Bummer, man.

A thought that recently struck me, for no particular reason I can work out, is that I feel really sorry for any team given the task of producing a new Bomberman game.

First, the good. They're guaranteed to get some sales through IP recognition. I would be more likely to buy "Bomberman" than "Explodeguy", just because I would know roughly what I was getting. And I'm sure there are some people out there that have bought (and will continue to buy) every Bomberman game that's released. Even Act Zero.

But I think the bad far outweighs it. There is a weight of expectation that comes with Bomberman - there have been some excellent games in the series in the past, so a developer has a lot to live up to. I think a lot of it is down to the games having such a "simple formula" (for want of a better phrase, though the best titles in the series have a lot of extra features). If a developer doesn't add anything new to their title it will get panned as being too basic and conservative. If they do add things then they'd better hope they chose them wisely, because there are few things in a reviewer's mind worse than messing up the "simple formula" with unfocused new features.

It makes me wonder why, other than for the cash, anybody does it. Did the people who've produced poor Bomberman games really think they were bringing something worthwhile to the table, or did they just do it for the money?