Are You Ready To Xplode? EXpect the eXplosive uneXpectable! Our little scene still has some gaps in the game genres to fill up. One of those kind of games surely is represented by the 'Bomberman' fashioned games, and we all know attempts to do something on that way have been performed with very promising results in alpha phase (video 1, video 2), attempts which unfortunately did not reach a well deserved final release...
And just before the end of the year, who comes to save the day for the Bomberman fans? Yes, Assassins, mastering C16/Plus4 games zone, are now back, and Skoro is active again on the keys, equipped, as tradition wants, with the only Plus/4 assembler monitor to show you what the dieharder coders can do, even nowadays in the crossassemblers era! Skoro's Xplode Man wins the prize for the first Plus/4 Bomberman, with 24 screens splitted in 4 zones to clean out and differently fast foes to set alight strategically placing your bombs. Level codes and vanity board will keep your interest high for a lot of time, we all shall meet here at Hall of Fame for sure! The game's charming graphics and overall design are another success by KiCHY, and the pretty sweet results are undeniably on screen. You just know who's missing to be named in order to regroup the terrible trio...yes, it's Csabo, who put in nice SFX and composed two of the most joyous tunes we heard ever on Plus/4, absolutely matching the gameplay.
The rhythm of play is targeted to a slow paced strategic setting, but we challenge all of you in keeping calm down when a faster foe approaches towards you thru the bricked walls and you've temporarily run out of bombs. So, let's see how you'll play your cards on the Xplode Man fields of play, challenge is now officially open. Good one, Skoro!
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Congrats guys! Ridiculously well polished, playable and enjoyable game! The graphics is also stunning! I wish a lot more to come exclusively to our little platform
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Yeah, I love it too! I wrote the music and the sound effects, but I had no idea what kind of game it will go into, so this was a very pleasant surprise
Congratulations Skoro and Kichy, this is an awesome release!
I hate to spoil the party but.., that gap in the game genre was already filled by Dork's Dilemma which is more than worthy of a mention. The Egg came to C16/Plus4 before the Chicken, or should that be Dinosaur as in the Rideable one that came later to the Bomberman series.
BTW guys, Factory Zone is a bit odd compared to the other zone names, might of been better if it was called Aztec Zone with it's grey colour?
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Hah, have to echo Baz here, that is a really insightful connection - between Dork's Dilemma and Bomberman. It wouldn't have occurred to me, but when you think about it, it's correct.
Just played a bit more again. The effort really shows, it's so polished. Cute graphics, flawless animation, good controls and gameplay. If I can have one little gripe, maybe an option to switch between music+sfx / music only / sfx only / silence would have been nice.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Great game! The music and graphics reminds me of Nintendo games, which is good of course. I played it only once. The only thing i missed is a little more action (more enemies) and speed in the game.
In summary its perhaps the most stylish game on our system i know of and a true masterpiece. It has great potential to become a classic, which you always want to play.
P.S.: Maybe i miss also a nice title screen graphic (e.g. the little character with a bomb). We have enough experts here to make one..:)
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? yeah, but Kichy doesn't like intropictures so i used a plenty of time to convince him the importance maybe next time, with the next release..
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Perhaps we can convince him together.
My personal opinion: A good intro-picture is very important for a game. Its like a filmposter for a film. It's the cherry of the top of the cake. It makes you identify with the character and want to play the game, even if you don't know anything about the game. Even if a game is bad, a good title screen makes it to be remembered.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Wishful thinking George as some people are too used to stuff like this and anything other than plain basic text is just too much to take in.
Seriously though, I share your view on having something really cool as non retail titles lack covers that would in turn give your imagination something to think about. A good loading screen or title screen can be just as effective. Mind you, I think this games title screen is very neat, just a little image of Xplode Man would finish it off.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Great Basic introscreen..
I totally agee with you.
And again congratulations to this great game, which can easily hold up with the best commercial games on other systems of its time like Nintendo, Sega, Atari...
This game also deserves a nice cartridge in a big box with an big manual. Perhaps also a poster and a Xplodeman action-figure.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? It is very good. I could already finish three levels. Fantastic! EDIT. This game reminds me Cuthbert In The Cooler which was one of my favorite. :-)
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? It's always nice to see new sw especially when it's a game and it's so well polished as this one. Congrats and thanks.
Btw you mentioned Dork's Dilemma and I remembered how classy that was so after a rough 2 hours gameplay I was able to finish it. I love that game, brings back nice memories. I love it when there are multiple screens that can be revisited and there is a mission to complete across screens. Just like Berks III.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? C. in the cooler: first time hear about this game. Noy a bad one, but the recent release is the best. But need to be fair with the old ones, a lot of things changed since then, and they had to fit into 16k.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Cuthbert in the Cooler and in the Tombs of Doom were at the time very average games and some what messy looking any way, they still are in many respects. The reason for this is simple though... The author wanted to offer as many levels or screens as humanly possible with-in 12k of memory. Both games have around 250 screens and for this reason alone they hold a place in most peoples hearts. I would not be surprised if only a handful of people have completed them without using cheats.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? If I remember correctly Cuthbert In The Cooler has less than 20 maps but I like this game, the sound of footsteps, the logic of bombs usage, ... IMHO In some ways this game is still the best.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Cuthbert in the Cooler has 20 or so maps yes, but obviously repeated to make the 200+ levels like Squirm and it's many 1,000's of screens. If you sit and watch the title screens on both Cuthbert games they will flick between the levels or rather screens at random showing the screen or room number. I would like to see Cuthbert in the Cooler remade, it could look miles better and the game could be made much smoother, less glitchy in feel and looks if you know what I mean. I want to see the walls of a cool Castle for the mazes and the guards made to look like guards, see cover.
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Maybe more along the lines of Into The Eagle's Nest. Something that will give it a Castle Colditz feel with spooky ghosts and grim reapers as the guards
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? @Acrid: uh...sorry for being so late, I read your question only today :v Having a real support for this game would be great, but Skoro has his own ideas about the social networking in general, being not on Facebook or Twitter, and spreading his great pieces of software in a real oldschool-ish way This wouldn't help keeping linked enough between publisher and author, I remember how many messages me and KiCHY exchanged with Kenz at the time Adventures In Time had to be released... Nonetheless, Skoro uses to read the forum, hence who can say, at least he'll get the idea
Re: Are You Ready To Xplode? Very funny and entertaining game! Thank you for the efforts, it is a pleasure to play such a game in my old (new) C16 with my kid.
For the records, I've found the game fully compatible with SD2IEc + Jiffy, just don't use CBM file browser to execute the game. Navigate to the folder, exit FB and then load the game with ,8. Otherwise you will get a "blue screen"! (the c16 hangs just before the very first note of the intro tune). Could someone explain this behavior?
Are You Ready To Xplode?
