
You can adjust the height and distance of Jack's jumps depending on how long you hold the jump button down and what direction you press. Otherwise, Jack has no abilities apart from jumping. You can spend the power coins you collect to open up locked chests and to temporarily transform enemies into gold coins. That's not a bad formula to build upon, but the level layouts are simplistic and every passage contains the same kinds of platforms, chests, and enemies. The whole game revolves around running and jumping your way through vertical and horizontal passages populated with platforms, treasure chests, and deadly lava beds while monsters randomly appear and chase after you. Around the same time, you'll realize how shallow the action is. Then, you'll notice how repetitive the backgrounds are, and that the developers didn't even bother to animate the flames that occupy so much space in the environment. For about two minutes, the game will charm your socks off.
#Bomb jack video game full
The soundtrack is full of circus tunes that genuinely make you want to bob your head. Jack's enemies are cartoonish renditions of snakes and mummies, and the main bad guy is a demon named Belzebut. The backgrounds put together with Mario-style blocks are colorful, and Jack himself is cute as a button clad in his red tights and superhero cape. Bear in mind, this was in the days before rentals, video game magazines, message boards, and the Internet, so word of mouth was slower to propagate back then.Ĭontrary to what the title would lead you to believe, bombs are merely another item that you can collect for points.Īs with so many 2D action games from the 1980s, the main problem with Mighty Bomb Jack is that it has heart but lacks substance. Mighty Bomb Jack was the hottest thing going for a few months, until word got out that it was nothing like Super Mario Bros., and was, in fact, just a crummy side-scroller steeped in goofy charm. When the game was first released for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1987, people took note of its jump-heavy design and charming graphics and snapped it up, assuming it would satisfy their craving for a Mario fix. Mighty Bomb Jack is the video game equivalent of Vanilla Ice or pump sneakers.
