Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare

[Scott_Arm]

This one is coming out soon (February 25th). Xbox One has local split-screen, but 360 does not. PC version some time in the spring. Haven't checked out the Kinect and Smartglass features for Boss Mode, but looks like there is some information on the site. More interested in the co-op modes than the vs mode.

http://www.pvzgardenwarfare.com/

I think I'm going to pre-order this one to get the pre-order bonus. Maybe not. Digital seems more convenient. Need to figure out how the pre-order bonus works.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Huh.....so every good game has to be turned into a shooter :-/ ! Doesn't excite me. In fact, the recent PvZ2 was a bit too much of too many thrown into the game. Too many games inside the game. I prefer the first one, addictive focussed gameplay.

 

[Cyan]

Huh.....so every good game has to be turned into a shooter :-/ ! Doesn't excite me. In fact, the recent PvZ2 was a bit too much of too many thrown into the game. Too many games inside the game. I prefer the first one, addictive focussed gameplay.

I kinda agree. I hope there is a classic mode somewhere, and I want to know about how they will use Kinect.

The classic game and interface if used with Kinect could be really original and would renew the gameplay too.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I don't see the point. Looks like a conventional shooter with a PvZ skin thrown on top.

Oh, that is the point.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Looks similar to Dungeon Defenders, which was an awesome game. I'm looking forward to it.

Actually, probably closer to Monday Night Combat, which was also a great game.

 

[AlphaWolf]

It's gears horde mode.

 

[Scott_Arm]

It's gears horde mode.

Monday Night Combat was basically a combination of Gears and a tower defense game and Team Fortress. This game looks really similar. Actually, not so much Gears. Basically just Team Fortress 2 turned into a tower defense game.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Next week. Looking good.

 

[Jwm]

I will tell you who is excited for this, my wife and son. I truly fear it will cost me a second X1 console just so I can get to play what I want.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Comes out today. Launch trailer:

Polygon and Destructoid liked it. Other reviews seem mixed. I was hoping to see something from Eurogamer, 1up, edge to get an idea. For $40, I'm going to take a chance on it. I'll let everyone know what I think.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Just tried it out quickly. Played a round of the "horde" mode by myself on easy. Graphics are nice. Frame rate is solid. Couldn't solo the mode on easy. Got to round 10 and died quick. The hard difficulties should be pretty tough. The unlocks reminds me a lot of Mass Effect 3's system, which is a good thing. The character designs are really good, and the animations and sound are pretty entertaining. I'll see how much I like it when I really get into it later tonight.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Played a few rounds. It's very much like playing Monday Night Combat. Seems like a solid game. The sticker packs for unlocks works much the same way that unlocks for Mass Effect 3 did. All in all, solid game for $40. Didn't get a chance to try out the player vs player modes.

 

[DrJay24]

$40!? I thought this was a $15 title.

 

[Scott_Arm]

$40 is a little steep, but it has more content and polish than a downloadable title. $25-30 would be better. Good game though.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I wonder if people's valuing of games is skewed by mobile? MAG was a full priced download. Warhawk was a little cheaper I think, but still priced as a 'full' title. $40 for ongoing online with server costs (are there servers? Or is irt peer-to-peer?) is probably pretty reasonable. My concern is the set-up for the microtransactions. Maybe they were going to go F2P and decided the core gamer market would actually be more lucrative at a single significant launch price? If they add MT on top, it'll definitely be overpriced.

How do the license fees even work with downloads and F2P? Have the console companies caught up with mobile and just charge a percentage?

 

[Scott_Arm]

I wonder if people's valuing of games is skewed by mobile? MAG was a full priced download. Warhawk was a little cheaper I think, but still priced as a 'full' title. $40 for ongoing online with server costs (are there servers? Or is irt peer-to-peer?) is probably pretty reasonable. My concern is the set-up for the microtransactions. Maybe they were going to go F2P and decided the core gamer market would actually be more lucrative at a single significant launch price? If they add MT on top, it'll definitely be overpriced.

How do the license fees even work with downloads and F2P? Have the console companies caught up with mobile and just charge a percentage?

There aren't any micro-transactions now. As you play you earn credits that you can spend to buy sticker packs. Stickers give you customizations. Your score at the end of each round is the number of credits you earn. I suppose they could add a transaction for buying credits, or buying different sticker packs directly. I don't think it would affect anything. There are a ton of unlocks, but you can get the stuff just by playing.

The game does use servers.

I think some people are turned off by the cartoony style, even though it's very well done. There are a lot of funny plants and zombies, all really well designed. I think the connection to mobile also turns people off. They think it means it's going to be half-assed. Some people actually just wish it wasn't a shooter. They like their tower defense PvZ without the shooter aspects.

So far, all the classes I've played have been pretty useful. The abilities seem to be balanced well. The Chomper is not great for the horde mode, but it's good in PvP. The maps are pretty big. The one mode that is like BF Rush has about 7 objectives before you get to the final objective. That mode is fun. The Garden Ops mode is very tough to beat on Hard. Normal is challenging enough with 4 players. The Wave 10 boss is normally difficult, and the extraction is hard on some of the maps.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

There aren't any micro-transactions now. As you play you earn credits that you can spend to buy sticker packs. Stickers give you customizations. Your score at the end of each round is the number of credits you earn. I suppose they could add a transaction for buying credits, or buying different sticker packs directly. I don't think it would affect anything. There are a ton of unlocks, but you can get the stuff just by playing.

Yes, I know there aren't. But the structure points to a MT intention. Whether that's been dropped completely and the price hiked from F2P to $40, or whether it'll come back, I'm wary of. I'd hope at $40 that it stays a complete game, although there must be a lot of management pressure to add in optional upgrade sticker packs to give people the chance to buy a pack with a wanted upgrade instead of hoping to win one through play.

 

[Scott_Arm]

So far, there are maybe five different sticker packs with varying prices. Each gives you a different chance to unlock upgrades. On top of that, you can unlock special class-specific packs by ranking up a class.

My only problem with micro-transactions would be if some of the content was stuck behind the paywall. If you could unlock everything just by playing, I'd have no issue.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It depends on the odds. The randomised packs means "Chance to win" rather than "pay to win". You want the UberMelonTrooper class, say. There's a 1:10,000 chance of finding one in a pack of stickers. You win a pack of stickers every game - that's 10,000 games you could be looking at playing to get this class you want to play. Or buy 100 packs for £5. Then you'd need to spend ~£500 to secure the class.

They're entitled to try this business strategy, but IMO if they weren't considering it from the get go, they'd have implemented a simple progress tree for upgrades based on play time.

 

[Scott_Arm]

It depends on the odds. The randomised packs means "Chance to win" rather than "pay to win". You want the UberMelonTrooper class, say. There's a 1:10,000 chance of finding one in a pack of stickers. You win a pack of stickers every game - that's 10,000 games you could be looking at playing to get this class you want to play. Or buy 100 packs for £5. Then you'd need to spend ~£500 to secure the class.

They're entitled to try this business strategy, but IMO if they weren't considering it from the get go, they'd have implemented a simple progress tree for upgrades based on play time.

The upgrade system is lifted straight from Mass Effect 3, and as far as I remember you could not buy unlock packs in that game.

Edit: Reading up on it, I think I am wrong. I found at least one story that says you can buy the packs with real money.