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How Micro-Transactions Destroyed Plants vs. Zombies · The Mind of a Man

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  Speaker 1: Plants vs Zombies 1 was truly video game perfection. Reviewers
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  Speaker 1: couldn't find even one thing wrong with its simple addictive gameplay.
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  Speaker 1: Compare this to the recent Plants vs Zombies 3, which
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  Speaker 1: people have called a game that straight up comes from
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  Speaker 1: a garbage can, in which watching 30 second ads for
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  Speaker 1: double coin rewards is more fun than the game itself.
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  Speaker 1: Let's explore how Plants vs. Zombies eventually lost its way,
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  Speaker 1: from an amazing tower defense game, fallen to the extremely
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  Speaker 1: predatory mobile game landscape. Firstly, what made the original so
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  Speaker 1: damn good? At a price of just $ 2. 99 in the
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  Speaker 1: App Store, with no ads or extra in-game purchases, Plants vs.
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  Speaker 1: Zombies 1 was simply amazing value. The easy first level
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  Speaker 1: gets players addicted immediately. In just one level, the game
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  Speaker 1: already indoctrinates you into its gameplay cycle flawlessly, and in
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  Speaker 1: a fun way. With one 5-star review writing, I won't
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  Speaker 1: say that the game is a cakewalk, but it isn't
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  Speaker 1: particularly challenging either. Still, the game offers enough mental stimulation
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  Speaker 1: that I never once grew bored. This is due to
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  Speaker 1: the game's incredible variety, offering loads of different plants, zombies,
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  Speaker 1: and music, with comments stating the soundtrack alone is enough
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  Speaker 1: to make you want the game. This makes it so
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  Speaker 1: entrancing that people can play for hours, which led to
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  Speaker 1: crazy commercial success. In addition to almost perfect professional reviews,
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  Speaker 1: Plants vs Zombies became the highest rated App Store product,
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  Speaker 1: having sold more than 300,000 copies in its first nine
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  Speaker 1: days available, a new App Store launch record. Developers expanded
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  Speaker 1: the game to 13 other platforms, creating so much success
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  Speaker 1: for PopCap games that'd be bought by EA for $ 650 million. Yep, EA.
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  Speaker 1: The company was such an extreme reputation for greed, there's
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  Speaker 1: an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to criticism of the company.
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  Speaker 1: People have called their use of microtransactions a plague, which
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  Speaker 1: sadly began to infect Plants vs. Zombies. Because on the
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  Speaker 1: 15th of August 2013, Plants vs. Zombies 2 came out,
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  Speaker 1: with one key difference compared to the first.
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  Speaker 2: PopCap found a way to cram this game with as
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  Speaker 2: many in-app purchases and microtransactions as humanly possible, to the
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  Speaker 2: point where it's too much of a hindrance for me
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  Speaker 2: to actually enjoy the game.
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  Speaker 1: Plants vs. Zombies 2 features microtransactions. Unlike in the previous
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  Speaker 1: entries to the series, new plants can be purchased with
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  Speaker 1: real money, as well as upgrades and coins. These items
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  Speaker 1: can also be bought in bundles to save some money.
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  Speaker 1: Certain plants could only be accessed using cold hard cash,
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  Speaker 1: and while coins could be naturally earned in-game, you could
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  Speaker 1: pay up to $ 52 to instantly unlock them. The pirate
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  Speaker 1: seas and wild west levels can also be unlocked without
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  Speaker 1: earning all of the required stars. They cost $ 5. 49 each
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  Speaker 1: to instantly access. More controversial for whatever reason was the
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  Speaker 1: game's new art style. People argued that every single character
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  Speaker 1: looked to be designed by a totally different person, each
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  Speaker 1: of whom had their own way of drawing. There's full
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  Speaker 1: videos dedicated to the poorly designed plants, with the excessive
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  Speaker 1: discussion about this floor being a meme within the community.
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  Speaker 1: This was because they'd hired a whole new team of designers,
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  Speaker 1: and under suspicious circumstances fired George Phan, who designed PVZ1
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  Speaker 1: all by himself. Well, an article later confirmed EA fired
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  Speaker 1: Plants vs Zombies creator for refusing microtransactions in sequel, explaining
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  Speaker 1: that George had lost his job as he didn't agree
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  Speaker 1: with the pay-to-win model. He'd partially confirmed this by tweeting,
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  Speaker 1: regarding recent rumors, It is true I was laid off
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  Speaker 1: by EA slash PopCap, and also true that I was
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  Speaker 1: against making PVZ2 a freemium game. That's all I'll say
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  Speaker 1: on the matter for now. Sure do miss paying for
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  Speaker 1: a game once, and unlocking cool things by actually, you know,
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  Speaker 1: playing that game. You and me both, man. These elements
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  Speaker 1: led to videos claiming, Plants vs Zombies 1 is better
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  Speaker 1: than Plants vs Zombies 2, but that's not to say
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  Speaker 1: that the second game was awfuler. It featured so many
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  Speaker 1: different plants it's hard to even count them and offered
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  Speaker 1: 312 levels compared to just 50 in PVZ1. These PVZ2
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  Speaker 1: levels were each set at varying levels of difficulty, better
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  Speaker 1: serving a wider range of players. The second game therefore
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  Speaker 1: also received amazing feedback. With critics stating the game is
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  Speaker 1: just as enjoyable without spending a dime, and that you'll
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  Speaker 1: only need a pay if you're exceptionally impatient, or just
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  Speaker 1: not very good at these kind of games. The microtransaction
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  Speaker 1: model also meant the game was totally free, leading to
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  Speaker 1: 25 million downloads in the first two weeks, more than
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  Speaker 1: PVZ1 had achieved in four years. In fact, according to HeyImJ,
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  Speaker 1: for every dollar the original was making, PVZ2 made 26,000.
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  Speaker 1: They'd therefore make the original free for every player, although
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  Speaker 1: this meant people would be paying with their time.
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  Speaker 2: It's free now, which naturally means that the game absolutely
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  Speaker 2: bombards you with ads.
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  Speaker 1: God, I love mobile games.
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  Speaker 2: There are ads before and after levels now, and even during,
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  Speaker 2: where the game tries to distract you as much as
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  Speaker 2: possible to watch a video for an extra item.
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  Speaker 1: Before every level, you have to watch an unskippable ad,
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  Speaker 1: then sit there prompted to download what you watched. At
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  Speaker 1: the end of every level, you're forced to briefly play
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  Speaker 1: a different mobile game with the hope that you'll download
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  Speaker 1: it later. Items can be earned by watching further ads,
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  Speaker 1: which are even served to those who initially paid for
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  Speaker 1: the game. You could say it's even more annoying than
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  Speaker 1: the microtransaction model, which was earning so much money for
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  Speaker 1: PVZ2 that it started to build Plants vs Zombies 3.
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  Speaker 1: In the meantime, developers took a detour and put out
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  Speaker 1: Plants vs Zombies Garden Warfare. This third-person shooter was certainly different,
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  Speaker 1: but extremely well-received, achieving consistent reviews of 7 out of
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  Speaker 1: 10 or higher. Garden Warfare was surprisingly amazing. I remember
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  Speaker 1: spending definitely over 500 hours grinding it as a kid.
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  Speaker 1: They'd therefore release Garden Warfare 2, which was even more
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  Speaker 1: successful than the first, confirming the third person shooter style
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  Speaker 1: was perfect for the series. So when they'd announce what
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  Speaker 1: was basically Garden Warfare 3, developers likely expected another successful title.
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  Speaker 1: It was called Plants vs Zombies Battle for Neighborville, which
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  Speaker 1: featured an epic trailer in 2019, gaining over 15 million
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  Speaker 1: views from super excited fans. But with people eventually stating, This.
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  Speaker 3: Whole trailer was fantastic and I love it. Too bad
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  Speaker 3: I love the trailer more than the game.
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  Speaker 1: The game was a total flop. Plants vs Zombies Battle
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  Speaker 1: for Neighborville is one of the worst games you've never
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  Speaker 1: heard of. Extensive posts like this called it a complete
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  Speaker 1: and utter disaster in almost every way, and one of,
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  Speaker 1: if not the worst multiplayer game I have played in 2019.
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  Speaker 1: It referenced problems such as bugs and graphical errors, textures
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  Speaker 1: and map design are absolutely horrible, whilst the characters all
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  Speaker 1: control awfully and feel very unenergetic, Since the sound design
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  Speaker 1: is absolutely garbage. Then of course there were the microtransactions.
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  Speaker 4: These need to be unlocked. And the way you unlock
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  Speaker 4: these characters is through a specific challenge called giving EA $ 30.
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  Speaker 4: But the game already costs $ 30 to buy. And you
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  Speaker 4: expect players to spend that twice in order to play
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  Speaker 4: the new characters?
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  Speaker 1: As mentioned, the game already cost $ 40, but demanded an
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  Speaker 1: extra $ 30 to unlock every character, which could be unlocked
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  Speaker 1: by grinding the game, but would take about three months
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  Speaker 1: to earn one costume. Players therefore dismissed the game completely,
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  Speaker 1: writing as a player who played the two previous games
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  Speaker 1: of this one, I can say that this game is
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  Speaker 1: a joke. On the Plants vs. Zombies franchise, bad graphics,
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  Speaker 1: boring gameplay, boring characters. Compared to Garden Warfare 1 and 2,
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  Speaker 1: this game is very bad. They therefore stopped updating it
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  Speaker 1: after only 11 months, leading to comments like it is
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  Speaker 1: so sad how fast this game died. If it had
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  Speaker 1: a little more time to develop and didn't have microtransactions,
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  Speaker 1: then it would have never disappeared. But apparently the franchise
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  Speaker 1: didn't learn their lesson, as during that very same year,
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  Speaker 1: Plants vs Zombies 3 was nearing completion. That had 7
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  Speaker 1: full years since PVZ2, setting high expectations for PVZ3. However,
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  Speaker 1: when the first bit of gameplay was posted to YouTube,
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  Speaker 1: people instantly disliked it. PVZ1, skill. PVZ2, wallet. PVZ3, won't
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  Speaker 1: download it.
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  Speaker 3: Why?
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  Speaker 1: For starters, the game was now in portrait, which to
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  Speaker 1: be honest was probably more convenient, but at the same
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  Speaker 1: time it looked extremely weird. The lawn is literally horizontal. Why?
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  Speaker 1: Why is the display vertical? The game had also gone
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  Speaker 1: from 2D to 3D and had another change in art style,
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  Speaker 1: prompting memes such as this. It is evolving just backwards.
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  Speaker 1: The new peashooter model looked absolutely awful, which sadly couldn't
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  Speaker 1: be upgraded through microtransactions. With videos like Plants vs Zombies
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  Speaker 1: 3 is mechanically broken, gaining over 2 million views, PvZ3
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  Speaker 1: was taken off the App Store. They'd re-release it one
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  Speaker 1: year later, to which people said compared to the alpha
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  Speaker 1: this looks great, however again it still wasn't good enough.
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  Speaker 1: This happened again in 2022, then again in 2024, receiving
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  Speaker 1: the same feedback at every single point. The game was
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  Speaker 1: simply boring.
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  Speaker 3: There is just nothing to do in this game, man,
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  Speaker 3: besides grind the stupid main quest that just sucks. 90-something
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  Speaker 3: levels of doing the same thing over and over and
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  Speaker 3: over is so boring.
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  Speaker 1: I've just spent three hours playing the fourth beta of PvZ3,
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  Speaker 1: and I gotta say, how does EA get away with this?
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  Speaker 1: The game is 10,000% dumbed down, no more collecting plants,
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  Speaker 1: no more input on plant choosing, sun is now worth
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  Speaker 1: one and plants cost one to five plus, Animations feel
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  Speaker 1: capped at 10 FPS. Gameplay feels unfun. Others complained it
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  Speaker 1: just had a scummy feeling.
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  Speaker 2: Right out of the gate seems to just have that
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  Speaker 2: manipulative mobile game feel about it.
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  Speaker 3: You know that feeling.
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  Speaker 1: Everything about this game feels off. It's like I'm watching
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  Speaker 1: an App Store ripoff of PvZ. As a result, it's
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  Speaker 1: still in development five years after its first alpha launch.