Bomberman: Act Zero – 360 – Review

Over the years, I have some pretty
fond memories of the game Bomberman, playing with friends and how fun of a game
it was. I even remember playing the Nintendo 64 version and having a blast with
it at various parties with my friends. I was excited to hear that there was a
remake of it for the Xbox 360 and couldn’t wait to see how it all played out,
especially over Xbox Live. Well, I can tell you that this game is one of the
biggest disappointments that I have seen in a long time and if you really like
this franchise you should avoid this game like it was the plague. Read on to
find out why.

The story to this game is really not
even important and has no real effect on the game at all. In fact you can hardly
even call it a story. You have basically been captured and put in cybernetic
suit that allows you to place bombs. You are then put into an arena and your
only object is to take out the other players before they take you out. That is
the entire point of the game. Unlike many of the Bomberman games of the past
where you go into many worlds to defeat strange little creatures, all you get is
a death arena and your goal is to live to the next round. Enthralling isn’t it?

There are three modes of play that
you will be able to participate in: Single Player – Standard, Single Player –
FPB, and World Battle. Single player – Standard is very basic. You play until
you get hit by a bomb, and that sums it up perfectly. Single Player – FPB is a
little more in-depth meaning that you get to control the camera at various
angles, but this actually makes things worse because you can’t get the scope of
the entire battlefield at times, which means you can die quicker. A big thing
that has changed is that you now have a life bar that will be depleted if you
get hit by bombs, which makes games last longer. One horrible decision in this
game is that there are no save points, so no matter which level you are on if
you die you have to start all over form the beginning. World Battle is where you
can test your skills against players worldwide on Xbox Live.

There are some new features that the
developers included in this game such as remote controlled bombs, infinite
bombs, block bombs, and line bombs. While these new additions are nice and add
to the shell of this game, I want to know what happened to some of his previous
moves that really made this game fun such as kicking and throwing bombs. You
will not realize how much you utilized these moves until you no longer have
them.

One of the biggest annoyances of
this game is the loading screens that you will face. After every battle you will
get a loading screen, and then you will have to wait for all of the computer AI
opponents to be dropped upon the battlefield to fight against. This gets really
old and aggravating quickly. Since there is no variation of the levels why do
you have to continuously reload it and wait for the game to start, and this is a
question you will be asking yourself many times as you are playing this game.

What happened to Bomberman? Whose
idea was it to turn him into this? I know that the developers wanted to take
Bomberman franchise to “the next level,” but instead they knocked him back a few
levels. My biggest complaint is the serious lack of level variety. You will be
fighting in the same level the entire game, that’s it. You will get so bored of
seeing the same level over and over again that you will want to plant a bomb
yourself so you never have to see it again.

A huge complaint of mine is how the
explosions are done. When you are online fighting against so many other
characters pretty soon there will be a lot of bombs detonating at the same time.
The bombs go off in such a flashy way it is really easy to get disoriented,
forget where you are (since the entire level looks the same), and run into the
bomb instead of away from it. Again the developers were going for bigger and
better, but in this game it really hampers the gameplay and causes many
unnecessary deaths.

Bomberman Act: Zero is rated Teen
for fantasy violence and suggestive themes.

Gameplay: 3.5
This game has no variety and is just boring to play.

Difficulty: Easy
The premise of this game is simple, blow up your enemy. Even in later stages
the computer AI doesn’t seem to be that intelligent so you shouldn’t have to
hard of a time. Most of the times you die it is due to your own mistakes.

Concept: 3.1
What happened? The developers had a successful formula and it seems
like they just threw it out the door and thought mindless repetition is what
gamers would want.

Multiplayer: 3.0
NO SPLITSCREEN!!! This was a huge mistake. The only multiplayer you can
get is over Xbox Live and only then it is eight players.

Overall: 3.0
Bomberman Act: Zero fails the entire Bomberman franchise. It is
recommended that you do not even look at this game if you see it in stores.