Worms: A Space Oddity (Wii) Review
I really do try to avoid mediocre games, you know. They are such a sad waste of time really, and our time is quite unfortunately too finite (yes, cheerful, I know) to waste. Also, I prefer not to defile this very blog with their presence, though in some cases the bits of the gaming public that do enjoy ButtonSmasher just have to be warned. Worms: A Space Oddity for the Nintendo Wii definitely is such a case I’m afraid. And yes, I’ve been a pretty devoted fan of the series since 1995. Even thought the 3D Worms offerings weren’t that bad…
Anyway. Better start with what’s good about Space Oddity. Let me see now. Well, it’s quite obviously a Worms game for the Wii, and there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s got the charm, style, classic mechanics and lovely 2D cartoon visuals to prove it and it can be reasonably enjoyable. At times. Quite happily it doesn’t do anything bad to the console either and definitely wont hurt the cat. Or dear granny. Oh, yes, and you can even play it with/versus a friend and try to relive those glorious Amiga gaming days. Well, that’s all there is to it apparently.
On the other hand, if I wanted to be as verbose as a particularly verbose thing, I could talk for days about what’s absolutely rubbish with the thing. Unfortunately, you see, everything is wrong. From minor things like the lack of online multiplayer options and the fact that the graphics aren’t as crisp as they ought to, to the irritating change of weapon names, to the bloody unforgivable stripping down of weapon and gadget options to a puny 17. But still, I believe I could put up with these faults and even pretend to like the included mini-games, just in order to enjoy the game from the comfort of my couch, if the controls were decent. Which the aren’t. Frankly, I’d say they are almost broken, what with the cursor constantly sticking to the edge of the screen, the incredibly unintuitive way of scrolling around the battlefields and simply selecting and firing a weapon is too fiddly to describe. Avoid!
If you absolutely have to play Worms on a Nintendo console, better give Worms Open Warfare 2 for the DS a try and you’ll be happy in that properly 90s way again. Better yet, try the Xbox Live Arcade version. It’s got online multiplayer for a fraction of Space Oddity’s cost after all.
Posted on March 29th, 2008 by konstantinos
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One difficulty I have is knowing when you have a game that is just mediocre or pretty good. I’m finding myself relying on recommendations from people I know and from trying a game out.
Then, again, even a mediocre game can turn out to be fun. My kids and I played Ben 10 on the Wii. An okay beat’em up, but we had fun with it because the kids enjoy the show so much.
What gets me about games with bad controls is how is that possible? Are developers so wrapped up in their designs that they can’t see how bad they are? The least bit of testing would show the problems.
That said, as much as I like the Wii remote and nunchuk (for both the motion control and the separated devices), the Wii remote itself sometimes presents a problem because of its length: the 1 and 2 buttons are almost too far from the d-pad, A and B to be used regularly in the game. I’ve found that some combinations of the A/B button and the d-pad can be a little tricky, especially in a twitchy game.
But then, I definitely find some of the 360 and PS2 controls to be awkward.
March 31st, 2008 at 7:16 amAbsolutely agree. The Wii can indeed be very tricky to play with (though admittedly that’s mainly a dev problem) and mediocre games can be fun. Just like mediocre films or the despised Dan Brown books. Still, after 15 years and a million sequels one would expect the first outing of Worms on the Wii to be on par with -at least- its Amiga granpa.
March 31st, 2008 at 11:10 am