Wi-Philes

This year the market has been flooded with games in the tower defense genre, particularly on iPhone.  While most of the games are good for a quick bit of entertainment, one game really shone through the bunch and that was Plants Vs. Zombies from PopCap Games.  The same group that brought you Peggle which is another favorite of mine after having downloaded it through XBLA.  This game really deserves a full review treatment, but at this point has been out for a few months.  At the very least I thought it deserved a blog post just so I could get the word out about how much fun it is.

If you're not familiar with the tower defense genre of games, they basically have you defending some goal or object against waves of enemies.  You usually do so by purchasing some kind of defensive/offensive objects that help eliminate what's coming at you.  In the case of this game, you're using a variety of plants to defend your home against hordes of zombies.  Between levels you choose a subset of your plant collection to bring into battle.

What sets this game apart from the rest is the humor.  The premise itself is bizzare, but the execution is very well done.  You have a variety of plants each with their own ability to attack, slow, blow up, block, etc. the enemy.  As you play through the game you unlock newer plants with more twists on those abilities that will help you against the ever-escalating difficulty of the enemies and the environment.  As with the plants, the zombies that come your way also will increase in their ability to get past your defenses and into your home to taste your delicious brains.  You start against your basic zombies, but it progresses to zombies with bucket helmets, zombies with snowmobiles, and zombies with inner tubes(for the levels with your pool), among many many other varieties.  It's difficult to express how funny the game is as the zombies seem to be getting smarter in their own way.  You really have to play it to appreciate it.

In addition to your standard levels, the game will occasionally throw in sort of a mini-game level with different challenges.  For instance, on some you're given wallnuts which you must use to bowl over the incoming zombie horde.  In another, you're given random plants at certain time intervals and you're tasked with using them carefully and timely to fend off the attackers.

The animation and sound in the game is also well done.  Although it means you've lost, the sounds of a zombie getting through your defenses, entering your house, and eating your brain off-scene never get tiring.

The game has some longetivity to it as well.  Once you've beaten the game once, you can go back through and play again, but this time some of your plants for each level are already chosen for you.  There are also other modes you can unlock including Survival(wave after wave), Puzzle(including one game that has you as the zombies), and others.  They've even included a Zen Garden in which you can raise plants that in turn give you money to buy you upgrades for your plants in the main game.

Funny, I never intended for this to turn into a full review, but the game's so good the words just flowed.  Go buy this game now; I won't say it again.  I picked it up on Steam a couple months ago for $10 and for all I know they might be doing a similar deal.  It's more than worth it, and I can't wait to see what PopCap comes up with next.

It's been 2 days now that I've had a chance to hear what the gaming bigwigs have to sell us on and also try out a number of games on the show floor and I thought it might be fun to share my thoughts.

As a lifelong Nintendo fan I always find myself rooting a little more for Nintendo at each E3.  I have to say though, I was most impressed by Microsoft's press conference.  Take that with a grain of salt, however, since I was not among the N-Philes staffers who slipped into the Sony press conference on Tuesday(from what I hear their new controller shows quite a bit of promise).  Yes, Microsoft tried to go with star power with the likes of the Beatles, Tony Hawk, and Stephen Spielberg, but I honestly thought they showed the most amongst the big 3.  None of the games shown were big surprises, but there were still a number of quality titles amongst them.  Natal looks very intriguing though I'll hold onto my reservations until I see something more substantial than a tech demo or mini-game that can actually utilize the hardware, not to mention the fact that we haven't gotten a price point for it yet.  The Tony Hawk developers must be pretty pissed though considering how much they touted their new skateboard peripheral only to have it obsoleted an hour later within the same conference.  I mean Microsoft even showed a Natal skateboarding ad during the trailer.

Nintendo, what can I say.  I have to admit I was disappointed.  Not only were the majority of us not actually in the same room as the presenters, but the great Miyamoto wasn't even there.  I did get a bit of a rush seeing that another Mario Galaxy is on the way, even if it's just a slight update from the last one(details are based only on what was shown in the trailer).  I never played the last Golden Sun game, but the crowd sure loved the fact that another one's on the way.  The big surprise of the teamup with Team Ninja for a new, stylish Metroid actually looked pretty sweet.  I never really got into the Metroid Prime games, blasphemy I know, but the trailer certainly piqued my interest.  I kept hoping and hoping to hear about the oft-rumored Kid Icarus game but that never came to fruition.  Nor was there any more word on the latest Pikmin game confirmed by Miyamoto earlier this year.  What gives?  The press conference was really a mixed bag.  I'll talk about the actual game impressions a little further down.

I think I felt a bit differently about Ubisoft's press conference than most of the other staffers.  James Cameron's Avatar was a big focus and although I agree he probably went into way too much depth about the subject matter, it seemed like he was genuinely interested in the game and the development process that's gone into making it.  His movies have been hit or miss in my opinion, but it's always interesting to get a better understanding of the mind of someone who's considered a creative leader.

Tuesday afternoon brought with it the chance to actually play some of the titles shown during the press conferences and I'll take the time to talk about some of them:

The Conduit - I played the multiplayer component of the game at High Voltage's booth.  The controls were a bit loose, and I was offered the opportunity to adjust them but I chose not to so that I could keep on playing before the line backed up.  I had a lot of fun playing against 3 other players on separate kiosks.  The game run very smoothly, but I'll be interested to see what it's like when the supported 12 players are playing.  There were some neat features with the wii-mote such as being able to adjust the spread range(think buckshot) of your fire with a particular gun by rotating the controller one direction or another.  A number of weapons were available and I found the alien technology a lot more interesting to use than your standard human fare such as rifles or shotguns.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 - I'm not really an avid golfer, but this was the shortest line I saw for trying out the Wii Motion Plus.  I'll say this, the controller really seems accurate.  Keeping the club face aimed properly at the ball takes some focus and I wasn't quite following through properly on my drives, but it was really fun.  I'm sure with some practice it would be fantastic.  The putting seemed better too which I've heard people complain about in previous interations in the series.  To be honest I really wanted to play the disc golf side game.  As an avid disc golf player I was curious to see how it worked with the Motion Plus.  I played a few holes on this mode and had a hard time of it.  The last couple of throws were getting better though and I think it's just a matter of adjustment.  In such a crowded environment you can't really follow through on throws without whacking the demo'er.

Wii Sports Resort - I have to admit I enjoyed this game so much I came back for seconds and not just because they were giving away frisbees as swag.  My first playthrough was brief but it was the archery mini-game.  I was really surprised how responsive pulling back the nunchuck as if you were pulling back the bowstring was.  Almost makes me wish they could flesh out a full game of just the archery.  Later that day I went back and tried out the basketball mini-game.  There are two modes offered, a 3-point challenge and an actual basketball game.  I love watching the 3-point competition during the NBA all-star weekend so I gave this one a go.  It took a little bit of getting used to, but as long as you shot the ball from the top of your jumping arc it almost always went in.  Watching other people play two-player on this mode and it coming down to the wire was pretty exciting.  I could see both of these mini-games making great party games.  Hopefully I'll have a chance to play some more of them during the remaining days of E3.

New Super Mario Bros Wii - I was a bit disappointed Nintendo made such a big deal about this game during their conference.  It was basically like they were taking the original Super Mario Bros and combining it with the 4 Swords Zelda games.  Having played it twice, though, I can say it really is a lot of fun, especially screwing over the other people you're playing with/against.  I'll be curious to see what new suits and other innovations are available in other levels they're offering to let us play.

Silent Hill (Wii) - I have never played a Silent Hill game prior to the 10 or so minutes I spent playing this game.  Definitely a mood, atmospheric game.  I like some of the motion control related puzzles related to opening the doors, though I almost felt like they were added in simply to show off some cool ideas that can be pulled off with the wii-mote.  These include pulling pins, turning dials, and a few others.  The game's got potential though.

The guys at Atlus were very cool.  Trauma Center was their big item, but I actually enjoyed their XBox Live Arcade games they had to display.  To be honest I can't remember the names at the moment, but I'm going to hit up their booth again tomorrow for another play-through and to hopefully to do a Q&A session with them.

While I was waiting in line for Wii Sports Resort, a Nintendo employee showed me a DSiWare application that utilizes the camera in an interesting way.  You can snap a shot of text in one of about half a dozen languages and it will interpret the text in the picture and translate it for you in 6 languages.  I can't say it's something I would actually buy since I don't travel to foreign countries(the oddities of LA notwithstanding), but I thought it was pretty cool.

I'm sure I'm probably leaving something out that I tried, but that's the thing about E3, particularly if it's your first time.  It's a complete whirlwind of flashing lights, booth babes, and oddly-groomed nerds.  After another day or two I should have more impressions, particularly from the other consoles.