It's not so much a weird observation as me being wildly ignorant, but I was browsing the Bomberman Wiki, and the article on Peace Town from Bomberman Quest mentioned a dog outside the library. A dog? I don't remember any dog...


You mean, this is a dog?
Well, okay, now that I've zoomed in on it for the first time in my life, I can tell what it's meant to be straight away. It's a cute dog resting its head on its paws! But for the longest time...


I seriously thought it was some abstract creature with a big shell and a blobby Kirby-like body, similar to Coney from Party Edition.The pixel defining its ear being the mouth, the nose forming the arm, and somehow interpreting its entire read end as a shell.
(In my defence, the only living creatures represented by background graphics are the dog and Kepo, and the manual claimed the latter was a statue, so...)

_________________

Totally can see what you mean. It would not surprise me if that dog isn't truly a shape-shifter and we are all being fooled when he "fetches" the stick. In reality, every time he brings us back that dirty piece of wood, we are actually inviting in another vampiric demon into our reality, only able to come in with our flesh as a medium. Noooo...damn you, dog. :(

_________________

Yeah, I was the one who wrote that article. I used to skim over it while playing, thinking that it was a rock, since it is the same color as the ground. But then I got to looking at it one time, because its tile is only used once, and that's when I noticed what it is.

The hidden profane voices in Atomic Bomberman. Hear Snively and Ren Hoek swear like sailors! Atomic Bomberman itself had this weird, western feel to it, proably because it was western-made.

The fact most Bomberman enemies, except Bagular and the Dastardly Bombers, are one-offs. I would love to have seen Natia again. Speaking of Natia, I wonder if she and the other animal bosses of Hero were under mind control and could have been spared like the other guy.

The fact Bomberman is completely DEAD at this point with absolutely ZERO attempts to save him after the 3DS game went six feet under. I would actually want to save Bomberman. I know that there are thousands of clones of the old Bomberman games, but I want something more story driven like the N64/GCN ones, preferably with Natia again.

....Is Natia like, the only thing you even care about...?

I would not really consider this to be a weird thing. It's quite common in series like this, where story and continuity take a back seat to everything else.

So, here's something interesting.

I was watching Gamera for the first time last night, when I saw something that instantly blew my mind. Well, "blew my mind" might be a slightly strong choice of words... But anyway, it turns out that Gamepuku, the mecha-turtle boss that Pretty Bomber rides in Super Bomberman 3, is almost certainly inspired by the titular monster from the film. Gamera has the ability to tuck its head and leg into its shell, then shoot flames from its limb-holes and spin around in order to achieve very quick flight... just like Gamepuku.

I'm sure that I'm not the first foreigner to notice this, but hey, nobody ever told me about it.

For reference, here's a clip from another Gamera movie (not the one that I watched) which demonstrates his spinning flight pattern:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j51XdsXGjFQ

And here's an image of Gamera using its back leg "jets" to propel itself forward, in pretty much the same pose as Gamepuku is in its artwork:

http://static2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130812221557/godzilla/images/1/15/Showa_Gamera_Flying.jpg

I imagine a fair bit of stuff in Bomberman is references to famous Japanese cultural icons. We've already spoken about how the Five Fiendish Bombers are likely modeled after Super Sentai, after all.  

The lessening of diversity andenace of Bomberman designs in the franchise's final years.

...The wha?

I'm not sure where else to post this, so bumpedy-bump-bump.

Recently, Ragey uncovered some unused graphics in Bomberman GB 2 (known as Bomberman GB in the west; the one with Indy Bomber):

Check them out here!

There's even some stuff that indicates that the final boss rush world may have been different at some point in time...!

That's pretty interesting! Maybe they had to scrap it due to time constraints?

That sounds likely. Or somebody suggested "boss rush" to a room full of weary developers.

I can't really fault them since GB2 is so packed with content; there are practically two full-length games in it. It's like the original Zelda in a way. Not like Super Bomberman 4. There's just no excuse for the fourth SFC game to only have four (ridiculously easy) worlds and a boss rush. No excuse.