The DSi Ware download service is home to some major names, from Phantasy Star to Dragon Quest. Now Hudson is stepping up with its biggest franchise, Bomberman.
Hidden away in this week's Famitsu release list is "Itsudemo Bomberman." The magazine lists the Hudson-published DSi Ware game for October release at 500 DSi Points.
The name can be translated to "Bomberman Anytime." Aside from that, Hudson has yet to share details.
It's certainly surprising that Hudson would let a DSi Ware version of Bomberman be announced so quietly. We'll presumably get more details shortly.
So, other then Japan will be getting a Bomberman based DSiWare title, nothing else is known about this.
That's kind of cool I guess?
Anyway, I do not have a DSi (and quite frankly am not interested in one. I'll stick with my less-gimmicky-able-to-play-frigging-GBA-games DS Lite kthx), so I won't be getting it.
EDIT: Is it sad of me to be more interested in these chibi Vocaloid figures being advertised there then the Bomberman product in question? Then again, I don't generally care too much for games I know literally nothing about.
_________________ The Local Video Gaming Lunatic
Recent stuff I'm into:
Watching: A Certain Scientific Railgun (ep.14, stalled), Hoshi no Kirby (ep. 71, stalled), Nazo No Kanojo X (ep. 8), Acchi Kocchi (ep. 8)
Reading: nothing
So it's only multiplayer huh? Can't say I'm particularly disappointed or surprised, since everyone seems to believe that's what Bomberman is all about nowadays. Never mind the people that actually liked the single player cuz it was actually, you know, fun and interesting (see: Bomberman 64 and Bomberman 64: The Second Attack!).
So as I mentioned prior, still no real reason for me to bother picking up a questionably improved DS, especially since the only real additions are improved DLC (although this I'm uncertain of) and a camera (but honestly, who in their right mind would use that? Everybody that would have a DS already has cell phones or actual cameras to do that and better), at the cost of removing GBA playability (was bad enough you couldn't even play GB/C games on it).
I'm not trying to be whiny or anything, I just don't see any reason to really be excited about a multiplayer only game, let alone online only, for a console I'm absolutely not interested in. For one, I'm more often then not playing games by myself (which is the only reason I didn't bother getting games like WarioWare Smooth Moves, Mario Kart Wii, and Mario Party 8 (or whatever the Wii one's called)) and two, I hardly ever use my DS much these days (and when I do, it's usually to play GBA games), so "upgrading" to a DSi isn't exactly logical to me. Again, not trying to be whiny or just a sore spot about this, just giving my opinion and reasons behind it.
Eh, I considered putting in some sort of rant going into detail about why I do not like online gaming, but I decided it'd be entirely beside the point and wouldn't really provide anything relevant to the topic anyway. It would also probably end up being this big wall of text that most people who even see it will simply say "tl;dr" and skip it entirely and removing any point or reason to go into it anyway.
_________________ The Local Video Gaming Lunatic
Recent stuff I'm into:
Watching: A Certain Scientific Railgun (ep.14, stalled), Hoshi no Kirby (ep. 71, stalled), Nazo No Kanojo X (ep. 8), Acchi Kocchi (ep. 8)
Reading: nothing
I'm not interested in the DSi either. Same goes for the PS3 Slim and the new PSP. They just keep taking away nice features and adding crappy ones. These new systems suck. I rarely play my DS, and I don't play my PSP much either anyway.
Also not interested in another generic multiplayer only bman game. meh.
It doesn't look like a bad installment of Bomberman. It just doesn't look like anything different. Just regular old Bombermen in a few battle stages. There's maybe one item there I didn't recognize.
It looks like Bomberman DS all over again, except with wonky graphics (I hate to be so petty, but when you rip sprites as a hobby you come to judge things like this). Even something like adding selectable characters or including Louies again would make this interesting, but all of the new multi-player-only instalments nowadays seem to follow a very strict role model of features and presentation. It'd be nice for them to even just experiment a little.
Wonky graphics? Oh... hm... upon closer inspection, they are kinda funny. Although it seems a lot of newer game sprites are kinda like that.
Also yeah, that's true, didn't think about the Louies. It's like they're not even trying... they're just making sure they release another Bomberman title every now and then.
From a developer and financial stand point, re-using as much as possible cuts down costs a lot. Especially if it still sells, it just means more profit for them. This compared to the costs of developing a completely new game, which would cost a lot more and may not do any better then one that had a much lower cost to produce. They're probably at the point where they aren't expecting to get any new fans for the series, so they're just producing them like clockwork not bothering to do much new with it. It's similar to what nintendo did, abondoning their fans to go for what makes more money for them- and only tossing something for the long time crowd here and there. I feel that they were trying some new stuff with BOJ, but in the end it didn't do well and it got shut down- which just cost hudson money. It was a complete minus for them because they refunded everyones money at the end, meaning that there wasn't a single cent made off of it.
_________________ "Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they're not entitled to their own facts."
Okay yeah - re-use the same Bomberman engine. I'm not against that. But it's the fact that they just keep cranking out Bomberman games that are nothing but basic gameplay and aesthetics. They can quite easily add new and inventive features to battle mode without having to overhaul the original engine. And Louies are not a hard thing to code, I'm sure. Which just leaves different characters, which is by far the simplest thing to add or modify.
Plus there seem to be only ten stages. I'd think that it shouldn't take an outrageous amount of time to create more stages, or even different ones that could just combine gimmicks of "standard" stages.
To me, it seems like laziness. They know how to make a Bomberman engine - they've done it on so many different consoles in the past - there's really no excuse, in my opinion. The whole idea of being a game developer is to make, not to recieve.
On a more serious note, I figured that, especially in this economy, Hudson is going to go with a formula that sells well, instead of branching out into more tenuous territory of a more complex single-player adventure mode. Doesn't make it any less disappointing.
From a developer and financial stand point, re-using as much as possible cuts down costs a lot. Especially if it still sells, it just means more profit for them. This compared to the costs of developing a completely new game, which would cost a lot more and may not do any better then one that had a much lower cost to produce. They're probably at the point where they aren't expecting to get any new fans for the series, so they're just producing them like clockwork not bothering to do much new with it. It's similar to what nintendo did, abondoning their fans to go for what makes more money for them- and only tossing something for the long time crowd here and there. I feel that they were trying some new stuff with BOJ, but in the end it didn't do well and it got shut down- which just cost hudson money. It was a complete minus for them because they refunded everyones money at the end, meaning that there wasn't a single cent made off of it.
This is the sickening truth, the world we live in today and the true face of today's industry.... It's all about making money to them. If they want my money, they'll have to earn it. I'm not giving in and buying any of this stuff, cause if we do it'll never change.
-Edit-
Lawls, Sora posted right before me and I missed it. Good stuff.