Bomberman

For the 1983 home computer game, see Bomber Man.

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TurboGrafx-16 PC Engine
Bomberman
System(s): PC Engine, TurboGrafx-16
Publisher: Hudson Soft Turbo Technologies
Developer: Hudson Soft
Peripherals supported: GT Com Cable
Genre: Action
Number of players: 1-5
Release Date RRP Code JP 1990-12-07 ¥5,3005,300 HC90036 US 1990 TGX020053
Non-NEC versions Amiga Atari ST IBM PC X68000

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Bomberman (ボンバーマン) is a puzzle action game developed by Hudson for the PC Engine and TurboGrafx-16. It is part of the long-running Bomberman series of games.

Story

Centuries into the future, famous roboticist Dr. Mitsumori creates Bomberman as his first robot, who is capable of thought and possesses incredible power, but has been programmed "only for the pursuit of goodness and justice". Unfortunately his second robot, Black Bomberman, goes rogue due to a programming error and kidnaps Dr. Mitsumori's only daughter, Lisa, and takes her to the Mechanical Castle as part of his desire to conquer the world. It is now up to Bomberman to infiltrate the Mechanical Castle, rescue Lisa, and defeat Black Bomberman.

Gameplay

Bomberman follows the same gameplay formula as its predecessors in that the goal is to use bombs that explode in a cross pattern to defeat all the enemies and find the exit warp hidden underneath soft blocks within a time limit to clear each stage. Bomberman can move with the D-Pad and place bombs using Ⅰ. He begins a new game with only one bomb and a one-tile blast radius, but one power-up item can be found hidden underneath a soft block in each stage. When all enemies are defeated, the soft block containing the item will flash to reveal its location, but not the one containing the exit.

If the player bombs an item or the exit, 8 enemies will spawn from it (the item will be destroyed, but the exit is indestructible). If the player runs out of time during a stage, all remaining eneimes will disappear and 12 Pontans will be spawned. The game has a total of 8 rounds with 8 stages each, for a total of 64 stages. The final stage of each round features a boss battle in which the player must study the boss' attack patterns and use multiple bombs to defeat it. The player has three continues to beat the game, and game progress can be saved via password or directly to memory (up to three save files) after a Game Over.

The game also includes a Battle mode for up to 5 players, and being the first home console Bomberman game to feature a multiplayer mode (the first multiplayer game in the series being Bomber Kid for the Game Boy) it established the mode as a famous staple of the series. The goal is to defeat the other players with bombs (all players start each round with one bomb and a two-tile blast radius) and be the last player standing, winning a set number of victories to win the match. This game has no support for computer-controlled players, but if there are less than 5 players participating, then the stage will also feature enemies. Only Bomb Ups and Fire Ups can be found in soft blocks, though Skulls can also be found if Skull Mode is selected during setup. There is also a dedicated Battle mode for two players using the GT Com Cable and two PC Engine GT/TurboExpress systems.

Items

All items collected will award 1,000 points. Dying will cause Bomberman to lose all items obtained except for Bomb Ups and Fire Ups.

	Bomb Up
	Increases the number of bombs Bomberman can place by one, up to a maximum of 10.
	Fire Up
	Increases the blast radius of bombs by one tile, up to a maximum of 15.
	Speed Shoes
	Increases Bomberman's walking speed slightly.
	Detonation Switch
	Allows Bomberman to manually detonate his bombs using Ⅱ.
	Bomb Pass
	Allows Bomberman to walk through bombs.
	Wall Pass
	Allows Bomberman to walk through soft blocks.
	Fire Suit
	Makes Bomberman invincible to bomb blasts for 60 seconds.
	1UP
	Awards an extra life.
	Skull Item
	Appears only in Battle when playing in Skull Mode. Infects a player with a random ailment, which can be passed on to other players and will wear off after 30 seconds. The possible ailments are: Tripled movement speed. Halved movement speed. Blast radius is reduced to one tile. Bombs cannot be placed. Bombs are uncontrollably placed every step.

Rounds

	Round 1 - The Wall
	Round 2 - Rocky mountains
	Round 3 - River
	Round 4 - Forest
	Round 5 - Rocky Cave
	Round 6 - Inside of the Castle, Part I
	Round 7 - Inside of the Castle, Part II
	Round 8 - Inside of the Castle (Final Stage)

Versions

This installment of Bomberman saw ports to various home computers, with a Sharp X68000 version published in Japanese markets in 1991 by SystemSoft, and Amiga, Atari ST and IBM PC versions published in European markets in 1992 by Ubisoft. European home computer versions were renamed to Dyna Blaster due to European mainstream media associating the original name with terrorist bombings.

Additional versions for the Atari Lynx and Commodore 64 were in development, but never released.

Production credits

• Game Designer: Tsukasa Kuwahara
• Main programmer: Atsuo Nagata
• Sub Programmer: Wrecker Muroya
• Graphics Designers: Hideyuki Ogura, Mika Sasaki
• Music Composer: Atsushi Chikuma
• Sound Programmer: Keita Hoshi
• Produced by: Hudson Soft

Source:

In-game credits (JP)

Magazine articles

Main article: Bomberman/Magazine articles.

Physical scans

NEC Retro Average
Publication Score Source Computer & Video Games 93 №112, p34-35 Raze 89 №5, p80

	91
Based on 2 reviews

PC Engine version

PC Engine, JP
Cover
50x50px Card File:Bomberman PCE JP Manual.pdf Manual 50x50px Extra

TurboGrafx-16 version

TurboGrafx-16, US
Cover
Jewel Case

Technical information

ROM dump status

System	Hash	Size	Build Date	Source	Comments
?	CRC32 9abb4d1f MD5 4bece0e426eec02f894399219f1951cf SHA-1 738bbced47d87cd438d7972eba58c08f5c031a74	262144		Card (JP)
?	CRC32 5f6f3c2a MD5 22945308eb41396f39c00444be9f251f SHA-1 dc63680e579764bbacb7f07514f4f49ab888d3b1	262144		Card (US)