Bomberman 64
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 One of the most popular game of the franchise and for good reasons.
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Bomberman 64 is the first 3D game within the Bomberman series. It implements a different single-player mode by incorporating action-adventure and platforming stages instead of arenas in which enemies or other elements must be destroyed.
Bomberman 64 is the first 3D game within the Bomberman series. It implements a different single-player mode by incorporating action-adventure and platforming stages instead of arenas in which enemies or other elements must be destroyed. This new variety of single-player game was well-received by critics for its imagination and depth, though most critics also deemed the multiplayer mode to be lacking compared to previous entries in the series.
Development
After working on the game for about six months, the development team scrapped all their initial designs and started anew due to the emergence of more advanced 3D games on the market. It was subsequently exhibited at the 1997 Electronic Entertainment Expo.
Plot
Planet Bomber was a peaceful place until a strange fortress descends upon it. Attached to it are four pieces of planets that were conquered by the Masked Trio, and now they hope to conquer Planet Bomber. Bomberman discovers what's happening and as he's about to depart, a strange new ally named Sirius joins him. The duo set off to stop these new villains, however, Sirius reveals himself to be the true threat and Bomberman and his new frenemy, Regulus, team up to stop him.
Why It Rocks 64 Times
- The idea of doing a 3D Bomberman game that change the concept a bit was an awesome idea, and this game execute it well, to the point of being one of the most popular game of the franchise even to this day, in fact this game inspired many other Bomberman games that would be made in 3D.
- Even the multiplayer new things are well executed, despite being a bit lacking compared to the SNES games, since it is now in a 3D area that is great and manage to still be faithful to the original games multiplayer modes.
- The gameplay is really good and solid, with many innovations for the franchise at the time, such as many gimmicks that are really unique and are only in this game for exemple, such as when you bound on your bomb to get to a platform more easily, or the bombs that have changed.
- Sometime, there is even some strategy in the levels, especially at the middle of the game or the last levels too, that will require a lot of strategy to beat some levels, such as the bouncing bombs, this easily make it the most strategic Bomberman game ever made, even more than The Second Attack!.
- The bouncing bombs is what make this game so special too, since it was never in previous Bomberman games and this is pretty much the only game in the franchise to use this mechanic along with The Second Attack!, and while it can be frustrating at times, it is challenging to do it correctly.
- Speaking of that mechanic, you can use it for some short cuts, which make some of the levels easier or at least shorter, this is especially fun to do in a speedrun or even in a regular playthough of the game.
- Not onlt that but despite the controls being a bit slow at times, the gameplay is really fast paced and in a good way, not to mention that because of that, it make the game extremely fun to speedrun and also amusing to watch due to how great a speedrun of this game can be.
- While they are flawed (see BQ#2), the controls are perfectly decent for a 1997 3D game and while they are a little clunky, the game is designed with it and are pretty responsive, which is neat.
- They also fit the game really well since despite being a problem with the fact that there is no jump button, then the game would not being the same, after all, the game was designed without it and it make the experience really unique and charming.
- Awesome graphics for the time, since they are very well detailled and colorful for a 1997 N64 game, they are so good that they are on par with games such as Super Mario 64, the later Bomberman games on N64 will had even better graphics.
- The colors palette as said before is colorful and is also great and well chosen, despite not being that fitting for the dark tone of the game or even some of the levels, but then again, this is not really a big deal.
- The characters models are also awesome and are well detailled for the time and even are 85% faithful to the original design (See WIR64T#5), and they overral are ressemblant to their design in the box art.
- Also, the effects for both water and lava are really well made for the time and might look even better than those of Bomberman Hero, since they look realistic and had a great art style, especially the lava.
- The art style is also really well made and is likely the inspiration for the Bomberman Land games characters design, since they mostly look like they we're inspired by this game due to being a little more deformed than the usual Bomberman game, and this isn't a bad thing at all.
- Speaking of the characters models in this game, the design of the characters are a bit changed from the previous games to look more cute, and it is well executed, especially Bomberman himself.
- This reason alone might even being one of the best game for being introduced to the Bomberman franchise, especially for the childrens, or even for the gameplay and these kind of things.
- The North America commercial is downright hilarous and maybe one of the best commercials of 1997, since it had a theme song that parody Spider-Man cartoon opening but rewritten for being based on Bomberman, the song itself is just as good and is funny, not to mention that the whole commercial is funny.
- Incredible soundtrack, as expected from a Bomberman game, with many catchy and awesome sounding musics, the soundtrack of this game remained one of the most iconic and one of the most popular soundtrack in any Bomberman games.
- The musics also are very fitting for most of the levels, as it manage to either be calm or agressive in the right levels, this is also one of the reason why this game soundtrack is so good.
- Some of them are even relaxing, much like Bomberman World on PS1, such as Green Garden that both sound beatiful and relaxing, and is even one of the most popular music of the entire franchise and the most popular of this game, and for good reasons.
- The story is pretty good, and is darker than most Bomberman games at the time, since for exemple there are some peoples that are killed in the beginning cutscene, the story is also full of surprise such as a great plot twist at the end revealing that Sirius was actually a villain and not just a helper for Bomberman.
- Lot of replay values since after you beat the game, if you want to do a 100%, then there is high chances that you will take a long time to finish the 100%, or even the multiplayer itself that might be the best part of the replay values, or even if you simply want to replay the game or even trying to speedrun it.
- In fact, you might have to do either two or three playthough for doing everythings in the game, which make the overral short length of the game a bit longer, but howewer despite that, the game is still really short.
- The new characters that we're introduced in this game such as Serius, are great characters and most of them also had great design, as usual with the Bomberman games, the other reccuring characters such as Bomberman himself also are still great characters.
- If you got 100%, you can get a secret zone and getting a true ending which is a first for a Bomberman game, unfortunately the 100% is Incredibly tedious to do.
- The stages design are really great too and are new for the franchise, such as Black Fortress or even Rainbow Palace, they also are fitting for the overral dark tone of the game.
- The bosses, while extremely difficult, are quite creative and require some skill to approach their incoming attacks and finally being able to counter them with your bomb attacks with a bit of strategy to weaken them and finally win the battle against them, which can make them very fun and enjoyable at times.
- It still offers a great multiplayer mode for fans of the franchise to play with the same strategic gameplay it is known for, even with the numerous amount of changes implemented, which is quite the accomplishment for this instalment and it's still fun as a battle-royale game with friends and family overall.
Bad Qualities
- While awesome, the international box art is misleading since due to the villains being behind Bomberman, we can think that they are allies of Bomberman, but in reality they are villains from the game.
- Another misleading thing of the box art (for both the NA and JP cover arts) can be also the art style of it that might make you thing that it is the same characters design for the in-game but not really, this howewer might be intentional, and this problem was fixed for The Second Attack!.
- "Collect hidden items" mainly involves collecting small items hidden in various places.
- Power-up items and jumping skills are hidden in places where they are needed, even in stage 1-1, which is supposed to be the tutorial .
- The layout of the hidden room with no visible entrance is still relatively easy, but the official guidebook introduces a devilish solution of a shortcut using bomb jumps and bomb towers.
- The strictness of the time requirement can be seen from the fact that even the theoretical value is such that it is impossible to make the time if you meet the requirements for other gold cards.
- While the controls are decent and responsive, they have their share of problem, such as:
- They are a little slow at times, and this could result in some cheap deaths if the enemies are faster than you and that they hit you, this howewer is an advantage in some sections of the game.
- They also are rather clunky to control and didn't aged well, but this is to be expected from a first 3D game of a franchise that always was in 2D, but still they are good enough for the game design and are somehow designed for it, much like Strider.
- This howewer is a big problem for some of the boss battle since some of them had lot of pits, and due to being clunky, you might accidently going to a pit and then fall, this is especially true with the spider boss.
- The controls for aiming your bombs to bounce on it are rather off and hard to do, and due to this, you will miss to grab the platforms a lot.
- It is also extremely unstable as you cannot change the trajectory of Bomberman's main body, and there is a time limit for the bombs on the springboards and you have to jump on them in time, which is difficult to do so.
- Lastly, there is no jump buttons, which is incredibly tedious since some of the levels are extremely hard due to this, and you might had a hard time with some levels because of this, but howewer the game was designed without it, so it's not as bad as games such as Super Monkey Ball: Adventure.
- This is also a bit of a missed oportunity for making a platform game or at least a game with some platforming, but that idea was next done in Bomberman Hero (which wasn't really a Bomberman game first).
- World 6 itself is extremely hard and one of the most tedious world of the game, since it have a lot of hard platforming and bombs bouncing mechanics to use, to the point that it feel like a kaizo hack of a game.
- It seems like you have to have the skill to get the gold card in the first place, and bomb jumps are essential just to clear the game .
- In higher difficulty levels, there are no remote controlled bombs, so you'll need to perform acrobatic feats such as using regular bombs as springboards to perform continuous bomb jumps .
- One of the strategies for defeating the boss, "Drop the first form outside the arena to kill it instantly in order to meet the time condition ," is endorsed in the official guidebook.
- It seems like you have to have the skill to get the gold card in the first place, and bomb jumps are essential just to clear the game .
- The game can be extremely frustrating at times or at least, way too hard, either due to the bouncing bombs mechanics or the levels themself, there is many exemple of how this game can be frustrating, which include:
- The bosses, such as the spider boss, are really frustrating and hard, since they require extreme intelligence and they can sometime be way too hard to attack them or even dodging their attacks, but howewer despite that, they still are awesome and fun to fight for most of them.
- You still die in only one hit, which can make the game more harder and even frustrating than it supposed to be, this is a major problem for both the bosses and some of the levels, since in some of them, there is a lot of enemies that are hard to kill or even to dodge.
- Doing 100% on this game is one of the most infamous part of the game for being extremely hard, frustrating and tedious due to you having to get the 100 gold cards, and some of these are placed in either in places that are hard to get to, or even are so poorly placed that they are almost impossible to see the first time you do a level.
- Red Mountain is notable for being frustrating and tedious for some of it stages, since you will get a hard time to figure out what you had to do or even had a hard time with the enemies or at least the one that chase you in one part of the levels, this also became annoying after a while but despite that, this world is still really cool and amazing.
- Speaking of the 100%, you had to collect the gold card without any hints, which is incredibly tedious and one of the hardest part of the game.
- There are no hints for finding these cards when retrieving hidden items or performing special actions against a boss.
- However, not all of them are completely hard to get; the rules are often the same for large bosses, such as "destroy each part," and for humanoid bosses, "throw a charge bomb to hit them" or "hit them with the flames of a charge bomb."
- You need to get all five at once to get to the true final boss, which make it even more tedious.
- You must complete all four special actions and clear the game in less than the set time. If you get four or fewer cards, the card you got will remain recorded, but they will not carry over to the next collect step, and you will have to start all over again.
- There are no hints for finding these cards when retrieving hidden items or performing special actions against a boss.
- The camera is rather clunky, despite being better than most 3D games at the time, this is mostly because sometime it doesn't show Bomberman on the screen or even move without doing anything.
- The final boss is a bit too easy, and is weaker than the final boss of other Bomberman games, such as the one of Super Bomberman 4.
- This is especially noticeable in the second form, in which he has no special attacks that can finish you off.
- He wanders around leaving bombs behind, disappears and runs away when he feels in danger, and occasionally emits a shock wave that has the effect of stunning the user ."
- When you hear that it can cause fainting, you might be on guard, but the restraint time is short and the field is wide, so you're safe unless you get very close.
- It may be implying that he is not the mastermind, but since there is nothing strange about the scenario, it's unlikely you'll notice and will only be left scratching your head.
- This is especially noticeable in the second form, in which he has no special attacks that can finish you off.
- To save custom bomber in the multiplayer mode, you need to get a Controller Pak but in the Wii U virtual console re-release it's don't support this feature so it's impossible to save a Custom Bomber in the Wii U version.
Reception
Bomberman 64 received mixed reviews by critics but positive reviews by fans of the franchise and also the gamers, the game received a score of 67% on Gameranking.
The game was mostly praised for the graphics, the gameplay and even the single player mode that was considered to be even better than the multiplayer mode, but the game was still criticized for it's extremely hard difficulty at times or also the camera that was said to be poor and annoying.
Nowadays, the game received an insane cult following and is one of, if not the most popular game of the franchise and is still remembered to this very day, and is considered to be one of the best first 3D translation along with Super Mario 64 and Sonic Adventure.
Speaking of the cult following, the game also received a huge cult following for the speedrun, in which the game is the most speedrunned Bomberman game ever, and the game is also considered to be a great game to speedrun and also considered to be fun to watch them due to how amazing it is to watch a speedrun of this game.
Trivia
- Regulus would make a second appearance in Bomberman 64: The Second Attack! as "Bulzeeb, the Black Breath," fulfilling his promise that he and Bomberman would fight again.
- Interestingly, Bomberman's "face" texture is not attached to his head, and can be seen floating an inch or so off where it should be from certain angles (such as during his victory stance after beating a level or boss).
- This marks one of the first times where Bomberman's bomb blasts are in a circular (or, in this case, octogonal) shape rather than the classic "+" shape, a look that would be seen in other, future Bomberman titles.
- There was a commercial made for the American release of the game, involving innocent people having a bomb pretty much dropped into their laps and exploding. A song is heard in the background to the tune of the old Spider-Man cartoon's theme, with rewritten lyrics about Bomberman instead.
- In the game's multiplayer, the "old-school" grid format is not used.
- The speed-up item is a shining, green single rollerblade rather than a blue-hued rollerskate.
- The power-ups, hearts, and other items found in destructable blocks actually slowly move in this game, and can fall off nearby ledges to a lower level or off the stage itself completely, thereby making them impossible to get until exiting and returning to the room. Annoyingly, this includes Gold Cards, which are necessary for reaching the final stage (though they are not permanently lost if they fall off).
- Bomberman starts out with the Bomb Kick and Power Glove abilities already equipped, without needing to find them as power-ups. This is also true for all players in Battle Mode.
- Other Powerups can found in the story mode as you go along.
- All of the stages in this game start with a word associated with a color: Green Garden, Blue Resort, Red Mountain, White Glacier, Black Fortress, and Rainbow Castle.
- Despite the title change from Japan to other regions, the "Baku" kanji character is present on the title screen in all versions of the game. A completely different game titled Bomberman 64 would later release in Japan only.
- Although the cartridge includes a save battery, a Controller Pak is required to save data for customized characters that can be used in Battle Mode. Since the Wii U Virtual Console version doesn't support Controller Pak functions, this feature is unavailable in that version.
- All of the "bomber" bosses are named after celestial bodies. Regulus, Altair, and Sirius are named after stars, Orion is named after a constellation, and Artemis is named after an asteroid.
- There is another game called Bomberman 64 on the same platform, but unlike this title, it wasn't an action-adventure game but instead a maze game just like the previous games and was only released in Japan, as it used the Bomberman Land artstyle that was introduced in Bomberman Land (2000) and the game itself was released in 2001.
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