Twisted Metal has "so much depth", leans on strategy and teamwork

The variation and balancing Eat Sleep Play has infused Twisted Metal with is what makes it a strategic fighter, not a balls-out destruction game, creator David Jaffe has said.

"A lot of people look at Twisted Metal, and they really just look at the surface. They see the chaos and the destruction, and that's what we've always called the shallow end of the pool," Jaffe told Giantbomb at PAX.

"We wanna get people in with the chaos, but there really is so much depth that we've built in."

Jaffe gave the example of the character Shadow, who has a weapon which becomes more powerful the greater the distance it is fired from, and Axle, who can jump much higher than usual to take shortcuts or avoid choke points. Skilled players will adapt a different play style and strategies based on unique abilities like that.

"This game has so many differentiators amongst the vehicles. When we say it's a fighting game, I really want players to find their favourites and learn to master all of them," Jaffe added.

In addition to general differentiators, each character has special abilities unique to individual multiplayer modes. The Eat Sleep Play leader hailed Nuke as his favourite multiplayer mode because it relies on strategy and team work. In this mode, players must capture the opposing team's faction leader and put him in a woodchopper - but different vehicles take a different amount of time to achieve this, meaning a co-ordinated group of players can take advantage of their knowledge of varying character strategies.

Twisted Metal is a PlayStation 3 exclusive, and was recently delayed to February 14, 2012. It sports online and offline co-op and competitive multiplayer.