"Blow stuff up...that's about it"

Everybody has probably played a Bomberman game at some point in their life. Everybody knows that the best fun that Bomberman can offer is in its multiplayer mode. What would happen if you took away the multiplayer mode? What if, while taking away the multiplayer mode, you took out most of the fun of the single player mode as well? Well you'd have the original Bomberman for the NES.

Gameplay is simple. You get to lay bombs that blow up blocks and enemies. In each level hidden in one of the blocks is the exit, and a power up, which will allow you to lay bigger bombs, more bombs, kick bombs, detonate bombs, or much more. Bomberman is sick of being a worker robot and he's decided to break out of the mines to his freedom, and this is how he does it. Not much game play variety, and not much fun either, because every level looks exactly the same, and the only thing different is the bonus levels, but all you do in these is blow up enemies.

The graphics really aren't that good, especially when compared to other Bomberman games. Bomberman seems a lot skinnier in the original (must be all the junk food he ate when he escaped), and he just doesn't look right. The enemies however, will be familiar to anybody who's familiar with Bomberman games. The sound isn't great either, so feel free to Mute at will.

All game series have to start somewhere, and this is where Bomberman started. It had all of the elements needed to make a great game, but after countless levels that are seemingly the same, you'll just want to stop playing entirely. The lack of a multiplayer mode really hurts this game...

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/99, Updated 08/07/01