Worms

"I got worms!"

An oldie but a goodie. Worms was the one of the first “party” games for the PlayStation. It’s so much fun to just grab a friend and plant a stick of dynamite right by home, or blow him sky high with a bazooka. This game definitely is one of the many sleeper games to have hit the PS.

Graphics – 8
Sure, the worms are small and hard to see. But I believe that’s one thing that gives this game it’s lasting appeal. As you can imagine, this game is best played on a big screen TV. The backgrounds are beautifully drawn and totally unique. You can even generate your own backgrounds to play on. Say your name is Roadkill (better not, that’s mine) well, when selecting a stage, just choose to input a stage and voila, there you go. Of course, there is no way to tell what kind of landscape your stage will be. There are verities of different landscapes. You have the beach, hell, a junkyard, mars and more. Each landscape twists and turns and there are no two alike. Some environments feature bridges, a small element that really adds a lot of fun to the game in my opinion.

Sound – 10
The background music fits the environments well. There is one theme song for every landscape and they just do a marvelous job matching them up. The sound effects are nicely done. The sound of the minigun, the explosion of the grenade, the bahhhing of the sheep bomb (don’t ask). Also, throughout your game the worms make little comments in there simulated high pitched little voices that sound like a squirrel got kicked in the…anyway, on with the review.

Control – 6
Excellent control. So then why did it fair so badly? Well, this game can accommodate up to 16 players (one controlling each worm). However, you may not appreciate the slight error the instruction manual made. In the instruction manual, it states that this game can utilize the multitap. But, it cannot. That means, controller passing. Now, do you feel like a 16 player match?

Replay – 10
This is such a fun game. You can create your own teams, keep track of the teams’ win-loses and configure a team to have anywhere between 75 and 500 hit points. This is just an awesome game. and the weapons greatly add to this games replay. I’ll just list a few to wet your whistle:

Bazooka – just that, a bazooka. Aim, make account for the wind and fire.
Homing missile – more precise then the bazooka, just select an area on the map you want to hit and let it fly.
Cluster bomb – like a grenade, but when it explodes, it sends smaller grenades for more damage.
Shotgun – get two shots to pick off your opponent.
Dragon-ball – not, not like in Z. Your worm lunges forward at an opponent with fist of fury.

There are many more so have fun experimenting.

Overall – 9
A great game to have in any collection. Weather it’s one player are a multiplayer deathmatch, this is just an excellent game. But, now I feel bad. I’ve been telling all this stuff about this game and it’s no longer available and hasn’t been available for some time. I wish this game sold enough copies to make it one of the PlayStation’s greatest hits.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/01/01, Updated 08/01/01