Worms Revolution Turn-Based Chaos with Exploding Sheep

The classic formula is here: take turns, aim, fire, watch the terrain crumble. What is new is dynamic water. For the first time in the series, water flows through the map instead of sitting at the bottom, so you can flood a crater, wash an enemy off a ledge or drain a pool with the Plug Hole utility. Physics objects scattered around the map explode too, releasing fire, poison or more water. And your team is no longer eight identical worms: pick from Soldier, Scout, Scientist and Heavy, each with its own strengths, and take any mix of them into a match.

Before the shelling starts, there is a wardrobe. Hats, glasses, moustaches, gravestones, victory dances, soundbanks and, for the first time, trinkets: you can dress a whole team of sixteen worms and give each one a voice. It changes nothing about the tactics and everything about the moment when a worm in a top hat and a fake moustache gets launched across a farmyard by its own grenade. Customisation extends to the battlefields themselves, because the game includes a level editor for building new places to destroy.

Solo play comes in two flavours: 32 campaign missions and 20 puzzle missions that exercise the brain as well as the bazooka arm. The campaign is narrated by Don Keystone, a wildlife documentary maker voiced by Matt Berry, from a script by comedy writer Dean Wilkinson, so even losing has a decent soundtrack of dry commentary. The puzzles and the multiplayer are where the game is at its friendliest.

This is a party game in the oldest sense: one screen, up to four players, turns passing the controller around, and rules you can explain before the first sheep is launched. Rounds are short, the slapstick physics write the jokes for you, and no match ends the way anyone planned. A grenade bounces the wrong way, a barrel explodes at the worst moment, and the room erupts. You can play it mean or play it silly; the game rewards both. Three modes, Deathmatch, Forts and Classic, give the evening some variety without a learning curve.

Local co-op and local multiplayer sit alongside online play, so the same game works for a team night on the sofa and a quick match with someone far away. Team up against the AI in the campaign, then turn on each other in Deathmatch. The class system gives co-op something to argue about: someone takes the Heavy for raw damage, someone else the Scout to sneak a mine into the enemy hideout and leg it before it goes off. Matches are short enough that a losing streak never lasts long, and one more round is always tempting.