Plants Vs. Zombies

• This game has a very friendly difficulty curve. At the start it's easy enough to allow you to pick up the mechanics, and it ramps up to brain-eating difficulty at a comfortable and easily followable pace. Pay attention, evolve your strategies as the maps change, and you'll do just fine.

• For the roof level: kernel-pults are effective, but chaotic. To get them to a point where they reliably damage and stop incoming bad guys, you're going to want two rows of them. The roof level offers a good amount of free sun, and this should be easy enough to finance if you have...

• The Double Sunflower. GET THIS GET THIS SERIOUSLY DO IT. Every other plant upgrade is mostly optional, but this thing will quickly become the backbone of your strategy.

• Finally, on the subject of my most hated foe: the Gargantuar. These things prove a challenge to most mere artillery, and distract your firing line from the hordes of smaller zombies that inevitably follow in its wake. Fortunately, a couple cherry bombs pretty much kill it. If you see the kaiju-sized motherfucker before the level begins, be sure to socket away enough sunshine to finance an emergency pair.

• There's no need to play through the campaign twice to unlock all of the (360) achievements. The amount of end-game content more than enough to earn you lots of money. If you're having trouble with 40 waves, use gloom shrooms in the water. That is all.