Worms: Reloaded returns to the classic 2D form of the game which we last saw on PC’s in 2001 with Worms World Party (WWP). Worms is truly a case of ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ game design. Team 17 seems to have taken that to heart after their venture into 3D, and a simple return to the Worms format of old, albeit it with plenty of touch-ups and polish, is most welcome.
Now I suppose there are two types of gamer in this world – those who have played a Worms game before, and those who have only just returned from a 15 year Arctic expedition. For the benefit of the latter, I’ll provide a brief description of what the game is all about.
Worms: Reloaded puts players in control of a team of cartoonish, anthropomorphised annelids, hell-bent on the turn based destruction of each other through the use of a varied and deadly arsenal of weaponry. The game is presented in a colourful 2D cross section of the world in which the worms do battle – a world which is slowly torn apart by the worms’ destructive tendencies. Aim and on-the-fly trajectory calculation are key to success. Wind effects projectiles, making for some skilled and entertainingly curved bazooka shots and grenade throws.
It might sound simple, but 15 years after the original title popularised artillery games, Worms: Reloaded is still highly addictive.
Worms World Party players will appreciate the level of customisation Reloaded offers, although the interface does suffer from a bad case of console-itis. The menu’s are downright ugly, but functional. Players can add a unique touch to their worminions (yes, I made up a word) by picking from a wide selection of quirky hats, humourous sound-banks, strange gravestones, worm colours and a team fort design.
The level editor is also pretty thorough, and one can quickly generate varied and interesting terrain upon which to do battle. These custom terrains can be saved, for quick loading pre-match. Otherwise, just before a multiplayer match begins, players can generate a fresh terrain within a few seconds.
Visually, it’s the same old 2D worms goodness from the WWP era, but everything has been touched up for a high resolution generation. The addition of cool ‘forts’ which are drawings of anything from elderly women to robots adds a further splash of variety to the levels. Animated 3D backgrounds add a nice touch to the game world and help to flesh out the huge variety of environments and terrain types available.
Rounding everything off are the great sound effects. Explosions provide a deep and satisfying rumble, machine guns spit bullets with a cartoonish crackle, and worms shriek in terror as their lives are endangered at every turn. There is even some ambient surround sound which complements the battle environment.
The game features a single player campaign and various single player modes. Annoyingly, one can only unlock new and powerful weapons for use in multiplayer through earning coins in the single player mode, and then purchasing the weapons. A strange decision in what is ultimately a multiplayer game, but perhaps its one way to justify single player modes at all.
This is not to say that the single player mode isn’t fun to play through once – it certainly serves as good training ground for the inexperienced, but confident players may resent the need to grind through in order to obtain the hallowed Concrete Donkey.
There are a couple of new single player modes – Warzone pits your wormy team against increasingly powerful opponents, and Bodycount is the same thing, except you only have a single worm. Again, a great training ground, but in these two modes, one can’t even unlock coins with which to purchase weapons.
All this single player action is shored up by some schizophrenic A.I. In one turn, the computer will unleash a draw-dropping, perfectly curved bazooka shot that causes a catastrophic chain reaction of deadly events, and in the very next, their shot goes wide and hits an uninhabited area of the level.
In terms of gameplay, old Worms players will feel right at home, with pretty much everything being just as it should be. The Ninja-rope feels as if it has been adjusted, and it is now far more difficult to pull off gravity defying manipulations of the rope physics. Players may exercise crafty defensive tactics, or go annelid-reproductive-organs to the wall, in an all out suicidal attack, which can often prove hilariously effective.
The multiplayer is the real meat n’ potatoes of the game of course, and a welcome feature is the built-in matchmaking system. The matchmaking did suffer from some teething problems in the early days of the game’s launch, but a recent patch seems to have solved this for the most part.
It’s usually not too difficult to find people to play with, and as more people purchase the title, it will likely become even easier. Organising a match with online Steam friends is a relative breeze, although learning the finicky ins-and-outs of the (once again hideous) menu system is annoying at first.
The multiplayer is a whole lot of fun – it’s just that simple. The familiar arsenal of weapons are available, either as standard or through collecting crates, and of course, some new means of destruction have been introduced. Half the fun is uncovering some new weapons of awesome and unknown power, but keep an eye out for the Three Ferrets and Invisibility.
Among the various gameplay modes, Worms: Reloaded offers ranked match play with standard rulesets, and player created matches which can utilise any crazy rules players desire. Fort mode pits teams against each other on their respective island forts – the fort design is chosen pre-game in the team customisation menu.
For Worms purists, the fact that only four worms comprise a team is probably a let-down. I’m sure Team 17 has some valid reason for this, but with only four worms, a match can feel like it is over before the battle can become truly epic. At the least, it should be an available option for player created 1v1 matches – four player matches comprising of a total of 16 worms proves that this can be done.
Overall, Worms: Reloaded is a great return to the PC for the series. The supped up yet classic 2D visual style is welcomed, supported by are great deal of customisability. The gameplay is just as great as it ever was.
The purchase decision for PC gaming newcomers to the series should be as straightforward as seeing if you enjoy the demo. For old hat Worms players, the visual upgrade and matchmaking capabilities might just be worth the US$20 purchase (±R145).
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