Chili Bean


 * For other usages of beans, see bean.

Chili Bean is the second plant obtained in Wild West in Plants vs. Zombies 2. When a zombie eats it, they will be stunned for 1.5 seconds before dying, unleashing a trail of gas behind them that stuns other zombies in the lane for 7.5 seconds. Chili Bean and its gas cloud do not affect mechanical enemies.

Origins
Chili Bean is based on the food of the same name, chili beans. Most of the time the food is made of the species Phaseolus vulgaris more commonly referred to as pinto beans. The effect of the zombie unleashing a trail of gas is based on when you eat chili beans the bacteria on the beans make you pass more gas.

Plant Food effect
When Chili Bean is fed with Plant Food, three additional Chili Beans will be created, landing on unoccupied tiles.

Costumed
It now creates one more Chill Bean, making four Chili Beans in total.

Strategies
Chili Bean is very useful as a "clutch plant" for quickly picking off tough zombies such as Buckethead Zombies, Knight Zombies, and Poncho Zombies, particularly when they appear unexpectedly during an ambush or are threatening endangered plants. The gas attack further expands its "clutch" ability by immobilizing enemies behind it, such as using one to kill a Knight Zombie and immobilize a Zombie King behind it. Using its Plant Food ability with Power Tiles or Tile Turnips can also flood the lawn with plenty of Chili Beans. It has a major drawback in that it requires the enemy to be able to eat and digest it, which means it is ineffective against some of the strongest enemies in the game, as they either do not eat plants (such as Gargantuars) or are immune to the effect (such as the machine enemies of Far Future).

Compared to the Potato Mine, it is usually more of a clutch plant as it needs no "charge-up time," but the Potato Mine is cheaper and can damage almost any enemy, including multiple enemies, that approach it. As a weaker alternate to Chili Bean, you can use Stunion, as he's cheaper and works more quickly, but it only stuns zombies, as opposed to Chili Bean killing one and stunning the rest in the lane.

Trivia

 * If not eaten, it will release its own gas once in a while as part of an idle animation. When this happens, it will lose its costume if it is wearing it.
 * It can kill a Disco-tron 3000 in the Chinese version.
 * When a Seagull Zombie eats it, the paralyzing gas comes from Seagull Zombie's head.
 * In any levels with Dave's mold colonies on earlier updates, if the player uses Plant Food on it and one lands on the mold colonies, the objective can still be completed. This can also happen with any other plants that create duplicates of themselves with their Plant Food ability.
 * As of the 2.1 update, it no longer makes Pianist Zombies faint and can no longer kill multiple zombies at once, but Zombie Bulls die instantly upon eating the Chili Bean.
 * If its gas stuns ten zombies at once, the player gets the Magical Fruit achievement.
 * If the zombie that eats it is immobilized by butter before the zombie dies, the zombie will not die but will be stunned and release gas.
 * If there are only two or fewer empty tiles, and the player gives the it Plant Food, it will create extra Chili Beans depending on the number of empty tiles.
 * If there are no empty tiles, it will play the animation, but will not create any extra Chili Beans.
 * This also happens to Potato Mine and Primal Potato Mine.
 * If a zombie is facing backwards (via Sweet Potato's Plant Food, Prospector Zombie after its dynamite detonates, or pterodactyl) when it dies from eating the bean, it will release gas backwards towards the house.
 * There is a glitch when the player plants a Thyme Warp right before a zombie dies by eating a Chili Bean, where they will end up staying in one spot, not being a threat.
 * This also happens if a zombie eats it in Glitter Zombie's rainbow.
 * If a fainted zombie gets pushed back by Primal Peashooter, it will continue walking for a short moment, then release gas and die.
 * It holds the record for being the plant with the shortest Almanac entry, at nine words (or 45 characters).
 * If Jester Zombie eats it while spinning, it will not become stunned and release gas.
 * In recent versions of the game, Chili Bean may not cause zombies to die when eaten. Sometimes it will get eaten but the zombie will be unaffected.