Twisted Metal 4 is a 1999 vehicular combat game developed and published by 989 Studios and released exclusively in North America for the PlayStation. It is the fourth game in the Twisted Metal series and the second and last developed by 989 Studios.
Players control armed vehicles in enclosed arenas, collecting weapons and using attacks to destroy opposing vehicles. Tournament mode can be played alone or cooperatively by two players, and the Deathmatch mode supports up to four. The game also introduced Create-a-Car, allowing the player to build and save a custom vehicle. The story follows Sweet Tooth after he overthrows Calypso and takes control of the Twisted Metal tournament, with Calypso entering the contest as a driver.
989 Studios developed the game in response to criticism of Twisted Metal III, enlarging the arenas, adding more environmental interaction and revising the vehicle handling. The soundtrack features seven bands, including Rob Zombie, who also appears as a playable contestant.
The game was met with a mixed reception from reviewers, who considered it an improvement over its predecessor but still short of the first two games. They praised the level design, vehicle roster, selection of weapons, visuals, and soundtrack, but were divided on the controls, physics, and multiplayer gameplay. The game sold fewer copies than each of the first three entries. The series continued in 2001 with Twisted Metal: Black, but with reinvention of its characters and story rather than continuing the previous games' narrative.
Gameplay
Twisted Metal 4 is a vehicular combat game in which the player selects an armed vehicle and fights other drivers in enclosed arenas until only one remains. The single-player Tournament mode has eight levels, with the player advancing by eliminating all opponents. At the end of each level, the player confronts a boss, usually an enhanced version of past contestants, with Sweet Tooth as the final boss. The player can be accompanied by a second human player or an computer-controlled ally. The latter option allows the player to pool lives. The Deathmatch mode supports one-on-one or multiplayer contests against human or computer-controlled opponents.
Players can select from a starting roster of 13 vehicles with varying attributes, while additional vehicles, including the bosses, can be unlocked using passwords. The Create-a-Car option allows players to customize a vehicle by selecting its body size and style, paint scheme, special weapon, and battle cry. These vehicles can be saved to a memory card. All vehicles carry standard machine guns, while weapon pickups include missiles, napalm that spreads fire on contact, remotely detonated bombs, proximity mines, and multi-warhead "MIRVs". Each vehicle also has its own special attack. Players can also perform "combo attacks" by entering button sequences. Some arenas contain interactive mechanisms and hazards, including a magnet that lifts and drops vehicles and a moving train.
Plot Twisted Metal begins as a traveling carnival led by Calypso, in which contestants fight in vehicles for a mysterious prize said to be a single wish, while those who lose forfeit their souls. Calypso claims the souls of defeated contestants, growing stronger with each one, and holds them in a ring. Sweet Tooth first encounters the carnival as a child and follows it until he eventually becomes a contestant. After proving successful in the competition, he wins and asks Calypso to make him the star of Twisted Metal. His desire for prominence eventually turns to envy, and he and a group of clown henchmen overthrow Calypso, taking control of the tournament and the ring.
Under Sweet Tooth, the competition again promises its winner a wish. Calypso enters as a contestant driving a nuclear missile launcher, seeking to reclaim the tournament and his ring. The playable contestants have separate endings based on their wishes rather than a single conclusion to the story. In Calypso's ending, he demands the ring after winning, but Sweet Tooth's henchman refuses to surrender it. Calypso then fights the henchmen and struggles with Sweet Tooth for the ring, causing the souls held within it to escape and destroying their surroundings. A boy later finds the ring among the ruins and sees Calypso and Sweet Tooth still fighting inside it.
Development and release 989 Studios developed Twisted Metal 4 internally, having taken the series in-house for Twisted Metal III after original developer SingleTrac was sold to GT Interactive. The team did not receive the source code used for the first two games, which remained under SingleTrac's ownership. Jonathan Beard directed development and produced the game with Darrin Fuller and William Todd, while Jim Buck served as lead engineer and Chuck Doud as music director.
Programmer Michael Riccio recalled that the project had a development schedule of one year, with the team beginning to work longer hours and weekends after about six months. Buck said the changes to the arenas and handling addressed repeated criticism of Twisted Metal III, in particular its small stages, limited environmental interaction and tendency for vehicles to overturn. By September 1999, the vehicle physics had been revised to allow more airborne stunts, and cars showed visible damage when struck. Other planned additions included larger interactive arenas, new weapons and vehicles, stages made specifically for deathmatch, easier combination attacks and a larger role for Sweet Tooth.
Pre-release plans for vehicle customization included choices of wheels, body style, engine, weapons, call sign and colors. The soundtrack featured seven bands, including Rob Zombie, who also appeared as a contestant driving the Dragula. Twisted Metal 4 was released for the PlayStation on November 16, 1999. A fifth 989 Studios entry was approved after Twisted Metal 4 shipped, but was canceled in December 1999 when the company shifted away from PlayStation games and sequels ahead of the PlayStation 2. The series returned in 2001 with Twisted Metal: Black, but it broke from the earlier games' continuity and instead introduced reworked characters, new backgrounds, and new storylines.
Reception
Twisted Metal 4 received mixed reviews from critics, with GameRankings recording an average score of 68% from 17 reviews. The game was compared favorably to Twisted Metal III, with reviewers regarding it as a recovery from the previous installment's shortcomings. The reviewers of Game Informer each described the game as a satisfying return to form, with Paul Anderson specifying that the previous game's cumbersome physics and small levels had been rectified. Joe Fielder of GameSpot characterized the improvement over III as comparable in scale to the second game over the original. Damien Thorpe of AllGame and Brian Chin of GameRevolution likewise considered 4 to be substantially stronger than III, though still deemed it short of the second game's quality. Kraig Kujawa of Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine credited 989's adjusted approach with recapturing the original appeal of the series. However, the reviewers of Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM) and GameFan contended that the formula had become stale and that its annual iterations were offering diminishing returns, with Tyrone "Cerberus" Rodriguez of GameFan recommending Vigilante 8 or Rogue Trip: Vacation 2012 as alternatives.
The controls and physics received mixed responses. Anderson, George "Eggo" Ngo and Jason "Fury" Weitzner of GameFan, and Mark Androvich of PSExtreme complimented the tight controls and familiar feel. Fielder, Chin, Game Informers Andy McNamara, and EGMs Dan "Shoe" Hsu and Dean Hager noted that the cars flipped less readily than in III. However, the cars were said to lodge against walls or ledges easily, with Thorpe warning that the glitch requires some levels to be restarted. Marc Nix of IGN was particularly unsatisfied with the sensation of controlling the cars, repeatedly likening them to lightweight toy cars lacking realistic mass or grip. Shaun Conlin of The Electric Playground expressed a similar sentiment, remarking that the cars are not driven so much as "shove[d] about like a toy boat in a sandbox." The reviewer for PlayStation: The Official Magazine described steering as frustrating when navigating ramps or targeting weapons, though found the special moves and attacks easier to execute than in previous entries.
The level design was commended for its increased size, interactivity, and amount of hidden areas compared to the previous game. Nix, Chin, Thorpe, Hsu and Hager praised the improved detail and inventiveness of the levels. Fielder singled out Amazonia 3000 BC and the Oil Rig as highlights for their verticality and variety of places to lay traps. Nix selected the bedroom and city levels as stand-outs, but was disappointed by the carnival level. Chin argued that the levels after the first few felt underdeveloped, elaborating that one stage made accidental falls too common and the maze level made locating enemies difficult. Ngo criticized the level design as uninspired and filled with open spaces that diminished strategic driving.
The vehicle roster and selection of weapons were received positively, though reactions to the Create-a-Car feature were lukewarm. The new contestants, among them Rob Zombie, were welcomed as colorful additions, with Kujawa and the PlayStation: The Official Magazine reviewer regarding as more compelling than those of previous entries, though Thorpe noted that the imbalance of attributes in some characters made them difficult for beginners to use. The new weapons, such as the MIRVs, freeze remote bombs, and proximity mines, were praised for their variety and tactical utility. The Create-a-Car feature, while acknowledged as a novel addition, was widely regarded as too limited in its customization options to sustain interest.
Reactions to the multiplayer modes were divided, with more value being placed on two-player configurations. Cooperative and deathmatch play between two players was called entertaining and replayable. By contrast, the four-player split-screen mode was said to suffer from reduced frame rates, with Kujawa dismissing the mode as "useless" and Nix deriding it as "laughable".
The visuals were met positively. Thorpe considered 4 to be the best-looking entry in the series to date, citing the colorful and detailed environments and singling out the lighting and fog in the Amazonia level. Chin complimented the vehicles for their variety in appearance (singling out Goggle Eyes as a favorite), and Nix and the PlayStation: The Official Magazine reviewer appreciated the vehicles' gradual accumulation of damage. The weapon and explosion effects were also praised. However, Chin, Thorpe, and Conlin cited the amount of pop-up as a graphical weakness, and Kujawa noted that the game suffered slowdown during heavier action. Fielder found the graphics less sharp than those of Vigilante 8: Second Offense.
The licensed heavy metal and hip hop soundtrack was positively received, with Nix liking some of the more bizarre selections. Fielder and Thorpe regarded the soundtrack as fitting, with Fielder singling out the Rob Zombie remixes as the best selections, though he said that the music "doesn't really draw you in", and Chin complained of the songs' implementation causing them to become repetitive. Ngo expressed distaste for the Rob Zombie remixes, which he pointed out were holdovers from the previous game, and Conlin was annoyed by the reappearance of "Dragula", which had garnered a pervasive presence in video game soundtracks.