Chapter 44: The Copycat Appears
Inside the experience store.
Wen Lingwei and Chang Xiuya were battling against Jia Peng and another guy.
"Senior sister, help me put a Wall-Nut here!" Chang Xiuya said.
"How many zombies have you saved up? Come on, put them here with me. Let's steal Xiuya's Corn Cannon first." Jia Peng said to the other guy.
Chang Xiuya panicked: "Hey, Jia Peng, you can't do that!"
Wen Lingwei's expression was blank: "It's fine, I still have two Corn Cannons waiting."
Chang Xiuya screamed: "Ah!! Jia Peng, why aren't you playing by the rules! Didn't you say you were stealing my Corn Cannon? Why did you eat my Sunflower instead!"
The experience store was buzzing with excitement. Wen Lingwei and the others were all playing the latest multiplayer battle mode, locked in a fierce and evenly matched fight.
Su Jinyu, meanwhile, was using the developer tools to design new plants and zombies, mainly focusing on their appearance. Her hand-drawing skills were far superior to Chen Mo's, and she had already sketched out two or three new plants.
These three plants were all full of Chinese style: the Wheat Machine Gun, the Sweet Potato Bomb, and the Bamboo Wall.
The community features within the *Plants vs. Zombies* game were also beginning to gather more and more players.
Nearly two months after its launch, *Plants vs. Zombies* had over eight hundred thousand users, with more than half still active. These people had formed thousands of communities, large and small. Many real-life friends and classmates had joined these communities, checking each other's latest updates every day.
Some hardcore fans of *Plants vs. Zombies* really loved the developer tools, especially players who were already interested in game design. They were all trying to create new mods.
There were already over a dozen mods, but most of them simply changed some values, like infinite sun, faster plant shooting speed, and so on. While quite a few people played them, they obviously couldn't last long.
But Chen Mo wasn't worried. With more mods, excellent ones would naturally emerge. He just needed to let the players filter them out on their own.
As for the multiplayer mode, it had indeed sparked a craze among the player base. In the *Plants vs. Zombies* community, many players were posting, discussing small strategies for the battle mode. One three-person team even achieved a twenty-win streak and posted about it in the community to show off, attracting a crowd of onlookers.
On various forums, players were mostly praising this version update of *Plants vs. Zombies*, even sparking another wave of downloads.
"I studied the developer tools today. This tool is way too powerful. You can change anything. It's basically letting us develop our own game! I'm waiting for a master to create a mod that rivals the original!"
"I thought I had completely figured out this game, but now it seems I was too naive... If this game keeps updating with mods, I could probably play it for a lifetime..."
"I can only say, I bow to the designer. A single-player casual game reaching this level is unheard of!"
"But opening up the developer tools means everyone can freely study all the data of *Plants vs. Zombies*. The designer has some real guts!"
"Exactly. Unlike other companies that hide all their game data, encrypting it in every possible way, afraid someone might steal it."
"Right. Just for the author opening the developer tools, I'm converting from a passerby to a fan!"
Chen Mo scrolled through the player comments and was basically reassured.
For him, the new version had reached a sufficient level. This update would greatly extend the lifespan of *Plants vs. Zombies*. It was foreseeable that for the next few months, *Plants vs. Zombies* would continue to dominate the puzzle and casual game charts.
Suddenly, Su Jinyu exclaimed in panic: "Boss, it's bad!"
"Hmm?" Chen Mo looked up. "What's wrong?"
Su Jinyu came over to Chen Mo with her phone: "Look, this game... it copied us!"
Chen Mo took the phone from Su Jinyu.
On the phone screen was a game from the app store. From the game's introduction screen, it was clear that the gameplay was very similar to *Plants vs. Zombies*. On the left were five lanes, and on the right were enemies.
However, this game's art assets were completely different from *Plants vs. Zombies*. The game was called *Moon Defense War*, and its main content involved players setting up various high-tech weapons on the moon to defend against alien insectoid attacks.
Although these high-tech weapons looked nothing like plants in appearance, their specific functions had countless connections to the various plants in *Plants vs. Zombies*.
For example, the Peashooter was changed to a turret cannon, the Spikeweed was changed to a magnetic energy trap, the Sunflower was changed to a supply station, and the Cob Cannon was changed to a nuclear missile silo.
The zombie packaging was also completely changed, all replaced with various alien creatures, all kinds of ugly insectoids, big and small, with different attack methods. However, most of the insectoids' attack methods clearly showed the shadow of the zombies.
"What's wrong? What's wrong?" Jia Peng also came over.
Su Jinyu said: "Look, this game called *Moon Defense War* copied us!"
"What? So shameless!"
Everyone pulled out their phones and found the game in the app store.
Indeed, everyone could easily tell that this game was a copy of *Plants vs. Zombies*. It basically just swapped out all the art resources, music, and sound effects, and changed the UI, but the gameplay inside was exactly the same as *Plants vs. Zombies*.
"Can we tolerate this? I'm going to give it a bad review!" Jia Peng said indignantly.
"Right, give it bad reviews! I'll get everyone from our community to do it too!" Everyone chimed in.
Chen Mo didn't say anything. He first carefully looked at the game's various data.
Its release date was two days ago. It was completely free to download. The rating was very low, only 2.3 points, with most player comments being one-star bad reviews.
Obviously, these players had all played *Plants vs. Zombies* and were very dismissive of this kind of copied game.
The game's monetization method was built-in ads, with a simple banner ad appearing on each level completion screen.
Also, there were some value-added services. Players could pay to purchase energy supplies (which was the sun in *Plants vs. Zombies*), and after dying, they could pay to get three revival opportunities.
The developer was Feixian Interactive Entertainment, and the designer was an unheard-of C-level designer.
Feixian Interactive Entertainment was a game company far away in Shanghai, barely considered second-rate. Before this, they had a few very ordinary PC and mobile games, but none of them were big sellers.
This company had a very bad reputation online, but because it was so unknown, most people didn't know about its long list of misdeeds.
Chen Mo only got a general understanding of this company's style after looking through the few games they had released.