Worms 4: Mayhem

Worms 4: Mayhem is the third installment of the 3D Worms series of games, developed by Team17. It was released in August 5, 2005 for PC, and October 4, 2005 for the PlayStation 2. It is also available for the Xbox. Its features include more detailed customization for the Worms (new additions are Worm outfits and Team Weapons, which you can customize) and a Story Mode consisting of missions where you must travel to different times, such as the Middle Ages.

Story
Worms 4: Mayhem is the first game to have its own story-line.

Tutorials
Starting in the first Tutorial, your chosen Worm team arrives at a college, Worminkle University, where grown-up Worms train to become powerful soldiers and soon join the military. At the university, Professor Worminkle (who resembles Albert Einstein and Doc Brown) greets you and says he'll let you join his university if you get rid of drunken enemy Worms from a rival school, who broke into the university's grounds. This counts as your basic weapons training.

The next Tutorial seems to take place some time afterwards with a football game in which your college's team win. But the opposing team seem to dislike this, and refuse to leave. The Professor tells you to deal with them. This is your first live-fire battle, it also counts as a small bit of utility training. Professor Worminkle also lets you know about the Ninja Rope's new feature, which allows you to move around landscape objects, such as Crates, Oil Drums, Land Mines, and even Dynamite.

In the next and final Tutorial, the Professor is proud enough to take you to Mike's Secret Laboratory, where you meet Mike, the Professor's "brightest pupil", and the designer of the lab. Then Professor Worminkle and Mike stand in front of an "enormous protective screen", but somehow they lose control of the lab and the malicious Cyberworms (which Mike created) in the containment pods escape and attack your team, although Mike did not intend to program the Cyberworms to attack your team. During the battle you can learn a little more about advanced weapons (a Sentry Gun is available too, in a Weapon Crate). After your team defeats the Cyberworms, Mike is upset about his lab being ruined from the battle which took place, while Professor Worminkle states that it was just a test and he and Mike were actually under complete control of the lab (although it appears that he was lying). The Professor congratulates you and tells you that you're ready for the real missions.

Story Mode
Worms 4: Mayhem has an actual Story Mode with more details, unlike the Campaign Missions of previous Worms games. Instead of just a few minor quests, detailed background and narrated introductory cut-scenes show the correct information about the background of the mission. After the Tutorials are complete, Story Mode begins. There are five Themes in Story Mode (and in the overall game too), the first is Construction (Present Day), second is Camelot (Middle Ages), third is Wild West, fourth is Arabian, and fifth is Prehistoric (Stone Age). There are five chapters, and each chapter has five missions, with the final mission of the chapter being the "boss fight". The final mission of each chapter can only be unlocked by completing the other four missions first, which can be completed in any order.

In the cut-scene before the player gets to play the missions, the Professor is seen reading a letter in his office. The Professor quickly hides the letter and greets the player's team once again. Then he explains some random mission objectives to the player's team, and states that they must not fail, and that failure would shatter his reputation. Then he dismisses the class, and now the player can play the missions. In the first chapter of Story Mode (which takes place in the Construction Theme), the player usually has to destroy enemy buildings or their property. After the final mission of the first chapter, Professor Worminkle is revealed to own a Time Machine, which he used to travel back in time with the player's team (in order to run away from the enemy agents) to the Middle Ages (Camelot Theme), where the second chapter begins.

As they travel back in time to the Middle Ages, the Time Machine becomes damaged and some parts are missing. Four wizards retrieve the missing Time Machine parts, and the player must defeat those four wizards and get those parts back. In some missions the player must also battle knights. In the final mission of the second chapter, the Time Machine is almost fixed, but a large group of knights attack the player. So the player's mission is to protect the Professor while he fixes his Time Machine, and hold off the enemy until the Round Time expires, which is when the Professor fixes his Time Machine. The enemy Worms will spawn infinitely, no matter how many times they are killed, and can only be defeated once the Round Time expires. After fixing the Time Machine, the Professor and the team travel to the Wild West. But after their travels (which ended in a crash landing, but strangely leaving the Time Machine unharmed), the Time Machine runs out of fuel, which is pure gold. Then the third chapter begins, which takes place in the Wild West Theme.

Throughout the chapter, the player collects gold nuggets, which is used as the Time Machine's fuel and is mandatory to continuing their adventure. The primary antagonist of this chapter is the infamous cowboy outlaw Boggy the Kid. In one of the missions for this chapter, the player faces a mini-boss, Tin Can Wally, another criminal cowboy. In the final mission of the chapter, the player battles Boggy the Kid's gang, but for some reason not Boggy the Kid himself. The Professor and the player gets all the gold they need and escape with the Time Machine. Boggy the Kid and another cowboy chases them, but they both fall off a cliff while doing so, and presumably die.

Now begins the fourth chapter, where the Professor and the player arrive at ancient Arabia. A thief named Ali Baboon steals the Queen of Sheba's jewels, and the player's task is to retrieve the jewels for the Time Machine (the jewels are needed for the Time Machine's "Space Time Navigation Balance Device") and stop Ali Baboon. Throughout the chapter the player fights Ali Baboon's goons, and in one mission, a few pirate ships that are attacking innocent villagers. In the final mission of that chapter, you reach Ali Baboon, but instead of battling him you must complete his "Thief Training Course" in order to capture him. Once the mission is complete, the Queen of Sheba believes that Professor Worminkle is the one who captured Ali Baboon and returned the jewels. The Queen thanks him and lets him have some of her jewels.

Now the Professor is trying to fix his Time Machine completely, saying it won't take long. However, a small device leaves a letter on the floor (which is definitely the letter that the Professor reads in the very first cut-scene of Story Mode). The letter writes:


 * "Dear Professor Worminkle,


 * It is with regret that we have to cease your current research funding grant. We are replacing your university with our new research laboratory.


 * Thank you for all the research you have done but it is no longer needed.


 * Yours Sincerely,


 * The Government"

Then the Professor quickly snatches the letter, saying "Oops how did that get there? Umm machine's fixed lets get home.", and travels very far back in time, back to the Stone Age (Prehistoric Theme). Then comes the sudden plot twist - the Professor reveals that he was using the player to "save himself" (he was going to be fired prior to the team's arrival), and betrays the player and leaves them stranded in the Stone Age. However, while the Professor was heading for home, a very small dinosaur somehow got into the Time Machine and bit the Professor's tail. The Professor attacked the dinosaur, and while he was distracted, his Time Machine crashed into some sort of volcano/mountain. The Professor survived, but was frustrated, and he was determined to repair his Time Machine before the player's team caught up to him. Throughout the chapter, the player simply battles Caveworms and Dinoworms. In the penultimate mission of the chapter, one of the Worms on the player's team becomes lost and is stranded on a small island with a volcano on it. So the player must rescue the lost teammate and defeat some more Dinoworms once again.

In the final mission of the game, the player's team finally catches up to Professor Worminkle, who is on a nearby island, where the mountain/volcano that the Time Machine crashed into is on. The Time Machine is almost fixed, and the player must reach the Professor before he fixes it and leaves. The player must fight some more Dinoworms, and after doing so, they build a bridge that consists of Girders to reach the island that the Professor is on. As they reach the Professor, the Professor believes that his team came to rescue him and thanks them, but because of the way he betrayed them, the team just steals his Time Machine behind his back and leaves without him. The Professor is stranded in the Stone Age forever and panics and loses his mind, while the player's team heads home, back to the present.

Weapons



 * Bazooka
 * Homing Missile
 * Shotgun
 * Poison Arrow
 * Grenade
 * Cluster Bomb
 * Gas Canister
 * Banana Bomb
 * Fire Punch
 * Prod
 * Baseball Bat
 * Air Strike
 * Landmine
 * Dynamite
 * Sheep
 * Old Woman
 * Super Sheep
 * Tail Nail
 * Flood
 * Team Weapon
 * Starburst
 * Sniper Rifle
 * Holy Hand Grenade
 * Inflatable Scouser
 * Fatkins Strike
 * Alien Abduction
 * Bovine Blitz
 * Concrete Donkey

Utilities

 * Parachute
 * Ninja Rope
 * Jet Pack
 * Girder
 * Worm Select
 * Icarus Potion
 * Bubble Trouble

Trivia

 * For PC, this game is rated 3+ by PEGI, but for the PlayStation 2, it is rated T for Teens by the ESRB. The reason for this drastic change in age rating is unknown.