In Defense of Bomberman: Act Zero (A Review)

Written by Jim Squires

Thursday, 18 January 2007 05:36

I think we can all agree that, in the world of next gen gaming, Bomberman: Act Zero has occupied the lowest rung on all of our charts. It has an average rating of 34% on both MetaCritic and GameRankings.com - the lowest average of any game on the system. For the most part, gamers of all shapes and sizes have written off Act Zero as the worst of the worst without ever having giving it a fair shake. Being an old school Bomberman fan on a bit of a Bomberman high thanks to the recent release of Bomberman '93 on the Virtual Console, I decided I had to sit down and see just how bad this game really was. After all, how in the hell could they screw up Bomberman?

As I fired up the title, the first thing that jumped out at me was the visual polish the game had been given. It's no Gears of War, but it certainly looks better than most of the port-heavy launch titles that popped up on the 360. Visually, I'd say it's a few steps up from the Live Arcade hit RoboBlitz. It's a minor detail, but I think it's important to mention that this is far from the ugliest game on the system. Even the radical makeover that the series has received this time around seems to work on some level. After the initial shock wears off, the new look seems to be a good fit for this title (although I'd never want to see an end to the cutesy classic Bomberman for a change to this.) Overall, Act Zero seemed to have a much higher visual polish than I had been led to believe.

But how good a game looks means very little compared to how the game plays, and again, much to my surprise, Act Zero played far better than the average score this game has received would suggest. The core of the gameplay remains the same as every other Bomberman experience - plant bombs to take out the blocks and the bad guys, and grab power-ups to get bigger, badder, faster and stronger. They've made a few small changes that really do seem to build on the gameplay, replacing one hit kills with a health bar and adding an optional (and enjoyable) 3D camera control. All in all, the gameplay is just as solid, tight, and polished as you'd expect from a Bomberman title. So what's the problem?

Well, it turns out that it's not all sunshine and roses. The single player amounts to no more than playing the multiplayer against AI, local multiplayer doesn't exist, and, at least at this point, the Xbox Live game may as well be considered null and void as nobody is playing this whatsoever. I spent three hours with this title last night during what I would consider the peak hours on Xbox Live (8pm-11pm) and wasn't able to find one other person online via the matchmaking the entire time - not one.

So all in all, Bomberman: Act Zero isn't nearly as bad as the press would have you believe. The lack of a proper single player campaign and local multiplayer, two major problems for all concerned, doesn't take away from the fact that what is there is still enjoyable. Had this been released as a Live Arcade title for 1200 points rather than a retail title for sixty bucks, I think things would have gone down far better. If Hudson/Konami get the courage to swallow their pride, I thnk a Live Arcade re-release would do this thing a hell of a lot of good. If you like Bomberman, own a 360, and want to have a fun little go-to game for single-player-pretending-to-be-multiplayer action, you could do a lot worse than tracking down a used copy of this for twenty bucks.

4 out of 10