Plants vs. Zombies has a Genius Tutorial

4:08 those snow peas are doing absolutely nothing 😭

Plants vs Zombies feels like one of those games that's about as close to perfect as you can get. The definition of leaving you wanting more. RIP Popcap and I'll never forget what EA did to PvZ 2.

When I was little I played the web version without knowing how to speak English. So I didn't read the instructions telling me to collect sun. Didn't know you had to click the sun to collect it and couldn't beat the second level. I still tried to play the game a few times afterwards until I tried clicking on the suns falling from the sky...

My mum always struggles whenever she plays games with more than a few mechanics which are required to know right away. Her most complex game she enjoys is Mario Kart, and even then she rarely uses items and never drifts. However, she has beaten the entirety of the Adventure in PVZ. This is almost certainly due to how fluid the mechanics are taught throughout the game. There’s no massive curveballs thrown at you, apart from maybe Fog-10. 10/10 design when it comes to a good combination of complex mechanics in a simple environment!

5:43 didn't know this existed, the attention to detail

Imagine if they made a third game where literally every level has a wall of text before it to explain everything

i remember reading the dialogue of the crazy guy and not knowing what "because" meant

5:38 i never knew this text existed

I didn't even know english when I played this game, to have an idea of how intuitive it is (Sure, my mother sometimes helped me) However, I just wished they teached some more advanced tips later in the game, like: - it's better to plant the sunflowers in front of the attackers (though maybe not even the devs realized it); - the conveyor belt sends less plants the more are in store; - But especually this: zombies will spawn faster the faster you kill them

This video deserves more like damn

0:05 Ironically the very first instinct i have upon starting ANY game is to do everything but starting the game, like pressing settings before start, yeah, it's as weird as you think XD

PVZ 1 was probably the best example of “let the player learn about new threats by experimenting and learning about their characteristics and counters” compared to PVZ 2 currently and PVZ 3 which just don’t do it as well since OG PVZ 2 kept with the original formula but now modern PVZ 2 is just a slow, force tutorials in face of the player and make it want you to use money and WE DONT TALK ABOUT PVZ 3

This was a really insightful video, it reminds me of some musing I did on how Potato Mine teaches the player a while back. There’s a trend in Nintendo games where you have the player do something intuitive, and reveal that the action they performed also did something more strategic that may have been a bit less obvious. Wario Land 4 has a bit where you ground pound to destroy a block, and when you land a nearby enemy with a spiked shell flips over to expose its soft belly. Plants Vs Zombies uses Potato mine as a more complicated version of this. The first level you have it, a zombie shambles onto the field, and it’s pretty much the only offensive plant you can afford. Because of the long arm time told to you in the almanac entry, you place it to the far left of the field, where the zombie will take a long time to get to. While you wait, you place down some sunflowers, and you’re already engaging with one of the games strategies. More zombies only spawn when the current wave has been eliminated. Earlier waves are smaller, so you can wait and still take them out safely close to base. If you stall the earlier waves, you can build a bigger defense. Its utility is very limited to teach you how to play, until the game feels confident enough to give you a more versatile option (squash). Being able to swap it out later on allows the developers to make it an incredibly specific teaching tool that does nothing but what you want the player to do with it. The main thing that’s missing though is an indicator of what the player did. Using the strategy does make it easier on the player, but without telling or showing them what happens if you load the instakill at the front line, I don’t think they’re likely to keep doing it once you take the training wheels off.

0:50 ok that's a clever use of show don't tell

This video is criminally underrated lmfao

7:16 bro forgot tall-nut exist💀

This is exactly the kind of video to get 100k+ views within a month. People who are getting into game design can actually learn from this.

Mannn, just now discovered your channel and i'm so glad i did, keep the amazing work king!

I didn't even notice any of this when I started playing the PvZ franchise.

Great video! I'm sending this to my game dev friend whose games are always missing tutorials 😅