Worms worms everywhere and not a sheep to throw! (Worms (PS))

Member Name: freespirit1402

Product:	Worms (PS)
Date:	16/07/02 (45 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fun, Has various options available, Addictive

Disadvantages: Computer hard to beat

Worms was released in 1997 for the PS1 by Team 17 software and their partners Ocean.

The retail price is variable as it is not amongst the mainstream games these days due to the arrival of more updated versions such as Worms Armageddon. Mine personally cost me £1.50 plus P+P from eBay but you can often pick up preowned ones for less than ten pounds.

The game is roughly within the shoot em up genre but is much more light hearted than most games of this genre. You can choose to play the computer or a friend and can play single games - friendlies, or participate in a league tournament.

The basic object of the game is to destroy your opponent's worms. Each team has four worms and you can choose to have them distributed at random throughout the landscape or bunched together into their teams.

You are given a variety of weapons and tools to use at the start of the game and can use the options menu to predetermine numbers of certain elite weapons. Weapons drops also take place during the game enabling the worm who reaches the crate first to gain the extra weapons or specialist weapons that sometimes turn up.

And so on to the game. You can choose whether to have a time limit on the game, after which the game goes into extra time, and also a time limit on each worm's go. I prefer not to use this option. You can also choose from a variety of landscapes - there are approximately four billion although many are similar.

The game itself is tactical, not only do you have to kill your opponents worms but make sure in turn that yours are not killed. This may mean sacrificing a chance to bazooka your enemy and instead choose to teleport or dig yourself a hole in the ground thereby using your go up on this instead.

The tools available for these tactical manouevres are the teleport, the pneumatic drill, the flamethrower (also a handy weapon) and a variety of building implements and ropes.

The weapo
ns are roughly grouped into three categories - close range, throwing and drop. Close range are for when you are nearby and involve things such as shot gun, dragon fist and uzi.

Throwing includes items such as the bazooka, grenades and banana bombs. You have to choose your trajectory using a crosshair and also the strength with which you throw your missile (you may need to take the wind speed and direction into account - there is a meter for this on screen). In this category are also items such as the airstrike where you can choose any part of the map to bomb.

Drop weapons are those such as mines, dynamite and the sheep where you drop it and have five seconds to get the hell out of there.

Your last couple of options include surrender, prod(where you literally push and opponent off a cliif - can only be used in these specific situations) and kamikaze where your worm is the weapon and, after tying on a tiny red bandana screams and launches itself in the direction of the crosshair, destroying rocks trees and nearby worms (call me sick but I find this hysterical).

The worms themselves are brilliant. They start with one hundred points and lose some with every hit they recieve until they get down to zero and self destruct with a little cry of Oh Dear! The voices are brilliant, whether they are shouting Oi Nutter in cases of friendly fire or I'll Get You! from rival worms they are both cute and deadly!

If you play the computer be aware it cheats! No I am not kidding. It gives itself the first go every time and misses maybe once in one hundred goes unlike us fallible humans. However you play though be prepared for hours of fun and the addiction that can only come with blowing up invertabrates!

Happy Hunting

Summary: