Plants vs. Zombies Adventures

Common Sense Media says

Campy zombie game adds new twists, more waiting.

Age(i)

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Quality(i)

 

Learning(i)

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Plants vs. Zombies Adventures gallery

What parents need to know

Positive messages

Players think strategically to repel zombie attacks with plants.

Positive role models

Players rescue people from zombies, protect the town from zombie attacks, and expand the town by constructing new buildings. However, players aren't always the good guys. They can also send zombies to invade neighbors' towns!

Ease of play

Controls are easy to understand, and there's plenty of hand-holding in the form of tutorials, in-game hints, and quests to guide players along.

Violence

Cartoonish violence. Zombies' heads pop off when they're defeated, and they fall down and disappear. Zombies can be run down by lawnmowers or exploded with cherry bombs, but the effect is  cartoony and is meant to be humorous rather than gory. Plants can be eaten by the zombies, and if the zombies reach a house there's a scream and a message saying that the zombies ate your brains.

Sex

Some male zombies are shown in their underwear or naked with their hands covering private parts.

Language
Not applicable
Consumerism

Players can buy a premium currency called GEMS to speed up the game, bypass quests that involve neighbors, and buy premium plants. Pop-up ads prompt players to buy GEMS and other perks. Friends make it easier to advance in the game, unless the player is willing to pay. This is part of the Plants vs. Zombies franchise, which now includes action figures and other merchandise.

Drinking, drugs, & smoking
Not applicable
Privacy & safety

Some mild privacy concerns. The game posts status updates and messages on players' newsfeeds. Friends make it easier to advance in the game, which might encourage the friending of strangers.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Plants vs. Zombies Adventures is a Facebook game inspired by the popular strategy title Plants vs. Zombies. There's campy, cartoonish violence -- such as zombies' heads popping off when they're defeated -- but no blood. The game is free to play, but players can spend real-world cash to speed up the game and purchase bonus plants.

What kids can learn

Skills

Thinking & Reasoning

  • applying information
  • decision-making
  • strategy

Self-Direction

  • achieving goals

Collaboration

  • meeting challenges together

Responsibility & Ethics

  • learning from consequences

Engagement, Approach, Support

Engagement

Plants vs. Zombies Adventures engages students with campy humor, challenging strategic gameplay, and a breadcrumb trail of new levels and unlockables to keep players coming back.

Learning Approach

The primary goal is fun, but players will learn to adapt new, and increasingly complex, strategies to deal with progressively harder challenges.

Support

Help and hints are readily available whenever players need them. Students can see their progress on a map, and compare scores with friends on a leaderboard.

What kids can learn

Skills

Thinking & Reasoning

  • applying information
  • decision-making
  • strategy

Self-Direction

  • achieving goals

Collaboration

  • meeting challenges together

Responsibility & Ethics

  • learning from consequences

Kids can learn how to think strategically and apply information to solve problems. To defeat the zombies, players have to think about different plants, terrains, and zombie types to make decisions about which plants to deploy in different defensive scenarios. Each plant and zombie has specific strengths and weaknesses that kids will learn to exploit. Kids can retry levels using different combinations of plants and placements. Plants vs. Zombies Adventures is an engaging way to practice thinking strategically in a pressured-filled (but hilariously fun) setting where the survival of your brains is on the line.

This Learning Rating review was written by Erin Bell

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What's it about?

Players fight off waves of attacking zombies by strategically placing projectile-shooting plants in the zombies' paths. The Facebook version adds a few new layers of gameplay: players must grow the plants themselves in a town, which they gradually expand by constructing new buildings and reclaiming pieces of land from the zombies. In addition to defending the town from random zombie attacks, players go on \"road trips\" to unlock new plants and rescue townspeople. Friends can send zombies to invade each other's towns for bonus cash; but they can also send friends cash and new plants.

Is it any good?

QUALITY
 

PLANTS VS. ZOMBIES ADVENTURES adapts Plants vs. Zombies to Facebook with thoughtful and fun twists. Zombies can now attack from different directions and go after multiple targets, and players must grow new plants from scratch in between levels to replace the ones they used. There are a handful of new plants and zombies too, like the Bee-Shooter (a bee-shaped Pea-Shooter that shoots swarms of bees), and the Barrel Zombie. Some players might chafe at having to wait 30 minutes or more to re-grow certain plants, but for better or worse that's par for the course for Facebook games. Plants vs. Zombies Adventures has some lofty expectations to live up to, but delivers the same quirky strategy fun as other games in the PvZ series.

Families can talk about...

  • Families can talk about how humor is used to make the zombies funny instead of scary. What are some other examples of campy humor?

  • Discuss the creativity behind the "Plants vs. Zombies" concept. What other fun "X vs. Y" game ideas can you come up with?

Game details

Platforms:Facebook
Price:Free with microtransactions
Available online?Not available online
Developer:PopCap Games
Release date:May 20, 2013
Genre:Strategy
Topics:Monsters, ghosts, and vampires

This review of Plants vs. Zombies Adventures was written by

Erin Bell

About our rating system

  • ON: Content is age-appropriate for kids this age.
  • PAUSE: Know your child; some content may not be right for some kids.
  • OFF: Not age-appropriate for kids this age.
  • NOT FOR KIDS: Not appropriate for kids of any age.

Find out more

Quality

Our star rating assesses the media's overall quality.

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Learning ratings

  • Best: Really engaging, great learning approach.
  • Very Good: Engaging, good learning approach.
  • Good: Pretty engaging, good learning approach.
  • Fair: Somewhat engaging, okay learning approach.
  • Not for Learning: Not recommended for learning.
  • Not for Kids: Not age-appropriate for kids; not recommended for learning.

Find out more

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Adult Written byCesar Magnoli February 26, 2015
AGE
11
QUALITY
 
LEARNING

plants vs zombies

yes! to play plants vs zombies
What other families should know
Easy to play/use
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Teen, 13 years old Written byAblation October 26, 2014
AGE
6
QUALITY
 

Pffft. 13+?

Ok I don't even remotely know why common sense rated this 13+. It is Plants Vs. Zombies. It is a cartoon game. There is no blood at all. You are plants and you fight zombies. Notice its ratings and how it is 1 dot out of 5 for sex. The reason they put this is because there are zombies in their underwear. If you let your kid watch Spongebob this game is no worse.
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