In 1994 a small group of plucky invertebrates went to war and after 10 years of slow slithering they are all set to finally arrive in Worms 4 Mayhem. But during that long decade, wave after wave of Team 17's spineless soldiers have also appeared in 3D, Blast, Party and about 40 other worm-based wars.
For this tenth anniversary edition the asexual annelids are planning to wiggle the short distance back to their roots, with a return to the open warfare of the classic game. So out goes all the fiddly nonsense of Forts and back come the spacious battlefields and four-player fun of the original antique title.
But to show that the worms haven't regressed all the way to larvae, a brand new toy has been added in the mischievously brutal shape of the Weapons Factory.
For the first time this factory of fatality will allow you to design your own suspect devices: trading power for range, and effect for laughs. And just to show you what you can do, the Codies team themselves seem particularly keen on pushing the poultry pain of the Exploding Chickens or the dirty protest of the Toilet Bombs. Nice.
But if you can't be bothered to add to your armoury yourself, such delights as the Poison Arrow, Sentry Gun, Tail Nail and the cow-raining Bovine Blitz have already been included to allow you to develop new strategies and to advance the cause of the annelid annihilation.
And before you send your infantry into the five themed war-zones and 25 missions, you can even enhance their faces, features and final thoughts to reflect your noble cause and team name.
Worms 4 Mayhem will take its turn to appear on PS2, PC and Xbox in the spring
