Bomberman II

Hudson Soft created many popular games in Japan. They're one of the big game developers that made use of popular media to make their games very popular in Japanese culture. They've made games for pretty much every console and continue to create and publish games today... sort of. Konami bought them and pretty much squashed most of their 3DS titles. I've enjoyed Hudson games, and I wouldn't mind playing more in the future.. if it be on the 3DS or Wii U.

My first introduction to Bomberman was Super Bomberman for the SNES in the early 90's. It was the first multi-player game that I played with up to four people (it was the first 4 player game on that console too). And while I believe that I was skeptical at first because the game looked simple, I soon found that it was so freaking awesome. Bomberman is one of the most popular multi-player series of all time.

Multi-player games up until that point were either platformers or fighting games, and my friends and I were amazed at the simplistic enjoyment we found from blowing each other to smithereens with bombs. I don't even remember actually playing the real game, I think we spent hours and hours just on the battle-mode.

Bomberman is one of the most prolific game franchises with over seventy titles and over 10 million games sold. The game follows a simple formula: a random grid is created for every level, and you have to beat the timer, blow up the enemies and find an exit... without blowing yourself up. Power-ups allow for more bombs, bigger blasts, timers, and other things to allow ultimate destruction.

I decided to play Bomberman 2 for a few reasons. I've played the original game before and  the game itself is really dated. Games made back in 1984 just aren't as friendly to the player in my opinion. Bomberman 2 was made in 1991 and features better graphics, sound, and game play. Bomberman 2 is a better game is what I'm trying to say. It supports three player battle-mode with the NES Satellite! Besides sports games, there weren't many others that allowed for more than two players at once.

Advertising

I wasn't able to find anything for Bomberman 2. Not sure why. I did find a funny Sega Saturn Bomberman commercial though. Enjoy.

The Art

The box art is different for each region's release. The North America version suffers from logo overload. It blocks the artwork and seems strange to have a large yellow bar covering up most of the front. The European art looks the best in my opinion, but is also covered with logos, text, and other licensing information. The Japanese box art makes the game look like a fighting brawler type game. Seriously. Where are the bombs?

North America version

European version

I'm not sure why they changed the name to Dynablaster for the European release. I'm not sure if they got the original Bomberman in Europe... so a sequel might be strange? Marketing people are weird.

Japanese version. 

The Graphics: 

Bomberman 2's graphics establish the cute feel for the series. The first game was kinda clunky and looks like a game made in 1984. The sprite design and levels are pretty simple, the cut-scenes are pretty standard for an NES game. I like the graphical changes in color and textures between areas.

The Music:

The sound is unique to the Bomberman series. Jun Chikuma composed the music for Bomberman and many other Hudson games. According to wikipedia: "Since 1992, she has studied ney composition and Tunisian music under professors Slah Manaa, Ali Sriti and Zakia Hannashi at l'Institut Superieur de la Musique, and studied req under Haytham Farghaly of the same institute. She curates Arab-music.com with Yoshiko Matsuda, and has also made music for TV, CM, and movies."

The simple melodies for each stage, items, and game overs are staples of the series. The style for some of the songs almost evokes similarities modern chip music... making it almost more musically oriented rather than just ordinary game music found on many NES games. I'm probably over analyzing it. He's a ska-ish, down tempo version of the main theme:

Looking over some of the games I've played it seems that there were many female composers working in the video game industry early on. That's great, and shows that even in a typically male dominated video game industry, female composers have repeatedly created some of the best soundtracks to games.

The Results: 

Framed for a robbery he didn't commit, Bomberman is thrown in prison. Using his explosive abilities, he's busting out of jail to right the wrongs that have been committed.

One of the first things I noticed is that I like that there's always a randomly generated room. For a puzzle type game and on the NES especially, it allows for some measure of forgiveness when you die. I like randomly generated stuff in general. The object is to kill everything without blowing yourself up. I find that most of my deaths are  from getting cornered by enemies, or by putting down too many bombs, underestimating the blast length, and being careless by blowing up everything. I'll clear a level and then carelessly blow myself up for no reason. There's nothing worse than blocking your only exit with a bomb. And I keep doing it... over and over and over.

Each time you die you have to complete the stage all over again. All blocks, monsters, and the exit is randomly generated again. That sucks if you accidentally kill yourself looking for the exit. Besides that the game is relatively simple. There's a total lack of items though. One power-up per level.. Sometimes you won't find it unless you take the time to blow up every block, and with the timer ticking down... that isn't always an option. If you die, power-ups go away so it makes the game tough towards the end.

Each area consists of 8 stages. All of them are pretty much easy, and I happily blew myself up over and over. I didn't reach a wall until level 6-5. Much of it had to do with my own carelessness. There's something awesome about lining up a row of bombs and watching them take out half the screen. For as much as I died, I didn't feel like I was getting discouraged, which is weird. Other games totally frustrate the hell out of me, and with Bomberman 2, it didn't feel that way.

You aren't given much time to blow up the enemies and find the exit. There are so many blocks in your way, that it gets really difficult. Here's where the random level generation begins to work against you. Sometimes you're walled in from the start, and with two minutes to clear the level... it just isn't enough time. With random luck on my side, I was able to finally complete all forty two levels.

In the end you break out of jail and track down the Black Bomberman who framed you. He immediately gives  up and then the credits start to roll. There was no end boss fight, all I had to do was beat every level. Kind of different than other NES games.

Black Bomberman gives up.

 During the end credits there's a password that comes towards the end, it is K3456712 and it opens up a sound test menu when you enter it. Kinda neat to hear all the songs and sound effects. Many old games had this feature.

VICTORY!

Statistics:

Deaths: 123 Continues: 41 Game Overs: 41 Time Overs: 3 Levels Completed: 42 Approximate Time: 4 Hours High Score: 74200