ic-games Review - Worms 4 Mayhem - Reviews, Previews and Interviews for PC, Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Wii

ic-games Review - Worms 4 Mayhem - Reviews, Previews and Interviews for PC, Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Wii ic-games Review - Home - Review, Preview and Interview for PC, Xbox,Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Wii

Worms 4 Mayhem

Information
Reviewer: James Collins
Developer: Team 17
Publisher: Codemasters
Reviewed: PC, PS2 and Xbox
Genre: Turn-based Strategy
UK Release: 22nd Jul 2005
Article Date: 27th Jul 2005
Difficulty: Medium
Retail Price: £29.99
Price Comparison:
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Score Breakdown

Experience:
Game Play:
Graphics:
Sound:
Overall Score: 79%

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Pros

Multiple game modes

Decent Single Player (for once)

Cons

Simply put, not for everyone

No 'stats'

Poor use of Xbox Live!

Screenshots

25 of 27

Worms is probably the most addictive team based multiplayer game ever devised since the days of ‘tanks’. The premise is simple enough; each team has a set of worms on the map. One at a time each team controls a worm and has a certain amount of time to move around and fire a weapon before either the time runs out, or a weapon is discharged. Then it’s simply onto the next team who gets to do exactly the same thing back. The winner is of course the team that survives to the end.

We actually enjoyed the single player mode, and much to our surprise, the AI actually put up a decent fight. Sure there was the odd occasion when the AI acted up or the camera didn’t do as it was told, but for the most part the individual missions were hard fought affairs and enjoyable to complete. The story mode picks up from the included training mission and ends with you trying to locate parts of a time machine, but that’s not what matters, what matters is that Worms has finally found a way to be interesting offline. The missions are varied and normally go through many different themes from construction sites to the medieval age as you locate the missing time machine parts. The single player mode also offers up many different gaming styles, for example you’ll only be allowed to use certain weapons, have a certain amount of time to complete a mission or you’ll have to blow up certain landmarks before you move on and collect the next part of the time machine.

Success in the single player adventures provides you with bonus coins that you can spend in the item shop. There are new voices available for your teams, different hats, glasses and even a few new multiplayer maps and game styles to purchase. These items can then be used in the single player story and of course put to much better use in the offline and online multiplayer modes, which allows you to make your team really stand out.

The wormpot throws up some interesting random gaming styles into the multiplayer matches. If the host creating the game selects the wormpot they will be greeted with a one armed bandit, that once selected, will choose random game environments to be added to the game. For example ‘max fall damage’ inflicts more damage to falls than usual, ‘double damage’ speaks for itself, and ‘jumping only’ forces worms to jump to get around and so on. You can choose what the computer randomly picks or you can select your own three if you are looking for that certain type of game. Either way adding these different game styles to the round can certainly spice up even the most barren map and will always throw up surprises.

New to Worms 4 is the ability to actually create a personalized weapon for your team to use against others. The idea actually works similarly to creating a character in a RPG, with a set amount of points available to ‘spend’ on that weapon’s features. A simple gauge is displayed that increases or decreases when you add an attribute to the weapon. For example selecting that the weapon will be a homing device will increase the gauge quite substantionaly whereas opting for ‘low worm damage’ will decrease the gauge. Only when you have spent less than the allocated amount will you be allowed to create the weapon and use it in multiplayer matches. There are quite a lot of varied styles available so creating that personal special weapon for your team should be quite easy, learning when to use that weapon in game becomes the hard part.

SCREENSHOTS

The biggest problem with Team 17’s last release, ‘Worm’s Fort under Siege’, was that it took an incredible amount of time to navigate the map. Fortunately for Worms 4 things have been speeded up somewhat and attacks can be launched just about anywhere on the map in one or two turns, a big improvement on the last effort. Sadly the camera does still have the occasional fit, and actually launching the first attack is made more difficult due to the camera snapping back into place after selecting a weapon, and pressing the shoulder button to fire.

As mentioned in our preview a few months back, Worms 4 features a plethora of new weapons some conventional, some as you would expect, totally wacky. The new Sniper rifle allows you to make a hit right across the map with its high zoom mode and will certainly be a weapon of choice for purists. On the other hand you have the inflatable scouser who walks towards the enemy, picks him up and inflates. Once the inflatable scouser reaches a decent height he drops the worm inflicting fall damage, or even a watery death if the timing is right. There are of course others, the poison arrow might not do a lot of damage on impact but will cause anyone nearby to catch a virus which slowly attacks the worm’s health. If you fire the poison arrow at the right place, at the right time this weapon alone can be devastating to the enemy.

The multiplayer modes once again look set to be the real winner though, Worms always was a multiplayer game at heart, and this version, in our opinion, plays the best multiplayer games since the title actually went 3D. There are five game modes playable this time (Deathmatch, Survivor, Homelands, Statue Defend, and Destruction) and all offer up a different style of game. ‘Deathmatch’ is the classic multiplayer mode that anyone who has played Worms before should have no trouble jumping into. ‘Homelands’ is similar in style from ‘Deathmatch’ except each team begins in control of a fort for a more tactical game. ‘Destruction’ changes the rules slightly in that the actual individual team worms are no longer the target but their base is. Each enemy base has ‘health’ with the winning team being the one that totally destroys the base. ‘Statue defend’ plays similar to ‘Destruction’, with the last game mode, ‘Survivor’ (and our own personal favorite mode) rounding off the package quite nicely. You see with ‘Survivor’, the team takes a single worm out at a time, for a one against one battle, very similar to the original ‘hot seat’ mode almost 10 years ago. If you are not yet graced with Xbox Live then all is not lost, all the games modes available on Xbox Live are able to be played offline as well. Having a few friends around playing ‘Survivor’ with individual teams and worms name’s is always going to be second to none and its good to see everyone has been catered for.

For all these improvements, sadly the stats seem to have taken a direct hit, it would have been nice to have had some ‘offline and online stats’ detailing how many enemies your star worm has killed, games won, and favourite weapons used, but there simply isn’t anything to tell one worm apart from the other. Xbox Online games have very little to no reward, and for a title begging for clans to be formed, the new Xbox Live features have been totally ignored making offline games a far better option. Of course the Live! function does allow for that quick game to be played when your friends aren’t available but the reward just isn’t the same. The lack of leaderboards, downloadable content and other extras really does fall short of what we expect from our Xbox Live games. If there was one game begging for all these features is was this one.

Worms 4 Mayhem proves Team 17 are starting to go back to their gameplay roots, and we for one are glad that they are. The single player mode is actually very playable for a change and serves as a great training ground for the inevitable multiplayer bouts that follow. If you are new to the franchise then look no further, fans? This is what Team 17 should have released last year, it’s just a shame it took so long and that the Xbox Live side is so barren.

DETAILED GAME INFORMATION

Version Reviewed: Xbox Gold copy
Other Versions: PC, Xbox, PS2
Muliplayer: Yes
Xbox Price: £29.99
Age: 3+

UK Release date - July 29, 2005

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