Review: Boombakas
Score:
73%
It's not one hundred percent clear if this game is officially derived from a "Bomber Man" licence or if it's just very clever use of language in the Ovi Store description ("Brave Pipyakas, the offsprings of Bombermen, settled down in cozy world of watermelon trees"), but I'm not that bothered, because what's on offer here is a wonderful mix of exploration, adventure and arcade action.
Buy Link | Download / Information Link
Spread over thirty levels, your goal, as the most adventurous of the Pipykas tribe, was to protect the crops of the village - after the Bombacks attack, your job is is to chase after those who have stolen almost the entire crop of watermelons. So you saddle up, take what few watermelons are left, and set out on a classic mission of revenge and recovery.
This format actually gets over one of the biggest issues I always had with the original Bomberman format (where you were on a very small game grid, and pretty much had to blow up everything in sight, like some OCD'ed pyromaniac). You now have a much more realistic goal, which is to safely get to the end of the level, taking out or avoiding the enemies on the level at your own discretion, blowing up walls, foliage and whatever the Bombacks throw at you.
Just to keep things on the cartoon level, you're not using bombs, but the last of your village's watermelons, which -naturally- explode. Practically, this makes little difference, as you still have an explosion that reaches out in the four cardinal directions (up, down, left or right) and you need to plant the 'bomb' and get out the way as soon as possible. What you do have is a choice of different fruits as you work through the levels, which naturally have different properties in terms of damage and range.
You also have another "new" move, compared to Bomberman, and that's push. Around the levels, you have buttons and switches that can be pushed to open up other areas of the world, and this little addition to the level designer's arsenal gives them a lot more flexibility in the world you have to walk through.
I'm also enjoying the decisions that developers DaSuppa have made with the controls. Rather than use the full portrait orientation of the screen, they've reduced the gameplay area into a more traditional rectangular size and given you a collection of on-screen touch controls to play the game. As well as the generously sized cursor keys to control yourself, you also have buttons to drop your bombs, press the buttons, and access your inventory and other menus.
It makes for a stylish menu screen as well, both during the opening of the game and in the menu between levels, where you can buy extra fruit weapons with the treasure you can find on each level. It's an interesting choice to have the on-screen controls not float over the game, but in this case, with slightly smaller sprites and the traditional square view of Bmberman being a nice historical touch, it works. That's always the most important part of any application. If something works well, that's what you code.
I also like that you are offered the choice of buying the game outright or having a free download coupled with the Inneractive advertising system in the game.
Boombakas might have echoes of Bomberman, but it is able to stand on its own feet in the gaming world. It has good level design, a bit of a retro feeling, but feels fresh at the same time. One for those looking for a deeper arcade experience that needs some thinking and planning.
-- Ewan Spence, May 2011.
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at