It’s Thanksgiving time, Dungeon Defenders fans, so you would be well served (ha!) to check out developer Trendy Entertainment’s DLC Steam deals between your plates of gluttony. This extra content includes the following extras (information courtesy of Reverb Communications):

The Great Turkey Hunt (Free until 12/2)
Hunt humongous herds of Turkeys for their delicious Thanksgiving meat… but watch out, dangerous Dark Elf Warriors and the gigantic “Mega Turkey” Boss will stop at nothing to protect them! Victory will unlock a brand new set of holiday costumes:

• Apprentice – Pilgrim
• Squire – Turkey Outfit
• Huntress – Pocahontas
• Monk – Conquistador

Dungeon Defenders Hero Pack – $4.99 (on sale for $3.99 for the first week)
Want 4 new Dungeon Defenders Hero Classes? Get ready to play as the gender-swapped versions of the main characters, equipped with all new abilities, stat ramps, and more:

• The Initiate: A student of the mountain monasteries, this female monk can debuff all nearby foes with her “Enemy Drain” ability and buff the defenses of any nearby allies with her “Remote Defense Boost” ability.
• The Countess: This noble female warrior can use her “Joust” ability to push through enemy lines with unstoppable force and her “Call to Arms” ability to rally allies to the cause increase their damage and damage resistance.
• The Ranger: This elven hunter can cloak nearby allies and their defenses with his “Invisibility Field” ability and use his “Piercing Spreadshot” to tear through lanes of enemies in a wide arc.
• The Adept: This female mage can destroy skeletons in a single blast and greatly damage their necromancer masters with her “Purifying Blast” and instantly upgrade any defense with her “Instant Upgrade” ability.
• Warping Core Challenge Pack – $1.99 Looking for even more of a challenge? This Dungeon Defenders Challenge pack contains four new warping core missions for you to tackle with your friends as well as unique loot that can only be obtained by beating these missions!

And remember, Dungeon Defenders itself is 50% off during the time period. You can thank the gaming gods for that, yes?

[Halloween Games is a retrospective highlighting horror-themed video games. This entry sees Jeffrey L. Wilson spewing love for Popcap Games' Plants vs. Zombies.]

When it comes to designing incredibly addictive, infinitely playable casual games, no company can match the track record of the magicians at Popcap Games. Zuma was marvelous. Even more so, Peggle. But with the release of Plants vs. Zombies, Popcap has truly outdone itself by crafting what is one of the most fun, engaging, and dare I say flawless games of this generation. Hyperbole this is not.

Originally available on the Mac and PC and then spreading to the Nintendo DS and every other gaming platform under the sun, Plants vs. Zombies is a 2D game with a simple premise: You’re given the task of protecting your home from a zombie invasion by planting a variety of flora in the yard which grant a variety of offensive and defensive capabilities. As the undead make their slow march from the street toward your abode, you seed a six square high grid with a number of plants including exploding cherries, Peashooters (which snipe from long range), and  Chompers (a zombie-eating Venus Flytrap-like green). The most vital plant of the dozens that you’ll acquire is the Sunflower, which is the fuel for your attack.

Here’s why: As with analog plants, these digital ones require sunlight to flourish. The golden rays are represented by falling orbs affixed with point values; gather enough points and you can purchase more plants. Sunlight orbs will occasionally appear on the field all by their lonesome, but as you plant more Sunflowers, they appear at a far quicker rate, vastly increasing your “money” supply, and thus your armaments. You can’t, however, simply litter the field with the most powerful of weapons and sit back; icons on the top of the screen display each individual plant’s refresh rate. Some like the Sunflowers are swift, while others takes seemingly a lifetime to recharge.

The Thriller zombie has been removed from the game. His replacement? A disco zombie. Not quite the same impact.

Plants vs. Zombies has a perfect learning curve, which is directly attributed to Popcap’s in-game hand-holding; when you acquire a new weapon, the game tells you exactly what it does and immediately presents you with a chance to put it to good use. And with the dozens of weapons available,  you’re encouraged to exterminate the zombie infestation in a number of creative ways. The genius of Plants vs. Zombies is that you can tackle the game in any manner which you deem fit. Love to mow mofos down? Stack your garden with the various types of peashooters.  Prefer to be more tactful? Lay down flora landmines, walls, and other items designed to stop the zombies.

On the topic of zombies, it’s the variety in the undead that help give the game a lighthearted, comical tone similar to the underrated 16-bit SNES actioner, Zombies Ate My Neighbors! The brain-hungry hordes consist of the standard lumbering types that are easy to bring down, as well as undead football players that are fast and hard to kill, pole vaulters that can leap over your plants, and even one that resembles a certain mega-popular pop signer that has a penchant of red leather and dancing in graveyards. Over the course of the zombie-slaying adventure, you’ll unlock a number of fun mini-games (zombie bowling is a rollicking good time), and a wacky neighbor will supply you with additional greens for bringing down the rotting masses.

The tell-tale sign of a game’s excellence is directly tied to the number of hours one logs. Plants vs. Zombies devoured so much of my free time that my sessions with it became so much more than analyzing the mechanics and jotting notes; it had thoroughly became a part of my life as I started plotting times around meals and work to get my game on. Tower defense vets may find it not as manic as some other titles, but it’s challenging nonetheless. Simply put, Plants vs. Zombies is a game that every gamer should play, casual or hardcore, to witness a prime example of programming excellence.

P.S.: Don’t forget to check out the Plants vs. Zombie vid we captured art E3 2010!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Popcap Games’ DS port of Plants vs. Zombies takes an already great PC/Mac game and makes it better. This new portable version of the popular tower defense game features touch screen mechanics, new gameplay modes, and added goodies that only sweetens the deal for handheld gamers.

For those of you who haven’t played the PC/Mac original, you can jump right in on the DS. The mission? Stop the impending zombie takeover of your house by positioning defensive and offensive plants on your lawn. For those of you who have played the PC version, the DS version offers more goodies for you to enjoy – more plants, more zombies, more mini games – as well as the ability to play in more places than in front of your computer screen.

Plants vs. Zombies DS is designed to take advantage of the handheld’s dual screens. You tap to plant instead of clicking with your mouse. The response time is quick, so your plants immediately appear on the playfield. The top screen parades fun visual zombie jokes to help pass the time while you’re preventing the apocalypse.

You start in Adventure Mode and unlock the rest of the game from there. Each level is increasingly more challenging in a way that’s intuitive and easy to catch on to. Some zombie raids are at nights and require plants that only work at night; some raids are on the pool in your front yard and require aquatic plants. Strategize to complete each level and you might earn yourself an Achievement trophy. There are 14 new Achievements to aspire to in this port, like Demolitioneer (blowing up 10 zombies with a  single cherry bomb – my first ), Cerebral Canopy (grow the tree of wisdom to 100 ft), and Nebulaphile (beat an extremely foggy level without disturbing any fog – my second).

While some Mini Games – like Slot Machine, ZomBotany, and Wall-Nut Bowling – were in the PC version, there are 4 mini games that are exclusive to the DS: Air Raid, Home Run Derby, Heat Wave, and BOMB All Together.  All of them are fun, though yelling into my DS to cheer up plants in Heat Wave was a little strange (it felt like I’d accidentally switched over to a Japanese puzzle game). Fun though all the extras are, the novelty of the zombie apocalypse wears off once you’ve beaten Adventure Mode.

The game’s colors are bright, the graphics are cartoony, and the music’s appropriately cheery with a tinge of creepy–all perfect for a suburban zombie attack. There’s even different types of zombies to keep you company, from football players to angry newspaper readers. The Michael Jackson zombie that was included in the original release (and removed after the death of the singer) is a disco dancer here, using generic moves to raise an undead army of polyester-clad brain munchers instead of “Thriller” zombies.

Plants vs. Zombies for the DS is available for $19.95 at Game Stop, Walmart, and most retailers near you. Stopping the zombie apocalypse has never been more addictive.

After delivering strategic zombie-bopping mayhem to the iPhone and iPod touch, Popcap Games’ much-lauded Plants vs. Zombies makes its Apple iPad debut. But this isn’t just Plants vs. Zombies, it’s Plants vs. Zombies HD. The difference? Multi-Touch support, a 1040 x 768 resolution, and butter. BUTTER.

“The iPad is a fantastic platform for gaming, and Plants vs. Zombies HD allows us to show off the great new features and functionality of this exciting device,” said Andrew Stein, director of mobile business development at PopCap. “In this adaptation, we’ve focused on the iPad’s Multi-Touch capabilities and opportunities for new gameplay like the Buttered Popcorn mini-game that will excite both new and current players.”

The Plants vs. Zombies HD app for iPad offers all 50 levels of Adventure and QuickPlay modes as well as Survival mode from the original Apple Macintosh and Windows PC game. It also includes four all-new achievements (for a total of 17) and 18 mini-games, including Buttered Popcorn – exclusive to the iPad – offering frantic and fun gameplay where players attack zombies by first “buttering” them up before firing corn-cob cannons at them. To defeat the growing hordes of zombies, players can touch them to place butter on their heads. With the Multi-Touch user interface, players can select up to eleven zombies at a time, targeted for “buttering” by the powerful cob cannons.

I told ya. Plants vs. Zombies HD is available now for $10.

If it seems as though Popcap Games marvelous cute and inventive take on the tower defense genre, Plants vs. Zombies, has been in the works for the iPhone/iPod touch for a long, long time, it has – the game was first announced in last August. Although Popcap Games didn’t make its “late 2009″ window, I can forgive the kindly team of casual gaming gurus because the trailer for the upcoming Apple port looks really, really good (and they know how to thoroughly rock a Halloween parade).

Judging by Popcap Games’ video, the winning gameplay looks in tact, but I wonder how the multi-touch will be implemented (which has, unfortunately, added a cumbersome elements to many good iPhone/iPod touch titles). Still, the prospect of playing Plants vs. Zombies on the Apple iPad’s slick 9.7-inch display sounds quite delicious, especially on long flights or road trips, if you happen to think the tweener device is worthy the dough.

Outside of innovative titles such as Rez, few music games have attempted to be more than simple “press the button when the icon is in the right position” rhythm games. That formula was the basis of Parappa the Rapper, Guitar Hero, and Rock Band, and has proved highly successful with wannabe music mavens. Fortunately, developer Stegersaurus Games attempts to elevate the genre.

Battle Beat (available for 400 MSP) is a new game available in the Xbox 360 Indie Games channel that eschews pseudo rockstar status by placing gamers in the role of space commander that must save his home world from hostile alien forces. Using instrument or standard Xbox 360 controllers, players command a squad of troops to launch attacks in this music-meets-tower-defense title.

Really, it’s an intriguing use of the plastic axes that populate our homes, but all it really does is Beg for a kick ass Macross 7 game to be created. LISTEN TO MY SONG!

Irresistible. There isn’t much other way to describe Popcap Games’ Plants vs. Zombies, an addictive and infinitely charming take on the tower defense genre. Instead of planes, tanks, mechs, or other miscellaneous items, the title demands that you defend a suburban home from a zombie invasion using the  flora that you plant in your lawn. Plants! If it all sounds a hair bizarre, it is, but in the absolutely best way possible. Fun and addictive, Plants vs. Zombies deserves a place in the collection of any armchair strategist.

photo courtesy of the official Plants vs. Zombies Facebook fan oage

When one thinks of the city that I call home, typically the Yankees, Broadway, Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building, Coney Island, and a dozen other landmarks and locales comes to mind, but the Big Apple also throws one heck of a Halloween party; absolutely killer if I were to draw from the well of fairly obvious puns.

If you were fortunate enough to be in the New York City this past October 31st, you would have witnessed several wild and wacky outfits that would’ve caused laughter, repulsion, and admiration (sometimes from the same get up)  as angels, demons, sexy police officers, and large men dressed as Little Bo Beep shimmied through the West Village. It was all par for the course, really.

What is unusual, however, is for a video game company to act as an in-parade sponsor, which is exactly what Popcap Games did with its Plants vs. Zombies troupe. Popcap Games assembled a motley crew of Halloween revelers (including myself and Examiner‘s Gracie Leach who chatted it up with  a Popcap Games rep as well as a member of the undead) that either donned the worker bee garb of the Temp Zombie, or the insanely cute visage of one of  the many in-game plants. And it was awesome.

photo courtesy of Carol Mangis

Those that went zombie were given a deathly grey-green makeup, plastic rotting teeth, and a red tie to complete the ensemble (we had to show up with our own white shirt/blue pants/brown jacket combination), while those that went plant donned foam add-ons (and their own dark colored clothing) to represent flora. Our goal? To march through the streets of lower Manhattan to bring merriment to all, give out freebies, and recreate the gameplay in live action.

We were drenched by rainfall and thoroughly worn by the end of the night, but the collective group enjoyed hamming it up for the enthusiastic crowd. Check out the gallery below for more photos of Popcap Games’ Plants vs Zombie NYC Halloween Parade troupe!