Hey again folks, been a while! I'm back to ask another question about something weird in a 90s Bomberman game.  

I'm not actually much of a gamer, but I *have* to complete games 100% when I play them. I have to find EVERYTHING, or at least see evidence of it. Imagine my surprise when I found out my Charabom list in Blue Champion / Red Challenger wasn't as 'full' as it appeared... Reading Japanese Wikipedia as all the hip kids love to do, I came across these names:

Aqua Dragon
Pommy Dragon
Thunder Kong
Thunder Shark
Rock Snake
Fire Force
Shardra
Ox Battler
Heat Rock
Takkong

According to The Cutting Room Floor, Heat Rock and "Oct Kong" at the end are unimplemented code still hackable with a cheat device, like Max 2's Elemouse and Flyshark. Several cheat sites have Shardra and "Ox Battra"(?!) listed as winnable in the hidden bonus game where you have to point a remote at your GBC, while the first six on the list are apparently the product of merging other Charaboms.

Seeing as I don't have access to my hard copy of Blue Champion, and no emulator seems equipped to replicate the GBC's infrared port - correct me if I'm wrong - I just wanted to ask if any of you guys had screenshots of the first eight on the list to sate my curiosity? Of course if there are IR-capable emulators out there, give me a name and I'll contribute screenshots of the buggers to BM Wiki myself!

It's just weird how little information there is on these guys online. Maybe I'm looking for the wrong transliteration of the names, but it really seems to be the one element of a Bomberman game no fan has cared to document!

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Wow, now that is really interesting. Cool find! I don't believe that I've ever heard of this... nor do I remember hearing of secret Charaboms from the IR stages... I eventually managed to complete all of the normal stages, I think, unlocked from both games via a special emulator, some years ago, and I guess that I thought that was all there was left... I guess I was wrong.

If nobody else gets around to figuring this stuff out, I might try my hand at it on some random Saturday. In the meantime, maybe somebody could crack the graphics and see if there are any hidden sprites in there?

Oh, and given that some of the Charaboms are renamed in English versions (ToughGuy, for example, was simply Strong in the Japanese games), you might have some difficulty searching for the original names there...

I was as surprised as you! Doesn't seem right that Max 1 has more secrets than Story AND Max 2...

I have zero hacking chops, and am really not in the mood to buy a new copy of Max 1 and an extra GBC just to do this infrared nonsense for real, but...



I'm a dedicated person  

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This deserves a good hacking for proof! You're on the verge of a discovery in the Bomberman world!  

Hey, if someone else in the UK wants to meet up somewhere and trade Charaboms until we get to the bottom of this, I'll do it!

...Only alternative being a GBC emulator which can emulate the infrared port, and I've *still* had no luck finding one.

But I'm more than happy to come back to this little project anytime if any of you other guys dig up something new, I'll never not want to learn more about old Bomberman games. Afraid I haven't found anything more since I last posted, though!  

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