User blog:Tecku/Tecku Talks: An Update from the Undead

Hey. So, someone messaged me and asked if I was going to do more Tecku Talks now that some new games were out. Well... honestly, probably not. I may do a post if something really speaks to me, but it's unlikely that this will be a regular series again. I mean, I kinda want to, but I have nothing to really talk about.

PvZ2

PvZ2 is all over the place. At this point, PopCap is just confusing me on it. They've shown they can make new plants and new Roman zombies, but they won't make any new worlds. Penny's Pursuit is just another leaderboard Skinner-box. I've already beaten all the worlds, so why would I want to waste my time grinding for hours upgrading my plants? And really, that's what the game is now: one giant Skinner-box timesink. If PopCap wants me to come back they have to COMMIT. Flesh out a handful of new plants and new zombies, and build a new world where you can get the plants for free.

There is one thing worth talking about: PvZ2 will probably keep getting updates after PvZ3 comes out. PvZ3 has different gameplay, so PvZ2 will become the game where new content for "old school" PvZ goes. Speaking of which...

PvZ3

Saints alive, PopCap, the zombies shuffle their feet less than you! Let's go over PopCap's plan:

• Release a game in every market EXCEPT your main one.
• Let everyone else play the game in a temporary account that they're less likely to spend money in since they're waiting for the international release.
• Wait until all the hype for your game has come and gone.
• Keep waiting.
• Keep waiting.
• Fix the last few bugs and release the game. Nah, just kidding KEEP WAITING.
• Wait another year, just for good measure.
• Now! Now the game is released and is going to be a smash hit.... hey, where is everybody? Why isn't this game popular? It must be no good, give it a year or two of content and then pull the plug.

It didn't work for PvZ Heroes, what makes you think it'll work for PvZ3?! *Sigh* Barring that, I hear PvZ3 is very pay-to-win, but I honestly have no idea. I love the idea of characters like Immorticia, Impfinity, Nightcap, Gravitree, Dog Walker, Zom-blob and more being in the main series, but I've just got no hype left.

PvZ Heroes

Dead. Still fun sometimes to make new decks, but dead. The most interesting thing to me by far about this game is Fry Em Up. His series of competitive PvZH is very interesting. I alllllllmost want to do a blog post about some ideas for PvZH card ideas I have, but that would be more of a one-off thing, maybe on his channel instead of here.

Battle for Neighborville

I always like the shooter series, but I can't keep re-downloading Origin and this huge game every time there's an update. I'm also not very good at it, and some of the map balance is really bad. Variants are gone, and new characters and maps aren't coming out at a very quick pace. I fear that the need to add in 3 new abilities per character may actually be more work than the variants.

The single-player maps are nice, but a lot of cool options for solo players are gone. There's no AI mode for exploring the multiplayer maps for details. There's also no AI teammate mode for Ops mode. Speaking of which, Ops is just sad here. I get that GW1 Ops was too hard but GW2 had a great balance and great options for going it solo. What does BfN have? No option to select a map, no AI teammates, a meager 5 waves, no evacuation level, and EVEN NO DIFFICULTY OPTIONS. It's just so boring.

The lore.... is awesome. Yeah, credit where due, this game still does a good job with crafting stories for each map. Zomboss' schemes and Dave's wacko inventions are always good entertainment.

All in all, I like PvZ, but there's just nothing to latch onto for now. I really need something to pull me back in. Until then, this has been Tecku.