First reviews are out and it got a 7.5. Quick tidbits on the game:


"feels incomplete"
cited omissions are things like only three boards (but a random generator is included also), missing weapons include holy hand grenades, skunk, baseball bat, and the select worm option.

"- fewer weapons and environments than series fans are used to"

"Was it purposely truncated to allow downloadable content?"


I knew they didnt include a lot of what people were expecting, especially after WWP. I also didnt agree that omitting weapons was a good thing, but only 3 boards? Thats disappointing. It sounds like a nice way to get extra money from DLC.

Shame :(

Obviously its not just hardcore Worm fans that were expecting certain weapons.

I have not read the review, but from what you have quoted it sounds like the reviewer is not liking it because it's not as grand as the "standard" 2d worms game. I do not completely agree with that method of reviewing. This is an arcade game, not a full retail game. I don't expect it to have everything in Worms Armageddon. Do I want everything in Worms Armageddon? Yes, but I don't expect it in an arcade game. I think I might be in the minority in this view though.

That being said, I kind of always thought this game was going to be microtransaction rich, so the fact that this reviewer is talking about them does not surprise me. Plus, in the recent interview Martyn did tell us there would be a lot of voice packets for download (some free and some pay). He went on to say that the ones you have to pay for would be provided for a very small price (microtransactions). That being said, I'm probably going to buy every single thing they put out, even though I'll hate myself for doing this. I'm team17's whipping boy, hehe.

I would rather buy new weapons than bloody voice's

The only thing that I'll even consider buying is weapons and maybe map themes. Anything else has absolutely no bearing on the gameplay whatsoever.

I agree.

There may only be 3 themes as standard, meaning that you may have to download more, but as spadge has already said, not all the downloads will be charged. Some will be free.

claiming that it is a cash cow for selling themes and voice packs is meaningless until they actually start charging for themes and voice packs. They may not charge anything at all.

EDIT: On the other hand, the PR seems to be gathering momentum. A possible release next week?

I have not read the review, but from what you have quoted it sounds like the reviewer is not liking it because it's not as grand as the "standard" 2d worms game. I do not completely agree with that method of reviewing. This is an arcade game, not a full retail game. I don't expect it to have everything in Worms Armageddon. Do I want everything in Worms Armageddon? Yes, but I don't expect it in an arcade game. I think I might be in the minority in this view though.

Well, there was a thing lately on Spadge's blog complaining about a review of Lemmings on the PS3 (I think) which went on about how it didn't have as many features as the PS2 version and wasn't the most original game ever made, and didn't really build on the PSP version much, and utterly failing to mention that the game cost less than a tenth of what you'd normally expect to pay for a PS3 game. He thought that a little bit mean-spirited of them, and I for one agree.

Obviously its not just hardcore Worm fans that were expecting certain weapons.
This person reviews videogames for a living and was chosen to review the Worms game on Live Arcade. I think it's safe to assume he has played or seen Worms 2, Worms Armageddon, Worms World Party, Worms 3D or Worms 4 at some stage in the past and knows what's expected. Knowing that kind of thing is practically a prerequisite to review a new game in a series.

But there's a balance to be struck between giving a review of a game in context with respect to its predecessors and giving a review of a game which judges it for what it is and not for what has gone before it -- why should this version have the holy grenade, just because the last version did? It's a tricky thing to get right, and without having read this review it's hard to say if they've managed it. Certainly I'd have liked the Holy Hand Grenade and the Baseball Bat to be in there, but I wouldn't miss the Battleaxe, the Napalm Strike, the MB Bomb, the Suicide Bomber, and so forth, and if the game works well without the "missing" weapons then in what sense are they "missing"?

Play it, then judge it. That is the correct way around. I assume there's a free demo coming?

Well i'm still getting it, i've been waiting too long and it looks gorgeous in HD. I also noticed from a video that they seemed to have included animated backgrounds (it was a ship moving up and down in the water). I dont believe thats been done before.

Either way I know a lot of people who wanted more weapons. I recently discovered the skunk weapon and was greatly looking forward to using it on XBL.. I cant help but be disappointed.

I also noticed from a video that they seemed to have included animated backgrounds (it was a ship moving up and down in the water). I dont believe thats been done before.
it was the same way on psp. not only is it animated, it is 3d. when you scroll around the map you can see it from slightly different angles. does nothing for gameplay, but looks great.

Play it, then judge it. That is the correct way around. I assume there's a free demo coming?

I'm pretty sure there is a demo coming. I have not seen an XBLA game without one, and I believe Martyn talked about it at one point. I believe he said the demo would not have multiplayer as a result of some policy with Live. I think he talked about it in one of those threads that got removed; however, I might be wrong.

I can live without the HHG, but the lack of a baseball bat is a bit disappointing. I had thought that was more of a standard weapon.

Can someone post the positives and negatives that they listed? I'm just curious, it will have zero effect on my decision to buy the game.

I shall miss BOTH the Holy Hand Grenade and the Baseball Bat. Almost nothing in the Worms games has been more satisfying than hearing the "Homerun" theme after knocking a worm into the drink or the "Hallelujah" just before a huge detonation.

If you could see me now... a single tear is streaming down my cheek. But alas, I'll still get the game.

3 themes sound about right - as Spadge has mentioned the HD art for each theme is huge, considering a 50Mb limit (formerly) for XBLA. Perhaps they plan to release more themes after the fact for free to compensate for the small size limit they were under.

Can someone post the positives and negatives that they listed? I'm just curious, it will have zero effect on my decision to buy the game.

+ Comic 2K carnage in an addictive turn-based format.

+ Fun Live multi-player

- Fewer weapons and environments than series fans are used to.

? Was it purposely truncated to allow downloadable content?

"Worms feels oddly incomplete" is a comment from the review that jumps out at me. My impression is of a fun game, that could have been deeper and better.

I'll blame the 50 MB limit for these issues, and this remains a "must buy" for me.

so basically the only downer is for people that have already played the series. which means for new players the game will be just fine. looks as if they reviewed it and compared it to the other games.

It will still be the best arcade game on market place :) The HHG and all that kinda stuff was (and still is) cool but I can live without it. The only thing that annoys me about his game is that it takes so long to be released on market place ;)

The only thing that annoys me about his game is that it takes so long to be released on market place ;)
What? It has been released on February 2nd. You must have got stuck in an infinite time loop since that day (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day_%28film%29).

that sucks , they better take advandtage of the space upgrade MS made for the arcade next time ( i think its like 500 mb ) :(

Worms live party FTW

All the weapons , custom map maker, All the game modes (like the one where you have to dig down to avoid armageddon ) , and all the voices

Thats all i need

and i think thats all the community needs aswell :cool:

All the weapons , custom map maker, All the game modes (like the one where you have to dig down to avoid armageddon ) , and all the voices

Thats all i need

"That's all"? That's a pretty big ask, you know.

And setting aside the fact that you keep talking as if the things you mention are things that the game is supposed to have but doesn't when in fact they're things you'd like it to have that it doesn't, you're still asking for things that never existed before. There's never been a game mode "where you have to dig down to avoid armageddon" -- there was one mission like that in one game once, and anything that came after that was a creation of the community, and the community has come up with so many game modes that you could barely fit them all into a 50MB download even as plain text rule sheets.

I don't think you understand what this game, or Live Arcade, is. It's not a Steam-style way of delivering full-featured console games over the internet. It's a collection of small games designed by be cheap and fun and bought on impulse -- this is practically disposable entertainment. The games cost just a few pounds and sit comfortably inside 50MB, much like shareware games. You simply can't expect all the features of Worms Armageddon and all the graphics of WOW from that. It would cost more to make than you'd make selling it, you'd never get it into the filesize limit, and you'd be aiming it at the wrong people if you could -- the big market is still in the conventional sales, so you'd really be wanting to get it on a disk in the shops if you were doing that kind of game.

I've never heard of this alleged "space upgrade". The cap is still, as far as I can tell, 50MB, and I found a news report from two weeks ago when Microsoft reiterated that they had no immediate plans to increase that.

Nah they did increase the filze sizes from 50mb to something

Nah they did increase the filze sizes from 50mb to something

Oh? I can't find even one sourced news report saying this has happened. All I can find is a lot of pages which all trace back to one anonymous tip-off on 1up.com which says it's gone up to 250MB.

Don't pretend that's a rock solid fact. That's a rumour, that is. It's not the same thing.

Also, any further discussion of this idea should go in this thread: http://forum.team17.co.uk/showthread.php?t=31633

Yeah, there's only like 16 weapons and they're the most basic, common weapons; nothing extavagent. It not as fun as having 50 different weapons to mix it up a bit and keep things interesting as well as some of the funny ones; Old Woman at least. Variety is the spice of life. :) How many megs does it really take to add a few BIG weapons? Oh well it is based on the original...

I'm more then happy with the weapon set in this game. I had a lot of fun with the original Worms game and I'm sure this one will be the same for me.

it would be nice if this release was a probe by Team17 to see if there's any interest in a full retail release.

Personally, all I want is to play a few games now and then with friends and family. Don't get me wrong, I consider myself fairly hardcore, but a lot of the people I like to spend time with are not. I loved the first worms games because they were simple and didn't provide too much choice to the casual gamer - anyone could pick it up quickly and be competitive with it after a couple of rounds. That's the idea behind XBLA and this implementation of worms fits in nicely for a having a few laughs with some mates and a cold beer or three.

Odd that Spadge hasnt been in here to 'defend' the game.

I've been away in Amsterdam, ironically with the XBLA people!

The 50mb size limit (yes, it still counts) caused us a lot of grief in terms of data once 7 localised voice banks were in, the game, soundfx, generic art and 3 levels...

There was ONLY room for 3 themes, that's it. I think the PSP data (everything) was about 800Mb and that was low-def!

The others will come via marketplace and we still haven't decided what will be chargeable and if so, how much.

are you planning to release any themes that were not on psp?

Some addiitional stuff is planned, yes.

Additional stuff actually worth purchasing?

Additional stuff actually worth purchasing?

That will be up to you to decide.

Assuming that different weapons will be released later on (probably for $), what will happen when I try to throw my Holy Hand Grenade at someone who didn't buy it? Will we even be allowed to play together? I hope this doesn't turn into a compatibility mess between players with and without extra content.

I'd like to remind anyone reading this thread that we have no idea how much this is going to cost. It's most likely this will cost between 800-1600 points ($10 - $20 US respectively). That's a lot cheaper then retail prices of $40-60.

So a "mini version" of Worms at that price is excellent, especially considering the core gameplay is still going to be there.

Also, while I've had lots of fun with 1-hit kill weapons like the HHG and BB, is it really that bad to have them omitted?

From a strategy perspective, I enjoy playing Worms matches that are more balanced (especially online), and any 1-hit kill weapons are imbalanced.

Sure, you can still knock people off the edges of the map with thing like Prod, Fire Punch, and Dragon Ball.... but at least those aren't so powerful, they work if the other player keeps their worms in bad positions. But the baseball bat is practically designed to kill a worm instantly... and that's not even considering Low Gravity!

So yeah, I think eliminating the imbalanced weapons (however fun they may be) will do more good then bad.

Assuming that different weapons will be released later on (probably for $), what will happen when I try to throw my Holy Hand Grenade at someone who didn't buy it? Will we even be allowed to play together? I hope this doesn't turn into a compatibility mess between players with and without extra content.

I refer you to this post:
http://forum.team17.co.uk/showthread.php?t=31646

Assuming that different weapons will be released later on (probably for $), what will happen when I try to throw my Holy Hand Grenade at someone who didn't buy it? Will we even be allowed to play together? I hope this doesn't turn into a compatibility mess between players with and without extra content.
if you use a weapon that your opponent does not have, you will get a de-sync, and either a crash or a disconnect, which is exactly why this isn't going to happen. t17 has already stated that things like themes and voice banks will be replaced with defaults for anyone who doesn't have them. this trick won't work with weapons, so it is safe to assume that new weapons aren't going to happen.
Also, while I've had lots of fun with 1-hit kill weapons like the HHG and BB, is it really that bad to have them omitted?
they aren't exactly 1-hit kill weapons. hhg dealt 80hp of damage, if i recall correctly, and while bb could do 100+, it would require very special circumstances to occur. at 200hp/worm, it becomes extremely difficult to deal 1-hit kills with any arsenal. you also need to remember that all these pend a perfect hit. if you cut back on ropes and jet packs, and force people to perform long range shots, perfect hits, especially with grenade-like weapons, are going to be relatively rare.

if you use a weapon that your opponent does not have, you will get a de-sync, and either a crash or a disconnect, which is exactly why this isn't going to happen. t17 has already stated that things like themes and voice banks will be replaced with defaults for anyone who doesn't have them. this trick won't work with weapons, so it is safe to assume that new weapons aren't going to happen.

they aren't exactly 1-hit kill weapons. hhg dealt 80hp of damage, if i recall correctly, and while bb could do 100+, it would require very special circumstances to occur. at 200hp/worm, it becomes extremely difficult to deal 1-hit kills with any arsenal. you also need to remember that all these pend a perfect hit. if you cut back on ropes and jet packs, and force people to perform long range shots, perfect hits, especially with grenade-like weapons, are going to be relatively rare.

I'm sure new weapon packs would be possible. The "trick" would just be to let players select what type of matches to search for when joining online games. The default option could, for example, be "Standard" which would be games that only have the basic weapons; then you could have other options that appear when you buy weapon packs, like "Enahanced".

Players who only had the standard game just wouldn't see "Enhanced" games, but players with the weapon packs could still join standard-only games.

As for 1-hit kills, while the HHG might not be able to do 100 damage except under special circumstances, it is still obviously over-powered compared to other weapons. It's specialty is obviously mass destruction, and it can do high amounts of damage to lots of worms at once. The baseball bat is pretty easy to kill a worm with usually, just by knocking them a long distance off the map.

In the end I think it's more strategic to have a weapons array that is fairly balanced in terms of damage dealt, bit specialized purposes. Bazooka and Grenades yield similar damage, but have different applications, likewise the Shotgun is equal as well. The WMDs, well they are a mixed bag and I prefer to play without them... it's still Worms just the same.

from previous posts, it takes only a small amount of reading between the lines to come to the conclusion that new weapon content will not be added, ever. Spadge has all but said it in those exact words, content will be coming, but not new weapons.

I'm sure new weapon packs would be possible. The "trick" would just be to let players select what type of matches to search for when joining online games. The default option could, for example, be "Standard" which would be games that only have the basic weapons; then you could have other options that appear when you buy weapon packs, like "Enahanced".
i would have gone with something a little more technical. you can easily transfer code for additional weapons over the net and hook it into the game. use some default graphics/sounds, and the transfer sizes will be tiny. if you write a special procedure that seeks unconditional epilogues for functions, the rest of the code to handle this is nearly trivial.

i would have gone with something a little more technical. you can easily transfer code for additional weapons over the net and hook it into the game. use some default graphics/sounds, and the transfer sizes will be tiny. if you write a special procedure that seeks unconditional epilogues for functions, the rest of the code to handle this is nearly trivial.

Personally, I think that's overly technical for a rather amateur looking solution.

I think the best way is to not offer extra weapons for download. People seem to think of weapons as something you can download and add to a game, because they can see that there are more weapons in one version than another and because they can with other things they pick from a menu in the same way, but the fact is that making a game that modular is much, much harder than just making a game is. And what will you get for that extra effort? A split online community and a forum full of people whining about how they've bought "half a game". Hardly seems worth it to me.

I could think of a free, mandatory patch that contains new weapons.

Well, then you have a forum full of 360 Core owners whinging that they can't play online and thus have bought "half a game".

Well, then you have a forum full of 360 Core owners whinging that they can't play online and thus have bought "half a game".
Doesn't the XBox automatically connect & update anyway?

but the fact is that making a game that modular is much, much harder than just making a game is.
it seems to me that you have a rather skewed idea of how to put multiple weapons into the game. you want it to be as modular as possible from the start, otherwise, adding/removing weapons in development will become a hassle. if you are as crazy as i am, and portability is of no concern, you would develop an abstract class that will contain a pure virtual function for single step of simulation for a weapon. new weapons would be added by creating child classes that inherit everything from abstract weapon class and override the virtual step function. weapons downloaded from opponents would be inserted by creating objects of original abstract class (cannot be done with new, due to pure virtuals, but can still be malloced using sizeof) and manually setting the pointer for the step function. it's a bit tricky, and breaks iso c++, but it can be done. if you are not quite as nuts, or if you want to stick to iso for portability, you will ignore inheritance, and will use straight function pointers. something along these lines will work:
class weapon
public:
void (*step)(void);
float posx,posy;
float velocityx,velocityy;
};
you'd want more parameters, of course, and you'll probably need some extra arguments for step.

WOW PSP version is not 800MB. It's around 185MB (http://forum.team17.co.uk/showthread.php?p=554472#post554472) . Of course, it doesn't change the fact that it was still too big to fit into 50MB.

I think you'll find it's a lot bigger with all the audio included*. The comparative data for the themes is much, much bigger on the XBLA version due to the high-def bitmaps, which are huge and due to the subject matter, don't compress very well at all.

*On XBLA, only 1 audio track (and sudden death audio) was squeezed in, the other stuff will be downloadable.

how long after the release of Worms on XBLA will downloadable content be available?

Doesn't the XBox automatically connect & update anyway?
Yes, but if you do that as a way of bypassing the 50MB limit, the game won't fit on a memory card any more, and then Core owners can't play it any more, and I can't believe Microsoft would ever let you get away with a stunt like that.

it seems to me that you have a rather skewed idea of how to put multiple weapons into the game. you want it to be as modular as possible from the start, otherwise, adding/removing weapons in development will become a hassle.
I think in a game like this one there's very little chance you'll be doing that, though, isn't there? I mean, it's the same weapon set as WOW and more-or-less the same one as in Worms 1. I assume Team17's designers have got this down by now.

I know there's a lot to be said for this wholly modular, portable, expandable code, but I'm really not convinced it's practical in real life. I've never really tried it, but I feel sure you can make a game where it's easy to add weapons to new versions or during development a lot more easily than you can make one where it's easy to patch them in, especially if it also has to be secure.

"...weapons downloaded from..."

Whoa, there. You've not considered the security implications of this, have you?

it seems to me that you have a rather skewed idea of how to put multiple weapons into the game. you want it to be as modular as possible from the start, otherwise, adding/removing weapons in development will become a hassle.

Adding/removing weapons in development? Have you ever made a commercial game? We have things called contracts, schedules and milestones. Design is the thing that happens BEFORE engineering, not during.

Regardless of weapons, quakerworm still has a point about well designed code. Of course, how many games actually have well designed code? lol. :rolleyes:

But just as what weapons and features will go into the final product should be decided during design stages, so to should the choices to develop well designed, efficeint, modular code.

Personally I think that is something that is lacking in most projects, whether that is commercial or open source, in business or entertainment software. The design phase is often full of interface, functionality, etc... yet developers don't seem to frequently plan their actual code.

Of course, quakerworm and I could put our code where our mouth is... maybe we should? :D

I don't think it's possible for a team of people to make a programme as complex as a game together without planning it in detail.

I can't imagine they sit down and say "right, lads, we did good code last week, so let's make some rubbish code today. You can go and code a long string of elseifs where a switch would do fine, and Dave and I will produce some network code that can be hacked into using only Yahoo Messenger. Then we'll all meet back here and get to work on some buggy collision detection".

I think trying to stick to what you feel code ought to look like instead of what just works is going to cause problems inthe long run. I tried to work with someone who codes to an ideal before and eventually I had to kill him.

I don't think it's possible for a team of people to make a programme as complex as a game together without planning it in detail.

I can't imagine they sit down and say "right, lads, we did good code last week, so let's make some rubbish code today. You can go and code a long string of elseifs where a switch would do fine, and Dave and I will produce some network code that can be hacked into using only Yahoo Messenger. Then we'll all meet back here and get to work on some buggy collision detection".

I think trying to stick to what you feel code ought to look like instead of what just works is going to cause problems inthe long run. I tried to work with someone who codes to an ideal before and eventually I had to kill him.

You're missing the point entirely. It's not about deciding "what code will look like", it's about making important decisions on how the game systems should be designed and how they should interact. Sure this does happen, I'm suggesting it's not as detailed and well defined as it could be since not as much time is devoted to this. Sometimes these processes actually happen during development, which you obviously wouldn't do for the design and outline of the game itself.

This whole "modular weapons system" idea is a good example. You decide these things ahead of time, and then they aren't going to delay and cause problems during actual development. Perhaps it's not that developer don't make these decisions, it's that they don't think them through.

Sitting down and deciding how each component of the game should be approached from a development standpoint. Developing modular, portable code isn't bad just because you don't intend to expand the game "at this point".

Developing modular, portable code isn't bad just because you don't intend to expand the game "at this point".

Just because something isn't bad is no reason to waste time doing it. Well laid out and well documented code can be modified and expanded upon without too much effort -- as long as it's clear what every part of the code is and how it works, and how it interacts with the rest of the programme, there'll be no (insurmountable) problems adding to it at a later date, should you need to. Code that can be modified and expanded upon dynamically by downloadable DLLs and modules is a much harder job and it needs loads of extra testing, security, error handling, and the like to get it to a releasable state, and it adds functionality that isn't really useful.

I mean, it depends what you mean by "modular" -- some might consider any code that's clearly divided into sections that do certain things to be fairly modular -- but what quakerworm was describing seems to me to involve a lot of work for no real gain.

Also "irregardless" isn't a word, and you only need one space after a full stop.

Just because something isn't bad is no reason to waste time doing it. Well laid out and well documented code can be modified and expanded upon without too much effort -- as long as it's clear what every part of the code is and how it works, and how it interacts with the rest of the programme, there'll be no (insurmountable) problems adding to it at a later date, should you need to. Code that can be modified and expanded upon dynamically by downloadable DLLs and modules is a much harder job and it needs loads of extra testing, security, error handling, and the like to get it to a releasable state, and it adds functionality that isn't really useful.

I mean, it depends what you mean by "modular" -- some might consider any code that's clearly divided into sections that do certain things to be fairly modular -- but what quakerworm was describing seems to me to involve a lot of work for no real gain.

Also "irregardless" isn't a word, and you only need one space after a full stop.

It also doesn't waste time. Programmers will always argue about coding practice, that's something that isn't likely to change, just like me using two spaces after a period.

Didn't you say you haven't actually written modular code? I certainly didn't used to, but I left that behind with BASIC. You seem to want to belittle me rather then actually carry on a reasonable discussion, as is evident by your last sentence.

Modular code can greatly improve your code base while making it easier to maintain and debug.

A well designed modular weapons system, for example, can have a wealth of benefits. The core system itself (that loads and utilizes the weapon modules) can be more streamlined and concise. Modifying a weapon can be easier, and overall the code and structure will be more logical.

It's only going to waste time if you don't plan ahead and actually think about what you're coding and why; which od course would be bad.

*Haoshiro goes back to coding...

Well, as I say, it depends what you mean by "modular".

I've written code where you can swap out whole chunks to do things another way, and to me that's pretty modular, and I think that's a fairly good way of working as long as you're careful you don't get distracted making things modular and clever if it's at the cost of writing code that actually does useful things, but I've never bothered writing code that would let me expand it by sending out a new DLL and have the software find and use it, because I've never written anything I think would benefit by that. And I don't see that Worms would benefit by it either.

I'm not trying to belittle you. I'm not even 100% sure we're disagreeing.

Edit: Apart from on the spaces after full stops thing. That's just wrong. Modern fonts are designed to remove the need for a second space. Putting one in ruins all that hard work.

Edit: Apart from on the spaces after full stops thing. That's just wrong. Modern fonts are designed to remove the need for a second space. Putting one in ruins all that hard work.

I haven't personally noticed "modern fonts" alloting more space after a full stop then they do between words. I find a clearer distinction between sentences can improve readability.

HTML doesn't even display multiple space in a row unless forced to, though, so I'm not even sure how you noticed as only a single space is even displayed in the forums.

Edit: Out of curiousity, what do you code and what language(s) do you use?

Didn't you know? I'm a leet hacksaw.

(No, it shows up in the edit box when you quote people.)

"...weapons downloaded from..."

Whoa, there. You've not considered the security implications of this, have you?
public key encryption.
Adding/removing weapons in development? Have you ever made a commercial game? We have things called contracts, schedules and milestones. Design is the thing that happens BEFORE engineering, not during.
in the context of number of leftover components in various worms games for weapons/features not included in final product, this comment isn't particularly credible.
I think in a game like this one there's very little chance you'll be doing that, though, isn't there? I mean, it's the same weapon set as WOW and more-or-less the same one as in Worms 1. I assume Team17's designers have got this down by now.
true. if they didn't plan anything new at all. but in that case, you don't need to talk about downloadable weapons in the first place. everything is fixed. on the other hand, if you are thinking about expanding the game later, you are probably going to begin work with a less than finalized weapon set.
I know there's a lot to be said for this wholly modular, portable, expandable code, but I'm really not convinced it's practical in real life. I've never really tried it, but I feel sure you can make a game where it's easy to add weapons to new versions or during development a lot more easily than you can make one where it's easy to patch them in, especially if it also has to be secure.
patching in is easier and more secure, but you still want it to be modular to make it easy to patch the game. if you don't want dynamically loaded weapons at all, you still want to have a base class that is extended for various weapons. it's just easier to code. the main difference is how the extensions will work. they can be run-time, using dynamically loaded code, or compile time, using class inheritance.

I'd like to remind anyone reading this thread that we have no idea how much this is going to cost. It's most likely this will cost between 800-1600 points ($10 - $20 US respectively). That's a lot cheaper then retail prices of $40-60.


OXM confirmed its 800 points.

public key encryption

Like many things in life, dropping a mot clef or two neither address nor solves the issue.

in the context of number of leftover components in various worms games for weapons/features not included in final product, this comment isn't particularly credible.

As far as removing components goes, I'll agree. I'm not sure that people will pay many MS points for that feature though.;)

I'd assume things are a bit tighter when you're working to a 50MB limit? Can't really afford to have a load of unused sounds and hi-def icons and redundant code cluttering up the place...

Like many things in life, dropping a mot clef or two neither address nor solves the issue.
bah, i knew i'd actually have to explain this one.
1) grab an off the shelf public key encryption algorithm. 4096bit rsa will do. unless you lose your private key, it is unbreakable.
2) encode all executable code that will be downloaded with purchased weapons using your private key.
3) every person who bought a new weapon keeps a copy of the weapon code encrypted with the private key, but also, decodes it with the public key to get the binaries that can be used by the game.
4) when a client connects that does not have the particular weapon, encrypted copy of the binaries is sent.

i hold that: anyone who needs to acquire binaries from an opponent will be able to, because the public key will be available on the server; nobody but t17 will be able to produce code packets, because it cannot be done without the private key; in the unfortunate event that the private key leaks, public key provided by the server can be changed immediately, with the only consequence being that people will need to re-download their addons.

usually, people who deal with internet security can derive all that from, "public key encryption".

@Luther, touche, but it seems natural to assume that if some features are being dropped, the design is not finalized, and new ones might be added to take the place of the dropped ones.
I'd assume things are a bit tighter when you're working to a 50MB limit? Can't really afford to have a load of unused sounds and hi-def icons and redundant code cluttering up the place...
you'd only need one weapon icon and one weapon sprite for this. sounds can be recycled from other weapons. if things are really tight, then even the graphics could be recycled. the confusion would be mild, and i'm sure would only make more people buy the weapons they are missing.

Well, then you have a forum full of 360 Core owners whinging that they can't play online and thus have bought "half a game".

Boohoo, maybe they shouldn't have bought "half a console". :D

I will not skimp on buying all the extras.I want it all.I just hope it will not cause issues when you play with others who don't have the extras.

it won't. they already said that things your opponents don't have will be replaced by defaults. so if you are using some weird speech bank that you purchased, and somebody else doesn't have it, they will hear the classic worms speech bank.

it won't. they already said that things your opponents don't have will be replaced by defaults. so if you are using some weird speech bank that you purchased, and somebody else doesn't have it, they will hear the classic worms speech bank.
I wonder how that'll work with landscape themes. The objects have different shapes on different landscape themes.
For example, it caused a desync if you chose the 'Tools' landscape theme as the host and had players that didn't have it with a previous beta version.

i thought about that. the game might send through a bitmap of the terrain. if you only send through a monochrome image (1 = terrain, 0 = empty) and do a run length encoding on it, it shouldn't take up much space. alternatively, you can just send the full 24bit bitmap, and hope that nobody managed to connect their xbox through dial-up.

i thought about that. the game might send through a bitmap of the terrain. if you only send through a monochrome image (1 = terrain, 0 = empty) and do a run length encoding on it, it shouldn't take up much space. alternatively, you can just send the full 24bit bitmap, and hope that nobody managed to connect their xbox through dial-up.

Or, just use one of the other themes instead. (On both consoles, obviously.)

i thought about that. the game might send through a bitmap of the terrain. if you only send through a monochrome image (1 = terrain, 0 = empty) and do a run length encoding on it, it shouldn't take up much space. alternatively, you can just send the full 24bit bitmap, and hope that nobody managed to connect their xbox through dial-up.

That's exactly what i was thinking, it should compress amazingly well and is pretty much what I used to do in a few of my (personal) games.

Or, just use one of the other themes instead. (On both consoles, obviously.)
yeah, but if you purchased a theme, you want to play on it. and while you, personally, might understand technical limitations of the synchronization on playing against people who have not got that theme, most people will not. they are going to assume that they should be able to play against anyone with a newly purchased theme, and if the game doesn't let them, going to view it as a bug. (remember, a 'bug' is anything that consumer calls a bug, even if it is an intentional feature.)

Have any of you played Uno? I bought the two extra card decks that are available, but my buddy didn't. When I pick one of those decks, the game loads the deck for him to use for that round.

I don't think a Uno deck is around 20mb of data (or 7-10mb compressed)

I don't think a Uno deck is around 20mb of data (or 7-10mb compressed)


So much for that suggestion.:o

How about people stop whining, download the demo, try out the game, and then whine if need be?

I was a bit disappointed at first look when I saw merely 3 themes and the handful of weapons, but a bit of thought later I came to the following conclusion:

Random terrain generator = fun enough until some inevitable free themes are released for downloads.

Current weapons = fun and strategy.

I always enjoyed playing WWP with my friends with things like napalm strike, HHG, battleaxe, baseball bat etc. restricted. People would be surprised about how fun and tactical it is to play with just bazooka and grenades (and dynamite). I am going to love this game - because sitting on my sofa, with a joypad - in an ergonomic position, in front of my HD tv will be enough reason for me to play this game in stead of WWP on my desktop computer.

Please people - you can not expect a full retail game for 800 Micro$oft Points. Trust me - the Xbox Live feature will make this thing worth it all! It is such a social game, and I always missed voice communication in WWP!

I am looking forward to this no matter what, even though I liked the "Homerun" sound, I still think that a Fire Punch will get the job done!

i kinda like that they've limited weapons. the later in the series because such that you could use all the non skill weapons, air strikes, super sheep, homing missiles, donkey etc. and there wouldn't be much in the way of worms left so the skill element in judging a nade, banana, cluster, rocket etc. kinda left the game.
I'm a little disapointed that the HHG has gone but i think only because of the 'hallelulah-boom' which never got old - the anticipation when you got it just right and the enemy worm went orbital also quite amusing lol.

I'm a little disapointed that the HHG has gone but i think only because of the 'hallelulah-boom' which never got old - the anticipation when you got it just right and the enemy worm went orbital also quite amusing lol.

I fully agree with the above statement.

-- Paid for by Holy Hand Grenade Supporters Alliance