Reader Review: Worms Reloaded

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This review was submitted by Matthew Tomich. If you’ve played Worms Reloaded, or just want to ask Mathew more about it, leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Worms Reloaded (PC)

Worms Reloaded is the latest instalment in Team17’s long-running non-arthropod invertebrate artillery series, Worms. Ostensibly a port of Worms 2: Armageddon on Xbox 360, Reloaded marks the series’ return to PC after a 5 year absence.

Loved
Gameplay: Worms is still a damn fun game, and the idea of teams of tiny, hilariously-accented and gloriously-hatted worms firing bazookas, grenades and explosive sheep at each other is still entertaining some 15 years since the series’ beginnings, despite gameplay remaining largely unchanged since the original.

Multiplayer: Easily the most appealing aspect of acting out one’s wormicidal tendencies is to do so on your friends (and enemies). Multiplayer (both local and online) provides a number of different game modes, including a standard 2-4 player game; pro, which limits weaponry and time limits, requiring a more strategic and quick-thinking approach to victory; forts, in which worms are stationed in two (you guessed it) forts and attempt to destroy one another; crazy crates, which sees almost stupidly frequent drops of health and weapons; rope race, in which worms race one another to the end of a level utilising the ninja rope; and a mode that limits everyone’s arsenal to only bazookas and grenades.

Customisation: The little quirks, including the 50+ voicebanks for your worms, and novelty hats, though hardly integral to gameplay, still do add fun to the experience. Moreover is the ability to create your own maps and game modes. There’s nothing like kicking worm-ass (or in my case, getting my worm-ass kicked) on a map modelled after Duke Nukem standing triumphantly over some alien waste.

Hated
Interface: Counter-intuitive and frustrating to navigate, the game’s interface is a big let-down, especially when the clock’s ticking all you want to do is move your worm but pressing escape won’t close the damn menu.

Rehash factor: Though calling it Worms Reloaded doesn’t promise a great deal of new features, this is almost a carbon copy of Worms 2: Armageddon. The campaign is the same, the weapons are the same; the modes are the same: most of the additions are small and inconsequential, and the game should’ve retained its Xbox 360 name rather than suggesting anything interesting and new was added.

Bugs: The beta testing period was clearly too short because the game is rife with errors. Games often crash when one of four players leave; sounds from a game loop in the menu when they shouldn’t; early region incompatibility (which thankfully has since been fixed). Certainly not major, but still a sign of negligence.

Map & mode editor: Though it appeared promising, these features leave much to be desired: spatial limitations, bugs including turrets firing on the team members they’re supposed to protect, and other errors are rife; not to mention custom modes are only playable in private matches.

Although the game does leave a somewhat bittersweet taste in the mouth, multiplayer is enough to make it a worthwhile purchase.

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