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The Lowdown
Pros: Lots of nostalgia, level design is random
Cons: Writing down passwords, feels very slow, no multiplayer support
 Purchase
at Play-Asia
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When you think back to classic NES titles Bomberman is likely to be
one of the games you remember. Back in 1985, it was all the rage. Almost
20 years later Bomberman is still around, but isn't quite the same.
After playing all the other renditions of the series and going back to
play the original game makes the game feel even more dated than it is.
When Bomberman came out it was designed as a single player game. You
were an astronaut looking sprite who had the power to lay down giant
bombs to clear a level of opponents. Impeding your path was a seemingly
endless amount of blocks, one of which hid a door to the next level.
While the premise of the game was quite simple playing it was a little
bit of a challenge. First of all the levels were randomly designed. This
meant that Bomberman was always a challenge because you couldn't just
remember where the level exits were. You always had to find them. The
game even reset the level if you happened to die during it. Another
challenge of Bomberman was the movement speed of your character. He was
slow, we're talking very slow, slower than an Atari processor. Moving
him around to dodge enemies was a challenge, since in later levels they
moved three or four times faster than you could react. Another challenge
was placing the bombs. On screen enemies were constantly moving around
and you couldn't move your bomb once it was dropped. Basically you would
place your bomb down and hope an enemy would run into it or you would
have to trap it between bricks. Later on some enemies could walk through
the bricks .So defeating those enemies would make any player feel like
they accomplished something.
When Bomberman first had its debut it was clearly a puzzle game.
Later versions of Bomberman were fast paced games that played more like
simple arcade games compared to the original Bomberman. Future versions
also featured multiplayer support, normally for four players. The trend
in Bomberman had clearly shifted to being a multiplayer game. Blowing up
your buddies was one of the best parts about Bomberman for most
fans of the series. However, you won't find any of that here. It would
have been nice to see a multiplayer feature added to the game, although
Nintendo has been adamant about re-releasing original copies of the
game. Even if Nintendo chose not to include multiplayer support they
should have fixed up the "continue" system. Bomberman, like many
Nintendo games, relied on password saves rather than a battery backup.
Password systems were phased out since it was annoying to write down a
random series of letters and numbers. Sadly, instead of altering the
game slightly and adding a battery Bomberman was released with its
initial password system intact. The passwords for Bomberman are 20
letters long, which wouldn't be too bad if you were sitting at home and
playing on your couch. You could probably find something to write a
password down with next to you, but playing on your Game Boy Advance is
a different story. When you're playing your GBA you're probably not on
your couch. You may be waiting in line, on a train, or wherever, but
you're most likely out and about. So imagine trying to find something to
write your 20 letter password on while you're holding your GBA in your
hand. If you don't take down your password its back to level 1, without
all of your power ups. Luckily the original game was designed to
remember the last password you got. So you can continue, until you turn
off your Game Boy. Still, the whole password system is asinine and
unfeasible for portable gaming.
Bomberman isn't and never will win any awards for best graphics or
sound. After all, this is a first generation Nintendo game. All of the
sprites look the same as the NES version, so if you're looking for
nostalgia you got it. You can't deny that Bomberman's graphics are
bland, even in the NES days they were bland. These graphics could have
easily been done on an older Atari. Bomberman doesn't have a lot of
music variety, which means you'll hear the same instage music over and
over again. You can mute your speaker, but then you won't hear the
satisfying blast of the bomb.
While Bomberman did have entertainment value, 20 years ago it just
doesn't hold up today. Some classics are always fun, Bomberman isn't.
Simply stated, it's not worth shelling out another $20 or $30 for a Game
Boy Advance version. Especially when there is a cell phone version of
Bomberman going around that you can get for a measly $5.
Import Friendly?
The menus are all in English, even the password system uses Roman
letters (i.e. English alphabet).
US Bound?
Quite possible, if the Famicom Mini series sparks enough popularity
you can bet on seeing US GBA carts of most of the same games released in
Japan.
Overall
Even if you love Bomberman games, do you really want to spend another
$20-$30 so you can play it on your GBA? We didn't think so.
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