Xbox Live Arcade - Worms

[Jazza]

At last!!!! :)

Worms have evolved and are taking no prisoners! Team17 Software Ltd. brings its popular “Worms” franchise to Xbox Live® Arcade, delivering the first turn-based strategy game to the platform. “Worms” will be available for download on Xbox Live Arcade for Xbox 360™ beginning Wednesday, March 7 at 0800 GMT (1 a.m. PST).

“Worms” is a cleverly balanced turn-based strategy game in which teams of heavily armed worms battle across bizarre, randomly generated landscapes for supremacy. Each team takes turns picking off opposing team members using crazy weapons, tools and other utilities along with whatever foul strategies they can devise. The simple and cute appearance belies the deep strategy of a game that is easy to play but difficult to master.

“Worms” will be available worldwide for 800 Microsoft® Points.

GAME FEATURES

* A mix of strategy and arcade action that, although simple to understand, contains real depth and massive replayability
* Turn-based multiplayer action for up to four players locally or over Xbox Live*
* An assortment of game options:
o Landscape on which to do battle
o Turn and round times
o Starting weapon arsenal for each team
* Three detailed tutorials to introduce the mechanics to first-time players
* Twenty increasingly difficult single-player challenges
* Three graphical themes for play
* A random landscape generator to ensure that no two landscapes are ever the same
* Twenty-two weapons and utilities to deploy against your enemies
* Many customizable elements, including what worms and teams are named, what worms say, and which gravestone they have when they die
* High-definition visuals and many graphical improvements throughout the game
* Twelve achievements
* Weekly, monthly and overall leaderboards

WHERE CAN I GET IT?

You can download “Worms” beginning Wednesday, March 7, at 0800 GMT/1 a.m. PST on Xbox Live Arcade.

“Worms” will be available for 800 Microsoft Points, and rated E10+, Mild Cartoon Violence.

Source : GamerScore Blog (http://gamerscoreblog.com/team/archive/2007/03/02/541944.aspx)

[Quietus]

... Why did it need such a big detailed specification of what it is.

Are there gamers who do not know what "Worms" is?

That's like not knowing what the Monkey Island series is... or the Lemmings... or the "Sim" games...

Sacrilege!

[TelexStar]

My friend had never heard of Worms....

I know! Crazy isn't it.

[gemini]

Is this the original worms game, i.e. the one where the worms were about 4 pixels big ?

If it is, I wont be buying, if it ISNT thehn I will most definatly be buying

[Jazza]

it looks like this

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gamerscore/sets/72157594566305588/

[TelexStar]

More importantly, how does it play? :)

[Siany]

Tempted to get this for some multiplayer fun :)

/me checks points balance

[Jazza]

Sian: get the demo, and see how you feel then ;)

I'll be giving it ago when I get home

[Siany]

...bought Worms

Only because I played the trial version and now it's listed in my played games as having a score of 0...which is totally unacceptable

*sigh* will have to play it now I guess :p

[Dux0r]

ill buy it later aswell if your up for a game :)

[Jazza]

played the trial. Just paid for it. Awewsome

[Siany]

I'm actually starting to like worms, despite owning myself with grenades for the first few rounds :p

[TelexStar]

Ok. MPUK Online Worms session anyone? :D

[RoboStac]

Me/rich/phoenixolgy already had one. Unfortunatly, they asked me to join mid tutorial, so I spent the first few rounds either blowing myself up, or jumping off things I shouldn't. Still won though, as I did quite well in the other rounds :)

If anyones suffering from the crashing problem on Live (when hosting), or getting lots of errors joining games, host your own game, and tell it to start before people have selected their teams (once enough people are in), and it will start without crashing when they've selected teams.

[Jazza]

I'll have to try and have an online game soon. I see you also get an achivement for a 4 player game ;)

[TelexStar]

The annoying thing is I have 220 points in my account already and will have to buy a full 800 points in order to buy it. Grrr.

[Siany]

Use those up for gamer pics and themes etc and buy the 2100 points pack from play.com; worms works out to be only £3.24 ;)

[TelexStar]

?

The 2100 points pack on play is £16.99. Is my maths way off or does this not work out to around £6.40? Is there a cheaper pack somewhere that I've missed?

[Siany]

Oops worms is 800 points not 400 :redface:

I'll get my coat...http://www.devmaster.net/forums/images/smilies/whistle.gif

[Rich]

This ****ing owns.

[Dux0r]

indeed :D

[Jez_Gafys]

I had it for my Amiga 600, always like playing on the Team17 or OCEAN logo maps.

Any idea what port of the game it is that will be on the 360? If the Wii got it it would be an crappy Snes version which really was bad and wouldn't be worth downloading but a proper Amiga version or 3DO (looked better then the pc version) puts other versions to shame

[Mingtea]

Xbox live arcade games can sometimes be original creations, not just ports like the Wii.

Was playing it till 1am with the guys from work last night, absoloutely fantastic and adictive, refreshing after the poor showing that was worms 3D.

[Jez_Gafys]

Yeah just read about it sounds like it was a fully developed version specifically for the Live arcade. Its the same programmer who made Lemmings for the PS3

[renegade_sound]

It plays well, but leaving out weapons like the holy hand grenade is a bit poor, especially for fans of worms 2 (arguably the best version, thanks to the customisable weapons). Very difficult to enjoy it on a standard definition display too, I'll just have to wait till easter so I can bring my monitor back to uni and get a VGA cable :)

[Rich]

Yeah after playing it a bit more - 3 themes is not enough tired of playing in "London" or on an iceburg when there used to be loads of themes :D not enough weapons really - they've missed out some classics and that bloody crashing bug seems to happen too often. robostac I tried it once when no one had selected a team - crashed. Tried it again when everyone had selected a team and even waited 15 secs for good measure - still crashed. Just seems to be luck of the draw as somtimes its fine, seems 1 in 3 times it crashes.

Still a good game, and yes it was written from scratch for the 360 - looks nice in HD and still the classic worms gameplay so great fun. The best Live title to date.

[RoboStac]

From what I've heard it's closest to the PSP version (same weapons etc). The theme doesn't matter too much, but it'd be nice to have some of the custom maps again. Shame it was finished before the 50Mb limit on XBLA was changed :(

The crash thing certainly seemed related to that for me - it's been 100% of games I hosted crashed if people chose teams before I clicked start, 100% worked if they hadn't. Might just be coincidence (and I've only crashed 2 times / hosted about 10). Still annoying that its so common after it's apparently been in microsoft testing for months.

Achievements are a bit poor in it, only the 'kill 3 worms in one turn' might need a bit of trying for (though its still really easy). It'd be nice to have a 'win a multiplayer game without losing a worm' or something else that would need someone to try.

It's great fun though, and I can see it getting played a lot, especially if they fix the crashing and add some downloadable content.

[Rich]

Yeah thats true most of the acheivments are just time related, ie if you play it long enough you are bound to get them all regardless of whether you actually do anything skillful.


And yeah, they delayed it for like 3 months to supposedly iron out all the bugs and make sure it was fine with Live, then they go and leave a glaringly massive problem in it which would of been obvious with like 20 mins of play testing, not sure how they could miss it really. Poor form.

[TelexStar]

Great game but the Jetpack is too powerful - especially when you can drop TNT in the same turn.

I haven't played around with the host settings yet but can you switch off certain weapons/tools?

[RoboStac]

I quite like what they've done with the jetpack - the default ranked setting of 1 means you have to choose the right time to use it, and with the awkward ninja rope controls, its about the only way to get to certain places. It'd be nice to have a delay on it though, as theres often a group at the start that are perfectly setup for jetpacked dynamite, whereas if it was delayed a few turns the worms would spread out more.

The host can certainly choose between different weapon sets, not sure if you can define your own (I've only hosted ranked games so far, which you can't change that on).

[TelexStar]

Hmm ok, I'm not sure what kind of online game I played but people were flying around like Lee Majors in that damn thing last night.

[Rich]

Yeah you can define your own weapon sets and disable certain things. In worms world party the only way to be good only was to do pro roping skills where you'd just swing across the map and drop bombs on people as you went over. No one seemed to bother using other weapons. Which is why my custom weapon set lets you use 2 jet packs and 2 ropes but after a delay. and only 1 air strike as I find it cheap and irratating ;P

[Jazza]

In the latest podcast from Major Nelson, he interviewed Martin Brown of Team 17, and he said that more soundpacks were going to be released in the future via marketplace. Fingers crossed for more themes as well ;)

Full interview
http://www.majornelson.com/archive/2007/03/04/show-214-the-one-about-nba-stree-graw2-worms-gdc.aspx

[Rich]

Fingers crossed for a patch to fix the crashing, its put me off the game big time due to having no effort to get up and reset the xbox when worms randomly crashes it joining games..

[TelexStar]

I've been noticing loads of bugs in the game as well. Things like distorting graphics in places and my worms being locked into moving a certain direction when passing over a certain type of terrain.

It's still fun and I'll live with it, but they seriously need to fix it.

[Rich]

Yeah, another one I've seen in a few matches is worms being stuck to textures or stuck in holes or small cracks where in other worms games you would just walk or jump out. Not sure if you mean the same kinda thing but it must be annoying having to waste a go due to your worm glitching inside the level.