you grew up in the NES generation, you had your pick. Everyone had their kryptonite.

For me, it was Bomberman. It’s a simple premise at first: You’re a little robot

guy, you’re in a maze filled with bricks and hostiles, and you can produce explosives

with which to deal with these things. Unfortunately, as the great Shinya Arino once commented,

“This is a game that requires your complete concentration.” And six-year-old me often

had more important things to attend to, like a spark of Lego-related inspiration. It didn’t

hurt that this game could be the definition of brutal. 50 stages long, full of mobs with

weird AI, and if you die, all your good power-ups went PIFF. It remained in the periphery of

my gaming experience, on the outside looking in, as I devoted myself to plumbing the depths

of Bubble Bobble and the Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle.

So I find myself now revisiting this madness, and realizing... yeah, it’s still hardcore

as all get out. It’s seen a couple forms over the years, and some gameplay improvements,

but there’s still no replacement for this, the NES original. (Or, in this case, the NES

Classics release on the GBA.) Here was our introduction to the White-and-a-little-bit-of-Blue

Bomber, who, admittedly, was just a sprite ganked from Hudson’s port of the Broderbund

classic Lode Runner. All the stages look identical, with the same green background and grey blocks;

the only differences are in the distribution of hostiles. Granted, this alone doesn’t

make for a huge challenge... but the real issues are a little more peripheral. For example,

unless you have the corresponding power-up, your bombs are blocking terrain. With fuses.

It’s not uncommon for a Bomber, in his usual panic, to accidentally trap himself in a corner,

leading to a few uncomfortable seconds of quiet resignation before the inevitable explosion

and a nine-note “You suck” fanfare. Accidentally bomb a power-up, or the doors leading to the

next stage? Welcome to hell, kid, ‘cuz you’re now swarmed with more mobs. Fail in any way,

and your precious remote control, any manuverability powers, and your general will to live will

disappear before your eyes. And if you should run out of lives...

Well, here’s the blessing of the NES Classics version: A save feature for your high score

and password. And it’s your salvation, too, because if not for that you’d have to enter

the entire 20-character password, manually scrolling through each letter, with no backspace.

Make a mistake on letter 19? You get to re-input the entire thing. Yeah. Not only that, this

version came before Bomberman discovered multiplayer. It’s kinda like Street Fighter 1 in that

respect: You see the beginnings of the epic experience you know, but it hasn’t quite

figured itself out yet. For the NES-style experience with the potential for deathmatches,

check out Bomberman Party Edition for the original PlayStation.