Bomberman Tournament

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Bomberman Tournament
Developer(s)	Activision
Publisher(s)	Hudson Soft
Release date(s)	2001 (US)
Genre(s)	Action
Mode(s)	Single player
Rating(s)	ESRB: E (Everyone)
Platform(s)	Game Boy Advance
Media	Cartridge

Bomberman Tournament (known as Bomberman Story in Japan) was a game in the long standing Bomberman series for the GBA. The game contains a fully realized multiplayer battle mode between linked Game Boy Advances. The player and up to three friends can compete in any of the game's eight multiplayer battle arenas, each of which has its own unique gameplay twist.

1 Story
2 Features
3 Gameplay
- 3.1 Karabons
4 External links

[edit] Story

On the edge of the galaxy sits a small planet, Phantarion. From the cutscene at the beginning of the game, it is given that five meteors (the five Dastardly Bombers) hit the planet. Shortly thereafter, a large fortress was erected, and in turn the land around the tower and the tower itself began to freeze over. The people of Phantarion sent out a distress call, and Professor Ein sent Bomberman Max to investigate. Upon arriving on the planet, Max makes his way to the tower. Once inside, he is confronted by a huge bird creature (later found to be Plasma Bomber in his transformed state). He is knocked out by the bird, and is either sent to the top of the tower or down a hole (the exact cannot be determined, Max is only shown falling into a dark circle in the center of the screen). When Doctor Ein talks to Bomberman, Bomberman tells him that they have lost all contact with max. Bomberman is then sent by Ein to save Phantarion and find Max, thus beginning the playable portion of the story.

[edit] Features

Each of the game's eight arenas (in Battle mode) is designed to affect the players' tactics in one way or another. Examples of this include environment hazards, such as buried explosives in one stage and the powerups in the Hi-Power Stadium. Tournament also includes a standard arena without any of these features, allowing for straightforward gameplay when desired.
Powerup tiles that augment the player's abilities.
A fully-fledged RPG-style singleplayer mode.

[edit] Gameplay

Tournament was generally lauded for its simple, approachable gameplay. In order to score (in multiplayer mode), players must lay time bombs in order to trap and obliterate their opponents, with the last player alive becoming the winner. As the player defeats enemies and clear away obstacles, a variety of power-up tiles appear. Randomly selected from a pool of 10 different items, these tiles have a number of effects, such as increasing bombs' blast radius, increasing the player's bomb capacity, or even reversing a player's controls.

Unlike other Bomberman games, Tournament's single-player quest mode takes a role-playing game based form with influences of Zelda- and Pokémon-reminiscent enhancements.

The majority of the action takes place in 2D from top-down vantage point, while Karabon battles and select minigames are presented in a side view. Each of the game's six different environments possesses only a minimum of rectangular features and is detailed with all sorts of wacky nuances, such as trees that topple over or an earthen giant collapsed in the middle of a road.

[edit] Karabons

The game includes a number of critters, called Karabons, that form a major part of the quest mode. These critters not only give out advice and augment Bomberman's capabilities, but they also add a scavenger-hunt aspect to an otherwise-standard RPG. The player can acquire 25 karabons by capturing them (a la Pokémon) or by artificially creating them. From time to time, NPCs will challenge the player to Karabon battles, which, much like Pokémon battles, are one-on-one, turn-based fights. Unlike Pokémon battles, however, the outcome of a match is determined before it ever begins, as the player's Karabon's prevailing stats and pre-set attack strategies determine the course of the fight.