Worms WMD, a 2D turn based fighting game, was released in August of 2016 for $60 AUD. The game is available on Steam, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. Your goal in the game is to eliminate the enemy team of worms with your arsenal of weapons and gear. Lose all your worms health, zoom off the sides of the map, fall into the water, and your worm is gone. Take your time to move, pick a weapon, aim and fire because every turn counts. Planning in this game is the key to success.
After completing the tutorial levels, you have three types of ways you can play: singleplayer, custom matches and ranked online. Singleplayer mode features a campaign with pre-made levels putting you up against bots that get harder and harder the more levels you complete. Custom Matches are probably the most fun way to play the game, as you can set up exactly how you want the rules to be, how many things spawn, what the map looks and how many teams there are. Online Ranked matches are fun for skilled and competitive people, but I personally don’t like them that much (because I am bad at the game).
The series has been going on for more than 25 years, with 18 games in the series. Andy Davidson made a game based off Artillery with graphics from Lemmings. It was meant as a joke for his friends, with inside jokes such as the concrete donkey based on a statue in Andy’s garden, or the Holy Hand Grenade from a Monty Python film. The game ended up getting so much support that he decided to change some of the stolen things around and gave birth to the Worms series. The massive and obscure weapon variety in Worms is one of the reasons why it is so iconic.
Now, I hear you ask, what’s new in this game compared to the previous games in the series? Well, firstly, you can craft weapons now instead of just having to wait a certain amount of turns to earn items. Crates spawn around the map providing crafting materials to make something. You can craft anytime, even if it’s the enemy’s turn. Additionally, there are new and exclusive weapons only available from crafting. Vehicles have also been added that spawn randomly around the map, giving unique ways to traverse the map and attack enemies. Mounted turrets have also been introduced making certain points around the map more advantageous, sacrificing mobility for firepower. Finally, buildings have been introduced to hide worms and provide cover from chaos happening outside.
There are so many games in the series, some people can find it hard to decide what one they should get. Now, this game isn’t perfect, as no video game can be. Some of the menus and UI feel a little bit buggy, and the game sometimes crashes if you have multiple monitors. I had problems with the resolution that I had to spend time fixing. The tutorial doesn’t cover every weapon in the game meaning you have to experiment crafting and using each item to figure out what things do all by yourself. Finally, the buildings are a cool feature, but they are often annoying as it is unclear which ones are part of the environment and which can be entered. Additionally, the entrances to buildings are very unclear.
Whilst there are some problems with the game, they all end up being resolved as you get used to using every weapon, traversing the auto-generated terrain, and fixing issues with the game options. Sadly, the game has been abandoned by the developers for Worms Rumble, but Worms W.M.D is the most recent entry in the series that isn’t majorly different to the Worms formula. There are still people who play online in the game, there are still new workshop items and cosmetics, and there are still many custom rules and fun game modes that could be invented. Because this game has the most content and features compared to any other standard Worms game, W.M.D is the best one you can get.
