After EA quietly rolled out invites for their next Plants vs. Zombies shooter, codename Picnic, fans of the zany series have been on high alert for the game’s inevitable announcement. Although no official reveal has been made, rumor has it that the next game in the series is called Plants vs. Zombies Battle for Neighborville.
Plants vs. Zombies Battle for Neighborville Rumor
The title comes from a recently leaked screenshot that made its way onto Reddit. The screenshot depicts the title text on a dark background, along with a short description of the game. Here’s what it says:
“Kick some grass in Plant vs. Zombies Battle for Neighborville, the wackiest shooter yet! Unearth 20 fully customizable character classes, one social region, three free-roam regions, nine PvP modes, including 4v4 Battle Arena, and more!”
The screenshot reportedly comes from a link on the EA website that leads to the Plants vs. Zombies Battle for Neighborville page. However, the information on the link has since been removed and replaced with the text “nothing to see here” alongside an image of a suspicious Tallnut. What’s interesting is the fact that EA didn’t bother to delete the actual URL, they simply changed what was displayed on the page. Perhaps we can expect the page to update once again after the Picnic playtest is over.
Loyalty Rewards?
This isn’t the first time PvZ fans have unearthed the Battle for Neighborville moniker. A little over a month ago, another Reddit user posted a screenshot of some leaked source code containing the Battle for Neighborville name. The screenshot mentions some sort of in-game rewards, and that accessing said rewards would require the Plants vs Zombies: Battle for Neighborville game, among other things. The aforementioned rewards may be loyalty rewards for players who devoted time to Garden Warfare 2, a strategy that PopCap has deployed in the past.
The consensus among fans seems to be that Battle for Neighborville has replaced Garden Warfare 3 as the successor to Garden Warfare 2. This is supported by the fact that PopCap has confirmed the next Plants vs. Zombies game to be a shooter. Dropping Garden Warfare from the title points to the notion that the upcoming game may also fully embrace the Plants vs. Zombies comic book series, since the comics take place in Neighborville.
This is all speculation, of course, so take it with a grain of salt. We’ll be keeping an eye out for any further details regarding the next Plants vs. Zombies game, so be sure to check back here for updates.