Ah, October, a time of spooks and candy, pumpkins and ghosts, and most importantly, horror media. But, what is the best horror media for the spookiest of all the months? Well my friends, look no further than the scariest horror video game of all time. Plants Vs. Zombies. 

Okay you caught me, it’s not a horror game, and it isn’t very scary, but it’s sooooo good. I wanted to do a little overview of the series as it’s been one of my recent obsessions, and I thought it would be especially on-brand to cover during the spooky month. Plants Vs. Zombies is a tower defense series that has defined its genre for over 15 years. The original PVZ was a computer-only game but was quickly ported to Xbox, Playstation, Nintendo DS, and even iPhones. The series had a mobile-only sequel, three third-person shooters, and a few spin-off games. 

I’ve recently been invested in Plants Vs. Zombies games after not playing them since pre-covid years, and let me tell you, they withstand the test of time. The first game was released in May 2009. (Darn! We just missed the 15th birthday) It follows The Neighbor (you) defending your house from the titular zombies (led by one Dr. Zomboss) by using the Plants, a creation of your crazy neighbor Crazy Dave, a genius, yet speaks in gibberish and has a compulsion for wacky food. I played the original PVZ’s console port and its mobile port, and while the free aspect of the mobile port is very eye-catching, the annoying ads and lack of popular minigames (without paying for them) are not great. But the console port shines in this, giving you access to all the minigames through the story mode. 

I also looked back at the 3rd person shooter games. Dubbed Garden Warfare, (a reference to Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare) these third-person games are extremely entertaining. I often played Garden Warfare 2 back in 2017-18, but never truly got invested. After playing for a couple of hours though, the nostalgia swept back. There are many characters to play as, loads of customization, and a still active player base. I would recommend these. There also is a sequel dubbed Battle For Neighborville but it is nowhere near as good.

Then comes my personal favorite, Plants Vs. Zombies 2. The mobile-only sequel to the original game, and the only one still getting frequent updates. I used to play this game as a young child but could never get very far, but earlier this year I played from the start and beat the adventure mode within a month, and wish I could do it all over. It’s an improvement over almost every gameplay mechanic from the first game, with the only downside being microtransactions and ads being shoved down your throat every time you look at a menu, but this can easily be ignored by turning on airplane mode.

That my friends, is a quick look back on the best, scariest, and spookiest horror franchise, Plants Vs. Zombies. Sorry we missed your birthday Crazy Dave, we’ll remember next year. Happy Halloween to everyone!