Worms Armageddon

Worms Armageddon was the third game in the Worm series, the first being just 'Worms' and the second being 'Worms 2'. Worms was originally created on the Amiga in 1995 and ported to the PC and various game consoles, including the PlayStation, Saturn, and Jaguar. It was also released for the Super Nintendo but only in Europe. By the time that Worms Armageddon came along in 1999, the primary platform was the PC (DOS) but it was also ported to the Sega Dreamcast, PlayStation, Nintendo 64 and Game Boy Color.

While Worms almost didn't even get published, Worms Armageddon frequently appears on various 'best games of all time' lists. It's not that the game drastically changed, it's just that the game was so different at the time that publishers didn't know what do do with it. Wikipedia describes Worms as '2D artillery turn-based tactics video game'. If you've never seen Worms and don't know what that amounts to, think of the original 'Gorillas' game the was included with MS-DOS 5 but far more advanced. Basically, each player controls a team of worms. During each turn, the player has a limited amount of time to move one of their worms in a 2D landscape and fire a weapon or use an item. Weapons range from somewhat realistic (e.g. bazooka) to outlandish (e.g. exploding sheep). The last person with worms still standing wins. Weapons and game options are numerous. There are a number of preset maps and the game also includes a random terrain generator and editor.

I mostly played the Dreamcast version and it is still one of my favorite games. The game is not substantially different on different platforms but the PC version has more options. While most of the console versions are perfectly acceptable, there's really no reason not to buy the PC version as it, along with most of the other games in the series, are available DRM free at http://www.gog.com or it is also available on Steam if you prefer.