Reviewed: March 14, 2007
Reviewed by: Blake Kenny

Publisher
Team17 Software Ltd

Developer
Team17 Software Ltd

Released: March 7, 2007
Genre: Strategy
Players: 1-4
ESRB: Everyone

7
7
5
8
7.7

Supported Features:

I remember thinking it was a great concept for a game, something original, something fresh and something that was surprisingly a lot of fun to play; and while the single player game was okay; the multiplayer totally blew it away. There was nothing more enjoyable than waging worm warfare against some friends. Taking turns and blowing each other away with various weapons of death and destruction was great fun, and often the battles would become a source of unexpected hilarity. Attacking and enemy with a weapon would often backfire, and due to the unpredictability of the gameplay, there were moments when riotous laughter would hit us. It was an enjoyable game; at least until our rental time was up or our supply of beer was depleted, whichever came first.

Worms has come in many different forms over the years, including versions in both its original 2D form and upgraded 3D. Appearing on virtually every console imaginable, including portables like the Sony PSP, Worms for Xbox Live Arcade thankfully has more in common with the original classic Worms, like the one I knew from the Super Nintendo. So the questions remains, is a game that was so much fun to play back in the mid 90’s still as much fun to play today on the 360? Well read on asexual invertebrates and we’ll discuss it deeper.

Seriously, playing Worms against some genuine human beings is where it’s at. While there is some fun to be had against the computer, nothing beats playing against people who can make the same stupid mistakes in battle that I can, and often do. The fun and unpredictability of this game comes not only from the fact that you never know what weapon the enemy is going to use against you, but how it’s use may effect the remainder of the match. With fully destructible environments, what once was land can turn into a huge, insurmountable crater if enough explosive go off. And while items like teleporters, jetpacks and grappling guns are available to make moving about the level’s terrain a little less difficult, things can and often don’t work out according to plan, which is what make this game so great. It’s the chaos theory, you know, action and reaction.

The game comes with a whole host of weapons, and while the concept of using dynamite or a bazooka may sound as basic as aiming and pulling the trigger, using these weapons effectively can be a huge challenge in itself. While it’s fun to kill the enemy, a poorly planned attack can often result in your own death.

While planting a stick of dynamite next to an enemy can result in an easy kill, sometimes getting away from the blast radius can be a bit of a challenge, especially when you’re a worm and don’t have any legs. Sure you can jump, sort of, but worms really aren’t all that athletic or agile. Truth be told, it’s a good thing worms don’t have any legs, because in all likelihood if they did; you’d probably blow them off with explosives before the game ended.

The bazooka can be devastating. Blowing an enemy away from a distance and occasionally blowing them right off the land to a watery death can be awesome, especially if you manage to hit more than one, but bazookas can also be lethal to their user. If you miscalculate the aim and power of your shot when compensating for the wind, the shell might fly right back in your face and kill you instead.

You might be thinking that this game doesn’t sound like fun at all; to be killed by your own weapons, but truth be told, it all adds to the challenge and humour of Worms and it’s gameplay. It’s hard not to laugh when you screw up big time and do yourself in purely by accident. I’ve played online and seen other players waste themselves many times. The surprising this is, most players just shrug it off and take it with a grain of salt; seeing it as more as an unfortunate and funny accident than a reason to get pissed off and quit. It’s just the way this game and its community are. Light-hearted.

As I mentioned, there are tons of weapons at your disposal and most of them are relatively safe to use. Air strikes, landmines, shotguns, uzies, hand-to-hand karate moves, killer exploding sheep, the diversity is pretty good. All the weapons are fun to use, and as the saying goes, you just need to use the right tool for the job.

Overall I love this game, especially on Xbox Live. 4 armies or players can battle it out, each with 4 expendable worms at their disposal. With 16 worms all fighting it out within close quarters, it can get pretty crazy. Granted, it’s turn based and can get slow sometimes, but this serves to give you a chance to plan your strategy, because this is after all, a strategy game – even if a very light-hearted one.

Worms comes with the usual 12 achievements totalling 200 gamerscore. For the most part they’re spread out rather nicely. All of them are obtainable, which is great since some of the arcade games released so far seem to have a few nearly impossible achievements; these at least can be done. It’s also nice that their not too easy, it takes a little commitment and dedication from the player to get them, but at least you’ll have fun doing it.

While some may wonder how a gorgeous game like Assault Hero can look so much better than worms and use virtually the same amount of their 50mb game size restriction, one needs to remember one very important thing. Worms is coded so that it is able to generate a virtually limitless variety of battlefields. Meaning that while the textures and artwork may never really change, the obstacles and shape of the landscape can be rendered in pretty much any form imaginable. This means thousands, maybe millions of different battlefields await and are at your disposal, and this if nothing else adds tons of re-play value. Pretty cool.

As for the sound, well, the effects aren’t anything special, they manage to get the job done and that’s really all you can ask for. The worms on the other hand, they can get pretty annoying as they shout out various comments during battle in a variety of different languages. It gets old pretty fast and the squeaky, high pitch tone of their voices can irritate a person rather quickly. Sound isn’t this game’s strongest point, but then it’s also the least vital in this case.

Worms' online battles are slow, methodical, unpredictable, and humorous social events. As an online game, it’s fantastic. Had it not been for online play, this title would have no value to me what so ever. However, with near limitless map designs, it’s a game I’m sure to get into from time to time, especially when I just want to kick back and relax to something simple.