Plants VS Zombies originally came out on the PC last year, and the iPhone/iPod Touch version was constantly being delayed. But now it’s finally out.

Does it hold up to the PC version, or should people just pay a bit extra for a better experience?

Read on and see!
(NOTE: this will be extremely short… I’ll mostly talk about the port’s quality)

Developer: PopCap
Publisher: PopCap
Date of Release: February 15th 2010

Platforms: iPhone, iPod Touch

Genre: Tower Defense
Players: 1
Rated E for Everyone

Well, I already reviewed this game’s PC version. And I really liked it. It was even a winner in our 2009 Games of the Year “Best Downloadable Games” category. So I won’t go back fully detailing the gameplay like I did in my original review, and mostly talk about the porting itself.

Graphics and performance
The graphics are lower quality than the PC release. Especially when things are moving, you’ll see a lot more pixels. And when the seed packs zoom in into the screen when you pick them up at the end of every level, you’ll see how low-res the graphics really are. BUT, despite the lower quality graphics, it looks great. It might not be AS good as the PC version, but the game retains the same style, and the sprites are still very nicely detailed, and the animations are smooth. The conversion to a lower resolution really didn’t do the game any bad.

The game DOES have performance issues though. When you have a lot of plants shooting at once, with tons of zombies appearing on the screen (basically every final wave), the game has a bit of slowdown. Sometimes it becomes really slow(like that pool stage with a conveyor belt that only gives threepeaters as projectiles). Not enough to ruin the game, but it can be a bit annoying. After a while it dies down though, so it never runs slow for too long.

Gameplay
The gameplay is intact from the PC version. The HUD got changed a bit, with the seeds to plant your defenses being placed vertically on the left-hand side of the screen. This is also where the conveyor belt appears in the final stage of every area. This makes it really easy to play, I’d say even moreso than the PC version. The touch-screen controls work really well and go a bit faster I’d say.

But there the game goes a bit down. After finishing the adventure mode, you can… replay adventure mode! Or use the Quick Play mode… which just enables you to replay certain stages from the adventure mode. The “bonus games” section here is just the conveyor belt levels and the mini-game levels within the adventure, with no unlockables or anything. In that sense, it’s a bit of a disappointement. It also lacks the garden from the PC version.

Overall
The game is still very good. The gameply is great, the variety of plants you can use is the same as in the PC version, it still has the fun humor and style, and it’s still a very good game. And you can’t really go wrong at 3$, compared to the 10$ on Steam, or 20$ on popcap.

While it’s lacking in content compared to the PC version, it’s still a really fun game, well worth getting.

Pros and Cons
Pros
- Just as fun as before
- Touch screen controls work great
- Looks great
- Cheap

Cons
- Slows down rather frequently
- Lacks a lot of content from the PC version

The Save Factor
Despite lacking content, the game is so cheap, costing only $3, that it’s worth it. So the Save Factor for this one is $3!

(told you it was gonna be short)

jobocan Games, Handheld, impressions, iPhone/iTouch, Review