Entertainment: "First of all, can I just say how utterly awesome it is that people are still talking about Insaniquarium in 2019? I never I would've expected that! As far as creating a timeless game goes, the first ingredient is: Don't name your game after something that references pop culture, such as naming your zombies versus plants game 'Lawn of the Dead.' I kid, of course! (For those that aren't aware, that is what Plants vs. Zombies was called for most of its development, and some of us are still sad that it didn't end up with that name.) The real answer, though, is to focus on making your gameplay stellar. Your state-of-the-art graphics aren't going to ?age as well 10 years from now and classic gameplay is still classic."

Fan, of course, didn't have the same resources Blizzard did in 2009. He recalls how the main framework was "a team of three people" (designer, artist, programmer), who spent "about a year to two years making a game." He says that PvZ "pretty much" foll??owed that same framework, but with the caveat of Fan being based out of San Francisco, while their main artist was out of Seattle.

Speaking of art, one of the most enigmatic Plants vs. Zombies characters has to be Crazy Dave, and as it turns out there is a story behind his creation. I'll let Fan tell it: "Crazy Dave was loosely based off of someone we knew in real life, only with craziness turned up to eleven. So maybe it's that combination of grounded 'realness' plus sheer lunacy that makes him so memorable? Some of the inspiration came from those craaazy car sal??esmen you'd see on daytime TV: 'We're slashing all our prices because we're craaaaazy!' Fun Fact: I actually did the voicework for Crazy Dave. I just reached deep inside and spouted off multiple takes of all the craziest ?gibberish I could imagine and we just kept all the best takes!"

Dave, the plants, the zombies: practically every facet of PvZ was memorable, and I just had to know "what was cut?" Fan told us that there was a "timestopper plant" that was basically an apple as a clock face, which was removed because it made the game unfun to play while that abi?lity was popping off. As for Fan's most beloved character? "The Zombie Bobsled Team still cracks me up the most," he said. His wishlist included a Tennis Zombie, who would deflect your peashooters, but there's actually a funny story regarding the Newspaper Zombie, which I informed him was my favorite.

"Fun fact: Right after PvZ came out, my brother called m??e to ask 'Was Newspaper Zombie based on Dad?,'" he said. "You see, growing up, me and my brother saw our dad spend a lot of time reading newspapers, and a good portion of that newspaper reading was while our dad was... well... on the toilet. When I handed off the design, I had no such intentions in mind, it was simply a zombie reading a newspaper. It was artist Rich Werner who added the touches that made it seem like the character had been on the toilet right before getting zombified."

That's kind of Fan's MO: there's a story behind everything he touches. But in the end, he doesn't really have any regrets. When asked if there's anything he wishes he added to the final build, he responded "not really." Fan followed that up by clarifying: "With PvZ I was given the time and resources to make the best game I possibly could, so I don't wish anything different. What's so unique about working on PvZ for me is nothing I've worked on before or after has gone nearly as smoothly, so what I do wish is I u??nderstood what the secret sauce was that made it so, be it the timing, the right combination of people, and/or PopCap setting up the right environment for us to do our best work in."

Fan was memorialized by his efforts. The Plants vs. Zombies homages and references still pile on to this day, but one of his absolute favorites was the "Grave Bramble" Magic: The Gathering card. I told him to geek out about it, and will post his full response: "Oh, I'm gonna geek out all right! I absolutely loved that Grave Bramble homage, and have over 100 copies of that card. I just about lost my mind when a few years after the Grave Bramble homage they asked me to design a Magic card for their M15 set. I designed Genesis Hydra for them, and they sent me a giant Magic card of it, which I do have lovingly framed."

He continues: "I thought nothing could top that, but I also recently attended a War of the Spark pre-release... a War of the Spark employee pre-release! You see, last July I started a temporary stint at Wizards of the Coast designing Magic! It's been an absolute blast and I now sit right next to Magic's head designer Mark Rosewater!! Ok, I'm done geeking out now." I'm sure we could have gone with a bit more geeking out??, but that'll do!

It has indeed been a full decade since Plants vs. Zombies was unleashed upon this Earth, and it's been on a wild journey after it changed hands as a part of EA's empire. But Fan still has love for the series, noting "It's really cool that Plants vs. Zombies spans more than just the tower defense genre now. PvZ Heroes makes sense in that very early on, PvZ was designed as a card game with tower defense." He reminds us that the seed packets ??were actually influenced by card games, after all.

One thing he never predicted though was Garden Warfare. Initially he thought it couldn't be done because of the locomotion limitations of the plant characters, but he's happy to admit that he was wrong (I think a lot of people doubted it too!). Fan ends the interview on a hopeful note: "I'd love to see PvZ continue this trend and expand to other genres, each time bringing with it the stylings the original PvZ ha??d." If they continue to be of quality, I agree.

As far as I'm concerned Fan has already cemented his legacy and is living his best life. Plants vs. Zombies was one of the first games I played with my wife so many years ago after we were married, and we created countless memories surrounding it: we even still hum the theme song frequently (composed and performed by Laura Shigihar?a). Whatever he's up to next, i??t'll be on my to-do list.

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A humble PSA

Ever hear someone name-drop an old video game and then immediately feel an irresistible impulse to stop what you're doing, seek it out, and see how well it ho??lds up? Hey, me ?too. What a coincidence!

Yesterday, in light of Frontier's upcoming Planet Zoo, the Destructoid staff got to chatting about simulation games we wished someone would make. (Here's a freebie courtesy of Occams: a thoughtful museum sim in which you design and curate exhibits. Neat, right?) Our conversation took some detours and, at one point, Chris mentioned PopCap's fish-raising click-'em-up Insaniquarium in passing.

At that moment, my brain was struck by nost??algia lightning. I needed to play it right then ??and there.

And so I did! After learning that 1) there sure are a lot of sketchy browser-based knockoffs and 2) somehow I never got the game on Steam or Origin or seemingly anywhere else (???), I bought Insaniquarium Deluxe. It was five bucks well spent. Case in point, it's been 24 hours and I've only no??w managed to mentally tear myself away long enough to escape the game's siren song. It's taunting me.

If you've never ?played it or yo??ur memories are hazy, the structure goes a little something like this:

Feed your fish – but not too much! Watch them grow. Snatch the coins they drop. Buy loads more fish. Fend off freaky alien invaders. Upgrade your blaster. Spend your life savings amassing so many guppies, they no longer exist as individuals with hopes and dreams and instead morph into a single screen-filling legion with no beginning or?? end. Beat the level. Unlock a ?new helper. Then happily do it all again.

A decade-and-a-half ago, Insaniquarium was an intoxicating little puzzle game. In 2019, it still slaps.

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None other than Wall-nut Hills

As confirmed earlier this week, a new Plants vs. Zombies game is in development for "consoles and PC." While there could one day be another classic-style PvZ title (and I'd be one-hundred percent down for that if it stayed away from microtransactions), most of us assume EA means Garden Warfare 3.

I'm a little concerned about what form it might take given the genre's battle-royale-loving landscape, but we'll see. A third installment that takes the best from GW1 and GW2 would hit the spot this year.

More immediately, though, PopCap has prepared a pleasant surprise for Garden Warfare 2 players. Wall-nut Hills, arguably the best map in the original Garden Warfare, is coming over to Garden Warfare 2 this mon??th. It's the one with the treehouse, playground, and hilltop mansion. It's good as hell.

Coming soon! Will be a dedicated mix mode for 1 week AND added permanently into Turf Takeover map rotation. //t.co/t5m87MI7Pk

— Shaun Laker (@slaker) February 7, 2019

February will also bring a new Garden Warfare 2 mode, Soil Survivor, which has a familiar-sounding playable area that "shrinks over time" and "team-based sudden death elimination rounds." According to creative director Justin Wiebe, it'??ll only stick around for a limited time through the Mystery Portal. "We'd like to see how players enjoy the experience before we consider making it more permanent."

Considering Garden Warfare is fondly remembered for its maps, Wall-nut Hills is a great get for GW2.

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::Peggle Jump gif::

I haven't thought about Origin in a while, but I think of Peggle often. It's such a timeless classic, and I can hear the celebratory anthem of&nb??sp;Ode to Joy and the little "bump" sound effects in my head.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about you should probably change that, and it won't cost you anything (for now). While it's normally five bucks, Peggle is now free on Origin again. If you have an account for the service y??ou can either log into the app or grab it at the link below, and you're go??od.

EA has frequently put Peggle up for free as part of its "On the House" promotion, and I have this theory that if Origin usage isn't up to par, they just flip the Peggle switch.

Peggle [Origin]

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I started up Origin for the first time in months for this

If you're like me and you have an itch to play some good old Peggle in a wonderful 1600x1200 resolution (like I did in my youth) and watch balls hit other balls while you stare into the void of those black bars on each side of your screen and question your own existence -- then you're in luck! Because Peggle is now free through Origin's “On T??he House” promotion for a limited time.

All you'll need is your Origin account and you can hop on now and download the game for free and have the glory of Peggle in your digital library until the end of time... or for however long Origin is a thing presumably. Notably, the game is the Deluxe version of the game, but, doesn't include the Peggle Nights expansion. So, if you're looking for some extreme ball bouncing -- then you're out of luck.

In the meantime, I can only hope that excited Peggle 2 guy returns one ???day to bring the good news of a third game.

Peggle free on PC via Origin [Eurogamer]

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I'm cautiously optimistic

I wasn't sure we'd see a direct follow-up to Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 anyti?me soon, but a thir??d game in the zany third-person shooter series might be on the horizon.

The source here is an odd one, to be sure. The Amazon listing for the upcoming comic Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare Volume 2 references Garden Warfare 3 with the following passage:

"Paul Tobin returns to write the official comic book bridge between video games PvZ: GW2 and PvZ: GW3 with Tim Lattie returning to deliver artwork!"

It's also worth noting? that this comic is set to be published on September 25, 2018.

I enjoyed the last game quite a bit, but it didn't have the same staying power as the original Garden Warfare, and making a compelling sequel will require more than just adding to the existing foundation. I think a potential Garden Warfare 3 will need to undergo a not-insignificant rethink if it's going to meet expectations. Competition is fierce, too. Kids are way into Fortnite Battle Royale these days.

That said, if GW3 comes to fruition, I'm down. I love th??ese character classes so much.

Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare Volume 2 [Amazon via reddit]

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'When I'm not making games I can usually be found playing them'

George Fan is pretty modest for someone who created Insaniquarium and Plants vs. Zombies, two of the most memorable and replayable games ever released. His career has spanned almost two decades, from freaky Flash games to creating a major franchise in Zombies, which is endlessly iterated upon by industry behemoth El??ectronic Arts.

In speaking to him about his upcoming release, Octogeddon, he fondly recalled his hu??mble origins on a gaming portal that he refers to as an "online version of Chuck E. Cheese," and described himself as a "gnomish tinkerer." I could immediately tell that this is s??omeone who never wants to stop making things.

A lot of people don't know who Fan is, and given that he's tried to keep it that way, that would make sense. I wasn't kidding when I said he was humble, as his first gig was way back in the early day??s of the wild west of internet gaming. Th??at era when your teacher showed everyone in class a "don't worry be happy" smiley face flash meme before everyone knew what memes were.

Fan recalls his early years and how he got started with PopCap: "My first job in the industry was making Java games for this website Prizegames.com, which was basically an online version of Chuck E. Cheese. In doing research on other Java games, I came across PopCap.com and their very earliest set of games (like Mummy Maze and Seven Seas) and thought 'Hey, these are really good!', as they were a cut above all the other Java games that I 'researched.' Right after leaving Prizegames.com, I made the first version of Insaniquarium, which I entered in the 2002 Independent Games Festival. I was in an internet cafe in Hawaii when I found out Insaniquarium made it as a finalist, and I rem?ember just screaming at the top of my lungs, probably startling everyone in there. I immediately contacted PopCap, who I'd been corresponding with, and asked if they'd be at GDC that year. They came to visit me at my finalist booth, and we just kinda hit it off from there."

That was 2002, but Fan had been making games before then. I really wanted to know more about his first project, Wrath of the Gopher (check out this screen I was given), and ended up learning a lot about Fan in the process. When recalling Gopher Fan told me, "[Wrath] was the very first 'real' game I finished. Before that, I had serious doubts about whether I was cut out to be a game designer. I remember cutting up index cards to do a paper prototype of what would end up being a simple puzzle game where you play as a gopher, trying to eat all the cabbages in a path without backtracking. I believe you can still play it on my very old and very out of date website, but you'll need to have Java installed, an?d no one I know has Java in their browser these days."

He didn't always have that same Insaniquarium luck though, as several of his projects were either canceled or unannounced at PopCap. I vividly remember when Yeti Train was discovered by secondhand sources, but it never saw the light of day. Fan gave me a little kernel to go off of: "Yeti Train was about... well... a yeti on a train. You played as a yeti stuck in a desert trying to get back to his snowy mountain cave. Inexplicably, you have a train. So you'd travel from location to location, collecting fossils to turn in for upgrades, recruiting yeti friends, and fending off dinosaurs by throwing snowballs at them. At the high level, it's me paring the RPG genre down to its essentials, much in same the way I tried to strip down RTS games with Insaniquarium, tower defense games with Plants vs. Zombies, and elements of roguelike games with Octogeddon."

Octogeddon is his newest project, which plays like a shoot-'em-up of sorts with the same level of charm as Plants vs. Zombies;&??nbsp;notably because the game involves some of the same staff members. I immediately asked Fan to paint us a picture of his new studio that set out to carry on the mission of game d?evelopment, All Yes Good, and he was happy to oblige.

"We're a really small studio with a simple purpose, so it's not gonna require much paint! All Yes Good is pretty much just a company I created so I could make games the way I want to. For Octogeddon, I'm working with a really small team of just me, Rich Werner (artist on PvZ), and Kurt Pfeifer (programmer on the XBLA adaptation of PvZ). We're also working with Jimmy Hinson, who's done an amazing soundtrack for us. Our long-term goals are nothing fancy, just: 1. Make game. 2. Hope that game makes enough? money to make another game. 3. Repea??t."

Fan isn't always working though, and is prone to a few passions, including Magic: The Gathering and LEGO. When asked what he does with his spare time, he remarked: "When I'm not making games I can usually be found playing them. I'm a pretty huge fan of Magic, and most weekends will involve having friends over for a Magic-a-thon, or heading over to Edmund McMillen's place for a [Magic] draft. 2018's looking like it's going to be a good year for me, as I just bought $500 worth of LEGOs and plan on holing up for extended periods of time like some gnomish tinkerer building Rube Goldberg machines out of 'em. Like this one!"

Everything is looking up for Fan even if sales for Octogeddon don't go through the roof, but I wanted to also get his take on where the Plants vs. Zombies series went after he left. Although the whole situation is bittersweet after he left following some disagreements over Plants vs. Zombies 2 (the details of which are still unknown), he does still have a soft spot for it. "I was only involved in PvZ 2 at a conceptual level in the early stages. I've only played Garden Warfare for a tiny bit, (haven't really gotten into shooters besides Splatoon) but I did play a decent amount of Heroes and had a good time doing so. For a few of the character designs I was ??like 'Eek! Who came up with that??', but I'd say overall it lived up to the spirit of the original!"

George Fan's newest game, Octogeddon, is ??due out on February 8 on Steam. You can read a review of it here around the time of its ?launch.

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Borderlands 2 being the clear winner

I'm a little shocked at the game selection for Games with Gold next month. Usually Microsoft kills it in terms of big-name titles or critically acclaimed indie hits. This month, though, we're getting a bunch of nonsense on the Xbox One and an inferior version of a fan favorite shooter. I can't say much about Heavy Weapon, but ??I know PopCap Games made it, so it probably isn't too bad.

For Xbox One users, you'll be able to get Evolve: Ultimate Edition from March 16 to April 15 and Layers of Fear from March 1 to March 31. For 360 users, you'll get Borderlands 2 from March 1 to March 15 and Heavy Weapon from March 16 to March 31. Remember, those 360 titl??es are backward compatible, so it isn't a total loss on the Xbox One front.

I don't know how the 360 version of Borderlands 2 fares against the PS3 version, but that port was a total pile of garbage. Split-screen was an absolute nightmare with horrible framerates, poor load times, and a bunch of crashes. My friend and I actually really hated? the game until we gave the PC version a shot, which quickly reversed our opinion.

Why Microsoft opted to go that route with Borderlands 2 is strange to me, since it could have just as easily given the better Handsome Collection version on Xbox One and skipped over the basically dead Evolve. Well,?? you can't win every month for free games and getting something is better than nothi??ng.

Xbox Live Games With Gold For March 2017 [Major Nelson]

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No specific release window other than 'later this year'

EA Access is far enough along now that you just knew it was only a matter of time before the program brought in Star Wars Battlefront, especially with one more expansion left to go and the never-ending need to keep its player base flourishing. That game, as well as Mirror's Edge Catalyst and EA Sports UFC 2, are joining the Xbox One subscription service's free?-play "Vault" later this year.

Up first, however, is a bundle of assorted PopCap titles from its Xbox Live Arcade days: Heavy Weapon, Bejeweled, Bejeweled 2, Feeding Frenzy, Feeding Frenzy 2, and Zuma. I can't be the only one who is way into those "move up the food chain" games. They're shallo?w, but weirdly satisfying.

The E?A Access Vault Expands this Year with Sports, Action and Arcade Titles [EA]

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Plants vs. Network Error

_{[Thanks to user Shaun for the tip]}

Either by some force of benevolence or a strange network error, most of PopCap's backward compatible titles are showing up for free on Xbox One. Users on a Reddit thread have noted that the games are still showing a price on the offi??cial Xb?ox website and through their 360s.

Since PopCap was acquired by EA back in 2011, some people were speculating that this was due to users having EA Access. Others have mentioned they don't have a subscription to EA's service and are still seeing the games. One guy stated he doesn't have Xbox Live Gold and is not ?seeing the free games.

Whatever the issue, I'd suggest grabbing these while you still can. I'm not sure if access will be revoked or not, but it never hurts to try out some free games. The titles showing up are Bejeweled 2, Bejeweled 3, Heavy Weapon, Feeding Frenzy, and Feeding Frenzy 2.

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Available now on PS4 and Xbox One, soon on PC

Oh, hey, this sounds familiar! EA is offering a ten-hour trial for Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2. That's plenty of time to figure out if this particular type of team-based shooter is to your liking. I know it can be hard to carve out time away from Overwatch, but it's worth an extended look.

The promo starts today on PS4 and Xbox One, and it lasts ??until August 30, 2016 at 10:00am Pacific.

During that time, the full, permanent version of Garden Warfare 2 will be sold at half price, with your progress and achievements carrying over from the trial should you choose to upgrade. PC players will have to wait until August 16 for the ten-hour demo to appear o?n Origin.

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Inline with the first game

In a very non-EA move, Plants vs. Zombies 2: Garden Warfare is getting a huge free update soon. Titled "Trouble in Zombopolis: Part One," the DLC will provide an all-new map (with its own miniboss), two new characters (Breakfast Brainz and Toxic Citron), m?ore customization options, and a "Boat Blast" shooting gallery minigame. It'll arrive sometime this summer.

I say "non-EA," but really, they deserve a lot of credit for the Garden Warfare franchise in general. They supported the original with free DLC for a long while, and it seems like the trend is set to continue with the sequel. As long as PopCap can keep making these games with as much care as they've put into this pair, I'm? totally ok with it.

Trouble In Zombopolis [EA]

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Stars don't have arms to reach for you

It's hard to believe that PopCap Games is turning 16 years old. Once recognized as the seminal "casual games" company with hits like Feeding Frenzy and Dynomite, it was acquired by EA in 2011 and hasn't been the same since. But unlike a lot of other indie acquisitions, this move hasn't been all bad. The studio exited its comfort zone and shifted into bigger-budget projects like the Garden Warfare series, which seems to have worked out for it.

Bejeweled Stars still has? some of that old-school PopCap glory, but it's obfuscated by EA's need to for??ce free-to-play into everything it can.

Bejeweled Stars (Android, iOS [reviewed on an iPhone 6])
Developer: PopCap Games
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: May 10, 2016
MSRP: Free

Bejeweled Stars, indeed, is Bejeweled, but amped up a notch. With the help of an adorable cat n?amed Felis, it's your task to reassemble constellations using the magical power of the cosmic gems. Okay, it's not actually as cool as it sounds, but at least they tried.

The real power of Stars is that it remains addicting even to this day. Using a level-based progression system, every stage presents the player with a goal, which is?? often multi-tiered in nature. Match four explosive gems before your move counter runs out. Clear out crystal pieces, which take multiple matches to destroy. That sort of thing. But somehow, PopCap managed to keep things interesting even as I progressed through an entire afternoon session, adding in new concepts like butterflies -- which need to be matched before they reach the top -- to keep me playing.

Most of it has been seen before, but the sheer open-ended nature of Stars allows these ideas to breathe. Players can utilize multiple strategies to clear goals, and some of them are really out of the box. Sure you can use the tried-and-true "match three" approach and mostly succeed, but with a multitude of different power-ups that can be crafted through square matches, "T" shapes, and four-of-a-kind (all of which create new power-ups on the board), the game is pretty fair in giving you the tools you need to win. This is in spite of that pesky "free" price tag you may have noticed above, but the hand of EA is strong, and creeps up on you befo??re you know it.

Rather than create powers in a stage with skill by matching them manually, you can also craft power-ups in the "lab." At first it doesn't seem all that bad -- specially marked jewels earned through normal gameplay can be transmuted into these abilities, giving off the air of fairness to it. But then you realize that even if you have enough currency, you have to wait a specified amount of time (usually 30 minutes or more) until the power-up is ready. Firs?t red flag.

While I found these to be ancillary to the core of the game, more and more crept in. Chests appear, which grant you access to random items, provided t??hat you craft a key to open them (or wait a few hours instead). EA also couldn't resist cramming in a Face?book connect option, which also grants you extra items. Thankfully, most of the funnels in the game primarily just contribute towards optional power-ups and charms, which can be used to customize your avatar for the tacked-on social features.

But the big holdup is energy. Now, there's a caveat -- unlike Pokémon Shuffle, which takes a heart (one play) from users win or lose, Stars only ta??kes one if you lose. Does it make up for the fact that the scheme is even in there in the first place, and that it ushers people who aren't adept at puzzle games to pay to keep playing? No. But personally, seven hours in, I didn't find it to be nearly as daunting as other games. Though obviously, I'd prefer to "buy out" of this system entirely.

Bejeweled Stars is a fantastic example of what the developer is capable of, and it is only held back by its insistence to monetize users at every turn. I can only hope that one day, when the dust settles in the never-ending quest for money in the free-to-play arena, after Zynga's office building is?? a distant? memory, that PopCap will go back to a premium model for its puzzle games.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of th?e game d??ownloaded for free.]}

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Stars -- they're just like us!

It's actually been 6 years since Bejeweled 3 and a cool 15 since the series' first iteration, even if I still can't reliably spell Bejeweled correctly. One of the reasons King is worth $6 billion is its match-3 Candy Crush, which hadn't even been released when Bejeweled 3 came out (neither were out in 1989 when Sega put out Columns, either, but hey).

PopCap, having just delivered the surprisingly great, full 3D shooter Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, is back to serving those seeking more fleeting diversion with the newly released Bejeweled Stars.

It is free (with optional in-app purchases naturally) in the App Store and Google Play. Stars boasts, "completely overhauled gameplay" -- it's been in development for three years -- and "new challenges, powerups, challenging obstacles, charm emojis and much ??more."

I may not have an eye for the finely tuned diff??erences, but I do like that cartoon cat. There's also this trailer for ??the game.

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It's more in line with the usual offerings

If April's Games with Gold lineup was the best yet, and I'm inclined to agree with Brett that it was, then whatever Microsoft has in store for May can't possibly stack up. I had that sentiment in mind when reading over the list of what's coming up ?next, and I'm still rather underwhelmed.

On the Xbox One side, it's a decent effort. Defense Grid 2 will be free with an Xbox Live Gold membership throughout May, followed by Costume Quest 2 from May 16 - June 15. Two tit?les many of us don't already own, if absolutely nothing else. I'm down for both of 'em.

For Xbox 360, we're looking at Grid 2 from May 1 - May 15, and then Peggle from May 16 - May 31. If you don't already own the latter in one form or another, then by all ?means, enj??oy it.

I'd like to formally request Asura's Wrath for Games with Gold and/or backward compatibility support. Kyle won't let me ever forget that I didn't play CyberConnect2's absurd quick-time-event-'em-up and?? t??he only way I'll be bothered to is if it comes to a more recent console. Help me help myself.

Xbox Live Games With Gold For May 2016 [Major Nelson]

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You don't need an EA Access account, either

Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 has slipped out of my nightly rotation, but I clocked I don't even wanna know how many hours when I was still actively playing. If you were thinking of getting into the wacky shooter but haven't committed, there is a 10-hour trial on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.

That's enough time to get a feel for the stor??y missions, the hub world side stuff, and also dip into the competitive multiplayer. The only catch I'm seeing is that the trial is a limited-time offer lasting until Tuesday?, May 10 at 10:00am Pacific. Which, hey, that's not too bad.

You're on the clock when the game is open, "so if you want to conserve your time, make sure you close the game when you're finished playing." Oh, and progress does carry into the full version.

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PopCap has done it again

Popcap has continuously surprised us with games we didn't even know we wanted, such as the Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare games, and the ever-popular Pachinko-like Peggle; their latest title Plants vs. Zombies: Heroes continues that trend by combining the formula of the original PvZ game with a hero-based card game, ala Hearthstone. 

Playing as one of 20 heroes from either the plants or zombies team, you'll be building decks of minions and spells to battle either the CPU in two different story modes, or against other players online. Each match starts with deciding which cards of four to keep, or to "recycle" back into your hand thus drawing different cards. Unlike Hearthstone where a coin decides play order, her?e zombie pla??yers always play first, but that doesn't necessarily give them an advantage.

Each round has four parts: Zombies play, plants play, zombie tricks, and fight. During the first phase only minions can be played, some of which may be hidden under gravestones that don't reveal themselves until later. The plants play portion allows plants to play both minions and spells, before the zombie tricks part that lets zombies play spells and reveals the minions under their tombstones. Fighting takes place from left to right, with minions in the same lanes attacking each other at th??e same time.

The five lanes are laid out with the left most lane being elevated, which gives certain minions bonus stats while the rightmost lane only allows amphibious minions to be played, which often have high stats. Minions can be placed as you see fit in the leftmost and middle lanes, though only certain minions can?? be place??d in the same lane as other minions.

The goal of each match is to deplete the opposing player's health gauge from 20 to zero. Each time a hero takes a hit, a ch?arge meter gains some power, and the attack that makes it reach full power gets guarded as well as granting a spell to the guarding player. These spells can be used immediately, and this can be done up to three times per match. It makes players have to rethink the layout of their playing field, but also adds a bit of luck to the game as the meter fills randomly per attack.

I had my doubts when Heroes was announced after the last mobile game in the series added some pretty shitty microtransactions after release, but thus far I'm pretty happy with how EA have handled microtransactions here?. After each game, players will be granted a card, with the winner getting their choice from two. Card packs can be purchased with real money or with gems, the in-game currency. Gems are earned by completing quests of which you can have up to three of at a time, or can be purchased with cash. Earning gems is easy enough and you can easily get a pack or two of cards a day if you complete quests as they refresh.

So far I haven't bought anything with real world money, but I'm considering it to support the developers for making such an awesome game, the same reason I don't feel guilty about buying Hearthstone cards from time to time. I've not come across an instant when I've felt any cards are unfair or overpowered (though ??I've mostly been playing the single player missions) thus making you compelled to spend money in hopes of getting those cards. 

While online matches add a bit of a difficulty, they are currently only offered in the casual variety against nameless opponents. In other words, there currently isn't a ranked mode or a way to play with friends, which is?? a bummer and my only complaint as these features would add some longevity to what is seemingly a solid package.

Plants vs. Zombies: Heroes is currently only ava?ilable in a few select countries for testing purposes, and is scheduled to go live worldwide sometime soon for iOS and Android.

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Clever use of the characters

PopCap is taking a break from tower defense for a crack at collectible card gaming with its next Plants vs. Zombies title for iOS and Android, PvZ Heroes. The project "began over two years ago as? a paper card game prototype" designed in cr?eative director Devin Low's spare time.

T?he studio is testing the single- and multiplayer game in a few t??erritories -- Brazil, Romania, and New Zealand for now -- ahead of a worldwide release which is supposed to happen "soon."

Free-to-play? Yup. "Players will be able to purchase new heroes and characters via in-app purchases, but everything in the game can also be earned and collect??ed without spending a penny. We won’t have any cool-downs or other barriers to play as much or as long as you want."

There's just a few seconds of gameplay in this trailer, but you can find more character-specific footage in the several accompanying clips. I'm wit?h the guy?? who says Super Brainz is the best.

As a fan of Plants vs. Zombies in general, I'll p?rob?ably try this out of curiosity.

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A map, more missions, and character reworks

This week, there's almost certainly going to be a big dropoff in the number of Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 players who sti?ck with Rose because they like to top the scoreboards. And thank goodness for that. PopCap is releasing a major u?pdate on Tuesday, March 8 with a new multiplayer map, more missions for the hub world, and much-needed balance adjustments to characters like Rose.

The all-seeing, all-knowing plant class is being "compl?etely re-tuned" to fit into her originally intended support role. Tha??t means lower health, less effective homing capabilities for her primary attack, and a reduction to her Time Snare ability, among other changes. With this update, PopCap is also touching up several other characters like the Imp (more health) and Chomper (less spammy Goop).

As for the new Team Vanquish map, it's a refresh of Garden Center, which was a staple of the original Garden Warfare. This new "Zomburbified" version for Garden Warfare 2 is called Aqua Center.

The update will hit PlayStation 4, PC, and Xbox One on Tuesday. Here?? are the full notes:

March 2016, Garden Warfare 2 Tuning/Balance Notes

New Features

• Added new co-op/team vanquish map "Aqua Center" which may seem familiar, yet completely different!
• Added night version of the Great White North map to the Turf Takeover Playlist
• Added Hide n' Find missions to Backyard Battleground
• Added Bot & Pot Missions to Backyard Battleground
• Added unique character variant images to group HUD
• World Options now shows all friends playing the game, not just the joinable ones
• Added classic setting in options to change primary fire button (PS4 Only)
• Added Aim Sensitivity slider to now allow more precise control over aim speed (for PC this is broken up into both mouse and gamepad sensitivity)
• Added ability to select between hold button to aim or toggle button to Aim
• Added kick player option to the in-game scoreboard for easy access (player hosted modes only)
• Added difficulty to Pause Menu for some game modes
• Game Now defaults to common chat in Private Matches
• Added ability to view scoreboard while vanquished

Critical Fixes

• Reduced length of round timer between rounds in Multiplayer matches
• Imp now properly earns XP when in Mech
• Players can now see other players’ Backyard customizations when visiting their Backyard
• Players can now see stats on other players stats boards when visiting their Backyard
• Improved audio for garlic drone primary weapon
• Setting HUD to "Light" now also hides XP Meter
• Major improvements to hit reaction "flinching" animations
• A plethora of quality & bug fixes

Tuning/Balance Notes

Overall

• Improved regeneration upgrade for all characters
• Re-tuned all hit reactions for both players and AI to reduce the flinching effect even more

Rose:

• Completely re-tuned Rose class, bringing her back into playing as a support role
• Reduced Rose’s health
• Major changes to her homing abilities, ineffective at range, requires player to lead target in order to land more hits
• Slightly reduced rate of fire for Magic Thistles
• Significantly reduced length a victim is trapped in Time SnareChanged how Goatify ability works so that damage does not break Goatify, creating a more predictable and less jarring experience and lowered time as a goat
• Slowed down rose variants (Fire, Ice) when charging their weapons to make them more vulnerable

Citron:

• Slightly decreased the Party Citron laser damage

Corn:

• We needed to improve Corn's ability to be a front-line fighter so we increased his health and also improved his long range damage
• Reduced Party Corn's damage output

Chomper:

• Decreased the digestion time after a chomp escape (i.e. your victim got away using anti-chomp ability like jackhammer)
• Brought Chompers regeneration delay to parity with all other playable characters
• Fixed a bug where Chomp Thing’s health regeneration didn’t match his weapon description. He now regenerates health slightly sooner and faster than default
• Increased Unicorn Chomper’s Rainbow Warp cooldown time
• Increased goop cooldown so it couldn't be spammed quite as much

Cactus:

• Zen Cactus was too damaging and needed some damage and reload adjustments

Imp:

• Imps tuning focused on ensuring he had a bit more survivability outside of his mech, and also improved his primary weapon slightly
• Increased Imp health
• Fixed a bug where the Imp couldn’t receive damage while he is making his Z-Mech phone call (he's now only invulnerable when the beam of light appears)
• Reduced Party Imp's damage output

Super Brainz:

• Slight cooldown reduction to Super Ultra Ball and Super Multi Ball abilities
• Minor speed improvement to Turbo Twister but at the cost of decreased his armor while in Turbo Twister
• Removed the decay from Toxic Brainz legendary meter to make it more useful
• Damage reduction to Party Brainz

Captain Deadbeard:

• We wanted to bring Captain Deadbeard closer to damage parity with Cactus, but just slightly below since he also benefits from his close range scatter shot
• Made some movement speed improvements to his barrel when unlit
• Made some damage reductions to Captain Partyman

The post Garden Warfare 2’s first free DLC drops tomorrow appeared first on Destructoid.

Free DLC and premium coin packs incoming

If you've spent any amount of time playing Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 online, you undoubtedly see R??ose when you close your eyes at night. There she is, way off in the distance, grinning. She knows you can't escape her homing shots. And even if you did, there's never just one Rose. They travel in packs! Players and PopCap agree: she's overpowered.

"Rose was conceived as a support role/specialist, not a primary damage dealer, and we've been working on rebalancing her to fit that role," the studio said in a blog post today. "This fix is going to be implemented very soon and we thank ??you for your patience and incre?dible support while we get it ready."

For the time being, might I suggest fighting back with the Scientist? The?? Marine Biologist variant in particular is adept at taking Rose out before she can cast spells. You just need to get in close enough. To that end, I've had good luck teaming up with a second healer to sneak behind enemy lines and wipe out whole groups of Rose players. They tend to bunch up in the back.

Besides the balance update, PopCap is also preparing its first free DLC: the Graveyard Variety Pack (shown above). It's a "trip back to Suburbia," apparently, but that's about al?l we know.

Free post-release multiplayer maps and character variants are to be expected for Garden Warfare 2, and the same could be said of optional microtransactions. Based on this European PlayStation Blog post, ??it sounds like play??ers will be able to spend real money on coin packs as early as this Thursday, March 3. No word on pricing yet, though.

I didn't pay for coins in the first game and I?? don't see that changing here. Aside from the legendary characters that are (I think) only earnable in Infinity mode, I already have 'em all.

Upcoming Balance Changes for Plants vs??. Zombies Garden Warfare 2 [PVZGW2]

The post Garden?? Warfare 2 is going to bring Rose dow??n a notch appeared first on Destructoid.

Against the grain

Chris and I were thinking about holding a fight to the death to determine which of us would get first dibs on Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, as is the traditional way to end internal kerfuffles at Destructoid, but we called it off at the ?last minute.

We realized we could both do the review, together, and I wouldn't have ??to die.

Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 (PC, PS4, Xbox One [reviewed])
Developer: PopCap Games
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: February 23, 2016
MSRP: $59.99

Chris: Can I just start by saying h??ow surprised I am that EA didn't waste this franchise's potential? I'm shocked that PopCap, creator of those classic browser games I played in networking class in high school, ended up crafting a shooter this good.

Because to me, Garden Warfare 2 immediately steps on the shoulders of the strong foundation the original built. It keeps everything people loved about the first, and expands upon concepts that needed to be addressed. For instance, the hub world tu?rned out well. It's great that after a quick five-minute tutorial you're able to not only choose your character right away, but your faction as well. I ended up messing around in it for several hours before I even remembered that this was primarily a competitive multiplayer game. Mission accomplished, as far as solo players are concerned.

Jordan: Absolutely. The hub world is a far more realized slice of the wider Plants vs. Zombies universe, and it's so delightfully odd. Similar to you, I expected to head straight into the standard multiplayer modes after transferring my character unlocks from Garden Warfare (which worked flawlessly), but instead I ended up spending the first several hours runni??ng around the open world in search of quests, mini-games, and collectibles. The plants and zombies have their own base on opposite ends of the map, and there's this eternal conflict in the middle. I can't tell you how many times I got swept up in that escalating fight.

The first game excelled as an online multiplayer experience, but it didn't offer much in the way of engaging, long-lasting single-player content. This time, you can team up with or compete against some surprisingly competent AI bots, and better yet, there is also a proper storyline ??for the two factions. The missions are varied -- one had me dropping bombs from a living corn airship, while another involved shrinking down to fight plan??ts inside of a sick shark -- and they do a good job of introducing the six new character classes.

I'm not sure if I have a favorite newcomer, but Super Brainz is a contender. Aside from his fabulous head of hair, he has this fun mix of ranged an?d melee attacks. Also, one of his abilities is essentially a Hadoken. Bless you, PopCap.

Chris: I think my new favorites are Kernel Corn and the Imp, for plants and zombies respectively. I dig Kernel's air strike ability, as it adds a new dimension to the game strategically and the fact that so many levels are built for it (read: indoor objectives often cleverly have holes in the ceiling) is great. As for the Imp, the risk-reward playstyle is constantly entertaining. You're completely open as your base class, but once you hit that mech call-in cooldown, you're in business. The new classes inject so much personality into Garden Warfare 2, on top of all of the base ones that are still in, and the multitude of subclasses that divide each core playstyle. It was fun picking it back up online and wiping the floor with people in the first multiplayer session -- like riding a bike again after a few years. We went 5-0??!

To speak to your praise of the hub world, the multiplayer arenas are also even more stylized than before. Missions might start with a "capture or defend the point" conceit, but they culminate in really wacky conclusions that suit the series well. Like the one where you're ruining a zombie graduation party by painting over murals on the wall, or playing a giant competitive pinball game. I don't think this franchise gets nearly enough credi??t for how unique it is. If you're looking for a shooter that isn't portrayed through a prototypical lens of brown, this is it.

As for? my time with split-screen, I'm bummed that you can't do quests or go online on the same console, but local play has been improved to the point where both players can earn their own rewards, and the entire hub and Garden Ops are technically available. It's...enough, and the ability to choose opposing sides and essentially play a 1v1 rumble in the hub is cool.

Jordan: Yeah, the pinball finale was unexpected. I spent most of my time in the original game with that mode, Gardens & Graveyards, and I can tell it's going to be the same for Garden Warfare 2. Wi?th a decent matchup, there's rarely a dull moment. I'm glad that in some of the maps, the zombies are on the defensive for a change. That needed to happen. All of the other returning competitive modes were seemingly left as is, but I? don't mind. Gnome Bomb is the only one I'm tired of playing.

Another thing I was happy to see altered is the way player progression works. You no lo?nger have to worry about completing uninteresting challenges or using an annoying-to-obtain currency to bypass them. Instead, you just earn experience points by playing any of the modes as you normally would. The 100+ character subclasses level up independently, and there are unlockable upgrades like an increased zoom distance and faster health regeneration.

More than any of that, though, I was pulled into the optional que??sts. They boost your XP multiplier and give out stars, which are hard to come by, or coins. Because I didn't know any better, I carelessly spent all of my stars on cosmetic rewards only to later learn that you need them for the post-game survival mode, Infinity. I don't want to spoil who you go up against, but it's super weird. And tough! Your first attempts at Infinity are free (one for each faction), but I'd still recommend setting aside stars for reentry.

As for the coin economy, payouts vary based on the mode, who you're up against, and how well you and your team performed. As an example, I took home around 6,500 coins in a seven-minute round of Vanquish Confirmed against the AI on the hardest difficulty setting. The pricing for card packs in Garden Warfare 2 ran??ges from 2,500 coins for an assortment of one-time-use defensive items like potted plants or zombie turrets all the way up to 75,000 coins for a guarantee??d character variant.

It feels like I'm earning coins quicker than I was in the first game, but it might just be that I'm en??joying myself even more?? this time around. Either way, I suspect I'll be hooked for the rest of the year.

Chris: Same goes for me. It has a Warriors level amount of content to wade through and I'm completely fine with how th?e coin system works. Now that you can earn them with nearly every mode, they don't feel like a grind. The defensive zombies remark is spot-on, and I love some of the new futuristi?c defense systems they're able to utilize now -- it gives them more parity with plants so the game truly feels like a 50/50 split. The first game was very plant-centric and zombies fans will have a much better experience. I'm still a plant man though, and you can quote me on that.

Jordan: And there it is. The truth comes out. Naturally, I'm a zombie guy, so we need to be sworn enemies until I invariably grow tired of playing as the still-kinda-c??heap soldier class with the crossbow and switch sides.

The post Review: Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 appeared first on Destructoid.

Based on your Garden Warfare 1 rank

When you first play the final version of Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 (how'd you like the beta?), yo?u're going to want to look out for the mailbox in the hub world -- that's where you can import your characters and progression from the first game. We still don't have all of the specifics yet, as far as I have seen, but Pop?Cap did announce the loyalty rewards today.

• Rank 10 or higher: Receive a free Helpful Fun Pack.
• Rank 25 or higher: Receive a free Wondrous Pack of Greatness.
• Rank 50 or higher: Receive a free character unlock.
• Rank 100 or higher: Receive five Super Rare Customization Items - with a 'glowing' effect added to them for good measure.
• Max Rank of 313: Last but not least, players who reach will receive a 313 Max Pack that includes a legendary character -- the Unicorn Chomper and Unicorn Warp Ability. Because what’s not to love about a warping Chomper?

I played the original game on multiple platforms before settling on PC where, according to Origin, I clocked in 86 hours. My goodness. As fate would have it, I left off at rank 98, which means I'll want to go back and rank up a couple more times before Garden Warfare 2 drops on February 23.

The post These are the?? loyalty ?rewards for Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 appeared first on Destructoid.