Worms: Open Warfare (Nintendo DS) - Review by Andrew

Introduction

It's hard to believe that there's anyone who has yet to encounter Worms because in its 13-year life it's appeared on every platform imaginable clocking up some 9 Million sales. It wasn't called Worms then, of course, but Artillery mostly because there were no worms in it. These came later after much reworking and a name change: Total Wormage. At this stage it was entered into the Amiga Format amateur programming competition only to lose to another entry. Undeterred the game was taken to 1994's European Computer Trade Show only to catch the eye of Martyn Brown of Team 17, who offered to publish it and the rest is history. This though is its first outing on the DS system and ever since screens appeared some time ago gamers have been anticipating a full-on battle title while using the DS' unique functionality.

Gameplay

If you haven't played Worms before then it really is this simple: two warring factions, they fire at weapon at you, you fire at them until one team is wiped out. That's it really, and it's this level of simplicity, which has made it so successful over the last decade or so. Operation Warfare is still very true to this core gameplay but after spending even an hour with it you'll start to feel that the developers felt that focusing on the gameplay alone would be enough to sell it to a new generation of gamers. On the plus side there are still many options available and the ability to name your team and its members will never lose its charm but still it in no way utilizes the DS' power or unique abilities. That said there is an infinite amount of gameplay here and both the challenges and main game will keep you coming back for more even if it is simply more of the same. The multiplayer mode is an incredible four-player game from a single copy of the game, although adding extra copies of the game doesn't allow you to use your own custom teams, which is a real shame.

Controls

The control is very simple indeed (move, aim, fire) but if you are getting a little stuck there's an extensive range of tutorials on the cart. Physics wise the whole this is just the same as you remember it for both good and bad reasons. On the positive side the weapons still react to their surroundings in a realistic manor with grenades bouncing off the rocks and air strikes destroying the first thing they meet. Unfortunately there's still a problem with your opponents AI which will either be incredibly good and right on target every time or keep missing you because a building or other obstacle is in the way.

Graphics

While the visuals are passable they're no real leap forward and everything looks much like it did some ten years ago. The real disappointment is the animation of the worms themselves as while they've always been incredibly small the low-res rendering here allows for less comical movement, which is something other versions were noted for. There's also a small technical hitch where the backgrounds don't appear to scroll as smoothly as they should do especially when the camera moves around rapidly from one worm to another.

Sound

Not only does Open Warfare contain some rather wonderful music you also get the various worm dialects too. For those of you unaware of what this means exactly, it's the ability to change how the style of speech of your worms sound from the dialect of European locations to the British Stiff Upper Lip and from Jamaican Rasta to Scouse (that's my hometown of Liverpool in case you didn't know).

Dual screen

Not a terribly impressive use of the touch screen as everything here could easily have been achieved with the standard controls (selecting weapons, moving around the game area, etc). A wasted opportunity really.

Final comments

After spending a great deal of time with Open Warfare it's hard to see it as a disappointment. The developers have managed to retain the core gameplay elements but it just hasn't progressed in any way and this DS version in no way utilizes the console's unique abilities, which begs the question 'why are you buying it in the first place?' Well, to be fair it does have the rather enjoyable four-player multiplayer and some great music but the flaws in the graphics engine should have been ironed out at the testing stage. If you have a DS but haven't encountered Worms before then you are in line for some great multiplayer warfare but for everyone else this is definitely a 'try before you buy' title.

Pro: Brilliant Sound Options, Great Multiplayer, Original Gameplay Intact.
Con: Weak Visuals, AI Opponents.
Final score: 6.5

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