I just watched Zombieland the other day and I have to say, zombie movies never get old. Something about the silliness of it coupled with abject horror, and plenty of bad acting or the usual character idiocy that goes along with being eaten by a slow-moving zombie – it’s a tried and true formula for fun. Michael Jackson understood zombie appeal, as have countless of movie goers over the past decades, and I, certainly, pop in a zombie flick every Halloween, with Dots, Jujyfruits, and other squishy candies that I chew in celebration of brain noshing.

If you’ve been paying attention to the App Store lately, then you’ve probably noticed a game called Plants vs. Zombies that has been the top paid app for this past week (possibly since its release). Obviously, with Zombies in the title, I was eager, compelled, to check it out. As it turns out, the zombie reputation held true – this is a fantastically fun game. But, first things first: the graphics and execution are top-notch. The game is designed in that lighthearted, cartoonish manner I like so much, and the music continues that lighthearted feel with a bouncy beat that wouldn’t be out of place at a ghoulish, college Halloween party. Mostly, though, it’s the amusing character sketches the developers, PopCap, wrote for both the plant and zombie players. I laughed out loud at the description of Flag Zombie, which was made all the better being accompanied by the photo of the zombie, itself, bug-eyed and panting with his unwavering, dead stare, and gripping a flag:

“Make no mistake, Flag Zombie loves brains. But somewhere down the line he also picked up a fascination with flags. Maybe it’s because the flags always have brains on them. Hard to say.”

I also appreciate the eccentricity of the concept: Plants… and zombies? Zombies used in bizarre, unconventional ways almost seems trendy right now, particularly with that garish revamp of Jane Austen’s classic, Pride and Prejudice, called Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith. It’s easier to get away with zombie manipulation in games, however, despite glowing reviews of the former. The plant element in the game actually makes for a natural enemy. After all, what is more alive and green, and completely natural and wholesome, than a plant? Seems like natural enemies, to me. Since zombies are the obvious villains in this game (when are they ever not?), for your arsenal you have an array of happy and bright-looking plants, each with their own special abilities. Sunflowers are definitely the mainstay of the game: without them, you’d never collect enough energy to harvest more troops, the most useful of which is the Peashooter, who apparently is so effective at killing zombies from his, “Hard work, commitment, and a healthy, well-balanced breakfast of sunlight and high-fiber carbon dioxide…” Ah yes, sunlight. Without sunlight, you cannot garner – check that, plant – troops, so rather than mining resources, you simply catch falling suns, and/or produce your own sunlight by planting sunflowers. For each sun you tap, and collect, you earn 50 energy points to go toward planting more troops. Hence, the more sunflowers you plant, the more quickly you produce sunlight, so try to make as many as possible, while protecting them with peashooters.

But, there is more in your arsenal than just the basic peashooter. To protect your home from the zombie onslaught, you have plants like the Cherry Bomb, an angry cluster of cherries just ripe to bursting, literally, and used to explode a group of zombies in one juicy swoop; the Snow Pea, a more advanced Peashooter that took a cue from the frozen aisle of the supermarket and shoots frozen peas, instead, to slow down the already slow zombies; the Wall-nut, who with his hard shell acts as a blockade the Zombies must claw through first, before gaining access to plant troops behind (he doesn’t do anything other than stand there and take a beating, as noted by his wide-eyed, blank stare); the Potato Mine, a spud stuck in the ground with a pulsing red mine indicator, used to blow up zombies that get too close; and various other plants that you earn along the way, including a few nightshades and mushrooms for the night levels. Some troops cost more than others, and some require a latency period before their skills are activated, but each one requires a holding period before you can opt to plant another one – an amount no more than 20-30 seconds between each purchase. Given how remarkably easy the game is, this helps to curb your troop production.

What I found curious about this game is how unrelentingly fun it manages to be, despite the lack of difficulty. After the game introduces you to gameplay with the first few rounds, even shortening the playing field to only one or two strips of lawn, it soon becomes second nature to plant a large row of Sunflowers in the back, away from the battlefront, and next lining up a blockade of Wall-nuts with rows of peashooters behind. The zombies are so slow, and take so long to plow through a Wall-nut’s defense, that you’ll find you can build up plenty of Sunflowers before even bothering to plant a Peashooter, thereby giving you the boost of rapid sunshine production, and a game of no worries, with plenty of energy to feed your troops. And yet, the game is always fun. I played the game all the way through in one sitting, becoming, in a sense, as mindless as a zombie – it was that engrossing. Plus, to be fair, later levels include different obstacles in the form of graves that you must destroy with a special plant called the Grave Buster – a menacing, black plant of a nondescript nature other than it’s furling, curling appendages, like fingers, below its eyes – and those Pole-Vaulting Zombies can be a pain. I usually destroy them in one swift blow with the Cherry Bomb. The night levels also add another challenge: no sunlight. You must rely on building Sunflowers and Sun-Shrooms to produce enough energy to plant a defeat (pun intended). In later levels, you even battle on rooftops, in a pool, in the fog, and more and more zombie and plant characters are introduced.

Regardless of whether or not the game provides enough of a challenge, it does provide enough variety in opponents, side-games, and mini-quests to keep the game fun in the usual zombie fashion. I hope to see continued updates to this game, as well as sequels, because I know as soon as I finish writing this review, I’ll be playing Plants vs. Zombies again.