Imagine being part of a brave platoon of worms in the fight for global domination. That’s pretty much the idea behind the latest entry in the popular Worms video-games series.
Worms Clan Wars makes it possible for players to form a clan and take on the world. Initially, there are some restrictions to ensure that players are not overwhelmed by rules and other information. For example, initially it is only possible to have eight members within a clan, but this number can increase to twenty after earning more experience.
Each clan has an emblem that is fully customisable with various designs seen throughout the demonstration. Interesting here is the possibility of more design choices being added through future updates.
The same applies to the number of items characters use, and that means players could benefit from lots of extra content. One idea consisted of making it so each clan could have items that were unique to it.
There is a league to compare clan progress that gets reset each month. This is also an opportunity to change the in-game every season. It seemed like a nice use of the system to ensure that environments looked completely new and possibly encouraged players to play every month.
It’s only natural to think that clans with more team members will have the advantage. However, it’s not an issue since the only way to move up the league is by pure skill – rather than amount of wars fought. Clan members can also play together or individually, and doing so will still help the clan to grow.
Team 17 is committed to delivering an experience that players will still want to play long after launch. It is even releasing a companion app so clan members can communicate between each other and check various statistics when away from the game. The developer is also planning on organising tournaments so everyone in the community can get involved. Other ideas to keep the community invested in Clan Wars include incentives such as double experience events.
It’s unusual to see such an idea implemented in a Worms video-game, but it certainly makes a positive impression. The idea of having clans promotes the community spirit that many multi-player video-games tend to lack. That’s why Clan Wars is a feature many will most likely enjoy being a part of.
There is also a fully fledged single player mode taking place within a museum, with a story penned by Dean Wilson. The intrepid worms have found themselves involved in some sort of robbery. It’s nothing ground breaking but it was still funny to see snippets during a preview.
The story is split up into missions that branch out. Each has different objectives, such as attempting to stay hidden and making use of moving parts to progress. The mission I played consisted of using moving platforms to get to the end. It came to a conclusion after defeating the remaining enemy worms with some rockets. It’s still pretty much the same Worms experience, but with some quirky new features.
Classes have also been completely revamped, so that each class is completely different. For example, Scouts are better at spying on enemies since they can only deal small amounts of damage. It made for a much more interesting approach to battle, since it was necessary to carefully think which worms to use.
There are plenty of new ideas implemented that improve the way a Worms video-game is viewed and played. There is a night/day cycle where the background changes after a small amount of time. This means that each stage will change in real time and thats made more interesting to fight for longer periods of time. There are also maps that are based on different time eras, such as the the Industrial Revolution. It’s another clever idea that makes use of the museum setting for the story mode.
It’s really fun to make use of the moving platforms and other game mechanics included in each story mission. It made it feel like there was a purpose to playing through each mission. The fact it wasn’t just about defeating enemy worms was encouraging. It’s even possible that these obstacles become tougher further on – which is actually rather exciting.
It’s not difficult to get the hang of the controls, and the different ways to fire weapons may prove confusing at first, but are very helpful once using them a few times. There are around sixty five weapons to make use of and each is put into one of three categories.
Some of the weapons have more than one use. A water spray could propel a Worm up in the air. It could also form small pools of water which could then drown any unfortunate worms inside them. It’s the sort of creative idea that made Worms so popular in the first place. More powerful weapons become available with progress and there is a decent mixture of familiar and new weapons.
Those unfamiliar with Worms can also take part in Worms Ops and get through the challenges set. One of the challenges asks the player to clear a set of enemies by using a bazooka. It’s just a teaser of what to expect.
Worms Clan Wars has proved that it is more than capable of being a single player or multi-player experience. Ideally, it is best to take advantage of both modes, especially considering the effort that went into making the Clans Wars multi-player side. It’s more or less the Worms mayhem that everyone likes to partake in, but these new features just make it more appealing to play.
Worms Clan Wars has the potential to become one of the popular online video-games if all the features work this well after launch. It’s a risky move, but Team 17 may have just gone and elevated the Worms experience to the next level.
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