plants vs. zombies eats our brains

The time has come to reveal that lately, here at the yurt, we have a secret identity, a secret purpose, one we take very, very seriously.

We kill zombies.

I know I previously commented on a lack of zombie action here in yurtsville, but all that has changed in the last few weeks. Here is why.

[Dun dun DA!]

That’s right. Plants vs. Zombies! Betcha didn’t know you could protect your lawn from zombies with horticulture. Well, we’re here to tell you: YOU CAN. And it is crazy fun! Because, when I say that Plants vs. Zombie’s has eaten our brains, I mean that in best possible way. Here look.

See the pea shooters to the left?     And the zombies approaching from the right? We’ve got a bunch of cone-heads, a few bucket-heads, a scuba zombie, a javelin zombie, that guy in the ice machine is a zomboni. Up top you can see the flag zombie, leading the charge—see his little flag with the brain on it?

Aren’t they adorable?

How can zombies, animated, rotting corpses that want to eat your brains, how can they be adorable? That’s just weird.

But it’s only part of mystery that makes this relatively simple game—the goal is to plant a good defensive line of sunflowers, shooters, chompers, squash, etc. (eventually you collect twenty or thirty different kinds of plants) to stave off wave after wave of zombies—so freaking SATISFYINGLY FUN. Is it watching the zombies fall apart as the trundle across the lawn? Is it watching them turn to blackened ash when you explode them with a good cherry bomb? Is it the ever expanding roster of funny zombies and plants? Because the game is nothing if it isn’t amusing. Amusing CRACK.

Here is a nighttime scene where you have to use various kinds of mushrooms (no sunlight in the night) to defend the lawn. Looking at this screen, my mouse hand itches to plant! It’s silly, challenging, and makes you forego sleep to keep playing. I’m telling you, Popcap hit the formula for playability just exactly right when they made this game. The kids play, Paul plays, I play, we cheer each other on, shout strategy from the sidelines, groan when the zombies break through our line and eat our brains—its just hours and hours of zombie killing fun! And it impresses the heck out of me that the game’s creators have managed to make something that is equally compelling to the three and five year old kids in the house, as well as their late thirty year old parents. That’s not easy to do! And they knocked it out of the park!

You should have heard us screaming in exultation the other night when the kids and I (I was driving the mouse for this one) beat the Zombot! We were all up dancing with the zombies, let me tell you, singing along with the break away pop hit “There’s a Zombie on your Lawn.”

Good times! Highly recommended game. And just think how prepared we’ll be when the zombies come for us! I can just see us out there, arranging all the junk into zombie killing traps. Because everyone needs a Zombie Contingency Plan.

You know I’m right.