User blog:Moon Snail/Plants vs. Zombies Heroes - First glance

Hello! It's been a while since I made a blog around here. Now that Heroes has been released worldwide, I am now able to download it and give my opinion on it as of now. Since I've been focusing on the beginner quests due to being too shy to fight online, and have not purchased anything and therefore only having 5 heroes as of now, my opinion will be quite limited.

Gameplay
Despite what I initially thought, this was quite a lot different from the "Hearthstone with PvZ" opinion I initially had. For one, there's a lane mechanic. Plants and zombies can only act on their own lane. Secondly, there are card categories, and thus, all cards are restricted to certain characters, unlike Hearthstone, where some cards can be used by all classes. Third, there are two different sides, and no two plant heroes or zombie heroes will fight each other, whereas in Hearthstone, anyone can fight against anyone else.

Alrighty, enough comparing it to Hearthstone. The basic mechanics are simple: You have a set amount of resources to use each turn. You need to use these resources to get the opponent to zero health. However, the opponent can also shield an attack after sustaining an amount of attacks, and gains a new card. For more advanced stuff, Zombies go first, and can place down troops. Next, plants go, and can do whatever they want. Then Zombies can play tricks to fight back. Finally, the troops attack. Each troop have two stats: Attack, which is how much health they can take off in one attack, and Health, which is how much damage they can sustain. If a troop's health reaches zero, they disappear. If a troop attacks a hero, they lose health, but gain a random amount of shield. Once a hero gains 8 shield, they block the attack that gave them the last amount of shield, and gain a new trick. They can use this trick if they want, or keep it for using later.

Aesthetic (Music and Graphics)
The graphics are general PvZ graphics. Cartoony, but still detailed. Not much to say about them. The music, however, is nearly nonexistant. I don't know if the battles have any music, but I can barely hear it if so. This is bad, because one of my favorite things about the series is the games' amazing soundtracks.

Characters
Most of the troops are recognizable plants and zombies from the other games, but a few are all-new characters we've never seen before. As for the heroes, Rose, Citron, Super Brainz and Z-mech return, but the rest of the heroes are all-new. I like the heroes, though. They all look great (Except for Spudow, but especially Night Cap and Neptuna), have their own quirks, and are generally memorable overall. As I stated, I've only used five of them, so here's a quick review for each of them:

Green Shadow
Green Shadow is the main plant character. She's a user of Smarty and Megagrow plants, so she's heavily offensive overall. The strategy I've found best overall is swarming the battlefield with low-cost plants and boosting them to hell with things like Torchwood, Fertilize and Plant Food.

Solar Flare
Solar flare is generally the second plant you obtain. She's a user of Kabloom and Solar, so she's mostly sun-based and offensive. The strategy I've found best overall is using combos such as Sunflower and Mixed nuts, as well as Shroom for Two and Buff-shroom.

Wall-Knight
As of now, Wall-Knight is my favorite hero. While very lacking on the visual department (A Wall-nut with a belt. Amazing.), he makes up for it in versatility. He's a user of Solar and Guardian, so he has power in offense, defense AND support. The strategy I've found best overall is just tanking and spanking. Put strong offense plants and sun producers behind a particularly strong nut, and just wham away at the zombies. Sadly, I predict when I get into online battling, I won't be able to use him much, because from hat I've heard, almost everyone plays Plants, making it hard to find a game as a plant. Ah well. He's great in campaign mode!

Super Brainz
Super Brainz is the zombie equivalent of Green Shadow. He's a user of Brainy and Shady, meaning just like Green Shadow, he's all brute force. I haven't found a best strategy for him yet, since I rarely play him.

Electric Boogaloo
Electric Boogaloo is a tricky zombie to describe. He's a user of Crazy and Beastly, meaning he's another brute force user, but is better for rushing cards out quickly. The strategy I've found best so far is putting out a lot of dancing zombies then buffing them or using Flamenco Zombie to do massive damage to the hero.

What I like about this game

 * It's a lot of fun.  You can spend a lot of time thinking up strategies and using them to tear your foes apart.
 * The heroes are memorable and lovable.
 * Graphics are great.
 * Campaign mode is great fun.

What I don't

 * Can't replay campaigns. Why not? you can't say because of rewards, because you could just decrease the rewards gained for replaying.
 * Music is either forgettable or nonexistant.
 * Spudow's design makes my eyes bleed.
 * It's way too hard to get new heroes.
 * The game is grossly unbalanced. Some cards are ridiculously overpowered (Octo Zombie and Toxic Waste imp come to mind), while some are useless (Weeny Beany and Cardboard Robot Zombie are replaced by virtually every other 1 sun/brain card and can't even be used well with other cards).

Overall:
I give this game a 4/5. It's an enjoyable and new experience for the series, but the poor balance and the fact that it's slow to really start may make it hard to enjoy for some players.