Worms 3D, the most recent in a line of games dating back to the Sega Saturn
console system, is brought to the Xbox by the obviously warped crew at Team
17. This most recent Worms game takes a new approach, as you may have guessed
by the name, Team 17 has cast those crazy worms in their first fully destructible,
three dimensional environments. Worms 3D is turn based strategy game that pits
your team of worms, up to six, against other players or computer controlled
teams, in a variety of missions or for simple comical carnage,

Gameplay
The goal of course is to annihilate the opposing teams from the small piece
of constantly shrinking land the game takes place on. The two ways you can accomplish
this is either by bringing a worms life total to 0 or below, normally begins
at 100, or to knock the worm into the surrounding water. Every level in Worms
3D is entirely encompassed by water, and worms do not swim, this makes positioning
of your worms a chess game of its own.

Worms 3D features many game play modes, including quick start, campaign, challenge
mode, and multiplayer. In quick start you are instantly taken to a level and
ready to battle it out with other computer controlled teams of worms, the down
side being your custom created team won’t be the one fighting, this mode
is most similar to skirmish mode in sports games and used for instant action
without the need to choose settings.

Campaign mode is the story driven explanation for the crazy worms to be doing
battle. Your worms are tasked with various humorous missions such as defending
their home crops, to searching haunted locations. The first level of campaign
mode casts your team storming “Wormaha Beach”, with the German worms
having the high ground. In Campaign the levels you would play in quick match
or another mode are planned out for you, you may lack certain equipment or weapons
necessary for the level and have to wait for it to arrive in the form of an
airdrop etc. The worms are also laid out on some levels opposite of one another,
where quick match often mixes everyone together.

The challenge mode allows for you to truly perfect your skills with various
weapons and fighting techniques. You may be tasked with shooting a number of
targets in a row or getting across the level using only a particular utility.
In this mode your worm is often alone and must complete the challenge being
issued within a certain timed period. Challenge mode is also a good place to
learn and improve on techniques you can later use in the other game play modes.

Now for the weapons! Your teams of worms are armed with an
assortment of weaponry that ranges from the realistic to the comical. The realistic
side of the weaponry features Uzi’s, shotguns, grenades and mortars. The
comical side contains flying sheep, homing pigeons that explode and the “Fire
Punch”, which looks like a Ryu uppercut. In tune with the level, all the
weapons as well as their effects are done with great humor, the worms do not
bleed nor get filled with bullet holes, instead they respond to being attacked
with a saying that fits your teams theme, and patiently wait for their turn
to exact their revenge.

The Worms series has always been known for its ability to customize game play
settings, which continues on in its predecessor Worms 3D. In this latest Worms
title you can customize the variety of weapons, total game time, sudden death
settings, frequency of weapon and health drops, etc. The levels themselves are
customizable, you can choose from an assortment of levels that have already
been created, or you can choose to randomly generate your own through various
settings such as land size, distance between masses, the levels theme, as well
as height of land and many more.

Multiplayer
Multiplayer, where would the Worms franchise be, without the enjoyment of watching
your friend beg for you not to push his worm off the top of a skyscraper. In
multiplayer matches the game is fully customizable, you can create random land
generations that fit particular settings you choose, the total number of worms,
as well as many other options. In Multiplayer up to 4 teams, totaling 16 worms,
can play at once in simple shot or blow them up chaos. Oddly enough, this latest
installment did not feature Xbox Live play, with previous installments of this
game on the PC allowing for online chaos I was surprised.

Control
The controls are pretty easy to master in Worms 3D, the difficulty lies more
so in controlling the weapons then the worms themselves. With a max of 15 to
20 minutes required to get the hang of the controls, a time often found just
playing the tutorial, you will be ready to actively take on the other worms.
The controls are simple; the left analogue stick controls the worms movement,
the right controls the camera, the A button is to fire a weapon, or to charge
it, the B button is used to jump, tapped twice to back flip, and last the L
and R triggers control the aiming, from birds eye view to first person with
targeting reticule respectively.

Graphics

The levels in Worms 3D, keeping with tradition, are fully destructible and
offer a variety of hiding points as well as places to attack from. The downfall
to the three dimensional version is the lack of ability to drill into the ground
to hide, with the inclusion of the jet pack; the locations throughout the levels
are also more easily accessible. The levels themselves are nicely done in cartoon
form, and also still keep together that look when they are being blasted to
tiny pieces by a volley of rocket fire.

Though not as versatile as they were in previous Worms games, the levels are
however a source of great fun and perfectly match with their 2D counterparts.
The same feel and cartoon style is present in this 3D version as was before.
Just moving around the island you may notice small things that add to the comical
appearance, such as giant sized hand grenades or things more obvious such as
King Kong climbing a skyscraper.

The worms themselves are nicely done, though how complex can a worm be? For
those of you who remember the former 2D games, the short clips of the worms
in 3D doing various comedic activities that you would see after a match is how
the worms are now, almost a dream come true to returning fans. Still keeping
with the cartoon look of the levels, the worms themselves blend fully into the
game, complete with their trademark eyebrows.

Audio
The audio in Worms 3D has been wonderfully done yet again by Team17. The worms
have returned with new phrases and an assortment of different speech types.
When customizing your own personal squad of worms, you have over 40 various
speech types to choose from, including alien, ww2 generals, super villains,
nagging wife, gangsters, and more. The speech types is what has always added
a touch of personality to your worms, and their phrases such as “I’m
gonna get you” have a lasting impression, so lasting that it has been
over two years since I last played a Worms game and that still echoes in my
mind today.

The upbeat background music found while navigating the menus is all together
gone once the level has begun and instead is replaced with a more subtle, almost
non existent music. While I understand the lack of music in a turn based strategy
game, it is however a big drop from the feeling you are presented with at first.
From the moment the round begins you are instead filled with the sounds of the
battle field; bazookas firing, land mines being triggered and worms splashing
into the water from insane heights.

Replay Value
Worms 3D offers much in terms of replay with its challenge mode, campaign mode
and multiplayer aspect. The battles themselves are guaranteed to never be the
same the second time around, though the missions will always be. This is where
replay becomes a rough topic to grade; the campaign mode may not be something
you go through again after defeating it unless you want to act out particular
scenarios, such as Wormaha Beach. While you cannot get the same game play in
quick match as you do in the campaign portion without setting many settings
to exact counterparts, this would lead you to play the campaign again, just
not start to finish. Luckily you can however choose which mission to play once
they have been defeated at least once.

While the campaign mode may not offer too much replay value, the single and
multiplayer counterparts do when experimenting with randomly generated levels.
This creates entirely new environments, while they may not be as nicely laid
out as the pre generated ones, they do however change the game play enough to
want to replay certain combinations of levels and weapon settings over again.

Reviewer's Additional Comments
When I first started the game I was notably impressed with the great job done
in converting the Worms series and keeping the same feel. I was worried, being
a fan of the series that I am, that Team 17 would fail in keeping the same great
fun the 2D counterpart once was. While they have sacrificed some of the strategic
elements the game contained in the 2D version, they have added a whole new dimension
to the game, literally. If asked to compare this with previous version of the
series I would rate this one equal, if not slightly lower then the previous
ones for the lack of strategy being removed from the turn based strategy game
it once was. Utilities such as the ninja rope have also lost some of their charm,
your worm no longer gets flung around on it almost uncontrollably and instead
it acts as it would in the real world, some of the best matches I played were
won through the manipulation of that rope to fling my worm to safety.

Despite its draw backs it does stand up on its own as a great game, without
comparing it to previous versions, Worms 3D is a masterpiece of comical enjoyment,
and the lack of certain things found in the 2D version wouldn’t effect
anyone that is new to the series. The weapons have also made a successful transition
from the previously flat world into the 3D, containing the same devastating
effects, both to the land and other worms. The new weapons have also been added
without unbalancing the game or making them too strong. All in all, Worms 3D
is a must have for fans of the series and defiantly worth a look to fans of
turn based strategy looking for something slightly different.

Overall Score
Overall Score: 7.5/10 [Not an Average]

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