My childhood in one collection, some of the most fun couch MP games ever.

Bomberman :

Similar concept to the old MSX game, except this one is vastly improved. There's powerups to be had, many enemy types, there's 50 stages plus the occasional bonus ones, hidden collectibles for bonus points and instead of ol' Eric, you play as one of the enemies from Lode Runner and upon beating the game, you *become* Lode Runner.. pretty neat!

This game is the reason I wanted to do the Hudson marathon in the first place, since I remember having a lot of fun playing a bajillion bootlegs on those "million NES games in one" DOS games as a kid, and I was curious to see how the OG held up. Turns out.. not very well, it's actually kind of dull. When you start the game with only one bomb and no powerups, it's kind of a slog until you start getting some powerups, then it becomes.. passable. The gameplay never changes, the stages are all exactly the same, the enemies all act mostly the same, so it's just 50 stages of doing the same thing over and over and over again with exactly zero variation.. plus once you get too many powerups and become essentially invincible, the game just becomes flat out boring, but in a "at least I'll be done soon" kinda way since at that point, stages will only take 30 seconds or so to clear. Oh well, this is just first game syndrome, and I know it gets better

Bomberman II :

Despite having two in the name, this is actually the 4th or 5th Eric game, and it's pretty much yet another exact copy of the first game, but with a handful of improvements. Kind of a sidegrade compared to Bomberman PCE, since it doesn't have bosses but instead has a much bigger enemy variety and somehow, the music is more of a bop'n the PCE game, which is impressive for an NES game (even a late gen one). Good going, Bomberman II!

It's still dull tho, and Atomic Punk is vastly superior

Super Bomberman :

The game that put Eric on the map since the PCE wasn't exactly popular in the West, it is a fan favorite.. and for a reason. It is *super* fast paced, you get drowned in upgrades from the get go and while line bombs are gone, this is the game that introduces stackable speed upgrades, as well as penetration bombs

It also makes you invulnerable for a solid 30 seconds at the beginning of every stage, which I personally think is the game's biggest downside since once you get wall/bomb pass, 30 seconds is more'n enough to kill everything on the map since you can just spam bombs without a worry.. it didn't even take an hour to beat the game, since you just absolutely *zoom* through it with zero challenge outside of the final two bosses

Still, the game is still an absolute blast (pun intended) to play, it's no wonder it's still a fan favorite to this day

Super Bomberman 2 :

Well, it seems the formula is getting stale again. The game lags again so I guess Mega was potentially not just a bad port, and it was a sidegrade at most. No more line bombs, no more Louies, but the speed upgrades stack again and the stage gimmicks are more expansive'n ever before. The music and visuals are good, but the bosses are easy and dull HP sponges. There's both remote bombs and penetration bombs, but you only have one of 'em at once, and penetration bombs tend to be a nuisance more often'n not

The year is '94, and the Eric formula needs a revolution

Super Bomberman 3 :

The first Eric game whose English release was exclusive to Europe prior to this Collection, there's a reason it wasn't released worldwide. It was essentially just a compilation of every previous main game. It has the stages and gameplay from Mega (minus line bombs), the Louies and (much, much crunchier) music from PCE, the story and villains from Super 1.. it literally didn't have one single original thing about it

Granted, it's a *good* compilation. Super compressed music and missing line bombs aside, it plays pretty well. No lag for the first time in a few games, the controls are smooth and responsive, and the beginning of stage invincibility from Super 1 is back, but only lasts a few seconds, so it feels pretty well balanced

Still, I wish they'd bring summat new to the table. Maybe make a jump to that newfangled PS1 or Sega Saturn console or something?

Super Bomberman 4 :

There's really nothing to say about this game. At this point, the formula is *fully* stale and they've run out of things to steal from the previous games. This one brings absolutely nothing new to the table, it's just more Super levels

Super Bomberman 5 :

Probably the worst Super game. Like GB 3, they tried to freshen up the formula, but this time they did it by.. making Bomberman open world I guess? Or trying, at least, it's incredibly vague and there's not much info online about just how this game works, so I had to go at it blind (and somehow accidentally got the good ending)

When beating a stage, one or many exits appear. If it's yellow, it leads somewhere new. If it's blue, it leads somewhere you've already been. So if you know the exact route you need to take, you can beat the game in 10 mins but if yer a completionist, you can replay the game multiple times until you've explored every route and gotten 100%. To help with that, this is the first Eric game to actually have a saving system.. I *think*. Once again, it's not clear whether it actually saves or just relies on passwords for the percentages. Either way, once you hit 100%, you get the good ending! ..Just kidding, the game just resets, and you hafta do it all again to get *200%*; no new powerups, enemies, bosses or story elements (heck, there's barely any story at all), so it's really pointless. Heck, even this Collection didn't bother adding an achievement for reaching either 100% or 200%, only for getting both endings

Graphically it's clean enough, but it's certainly no Saturn Bomberman. The music is nice but once again, it's no Saturn. Gameplay-wise, however, it goes back to I'd say Super 2 quality, since the lagspikes are back.. also there's still no line bombs, so Saturn remains superior in every aspect. At least Louies finally make a comeback, but they only act as extra hitpoints, and don't have any special abilities. Talk about ending the SNES era with a whimper, how disappointing

The Collection in general :

It's an alright start, if it means re-releasing more Eric games to the West. Focusing mainly on the generally mediocre Super games instead of the actually good ♥♥♥♥, it's faaar from worth the full price, but there's still a few interesting things. The collection includes manuals! ..but only in Japanese for 4 and 5. There's quicksaves and quickloads! Except they're far from quick, since you hafta go through two menus and multiple button presses each time. There's rewinds! But it's way too fast and aggressive, so it's more of a nuisance most of the time. There's achievements, but they're pretty generic (play game, beat game, beat boss rush.. that's pretty much it except for Super 5's "get both endings"). There's multiplayer! But it's mostly local, no online features (a concept Konami greatly struggles with in every Collection they make, so don't hold high hopes for a patch)

As for the purely positive stuff, the borders are pretty nice and colorful, but I wish they'd have two Retro-style ones for the NES games as well. Finally, the new boss rush modes are pretty fun and challenging, since savestates and rewinds are disabled and you can't just barge in with full powerups

So overall.. when will they release another Collection with Bomber King, Bomber Kid, Bomberman PCE, Saturn Bomberman and the GB games? Give us the actually good games, Konami!

The game runs well on steam deck, and it's great to have the translation for Super Bomberman 4 and 5. There was a slight audio issue towards the end of Super Bomberman 1, but other than that no major issues.
Overall I'm happy with the package, and I'm looking forward to playing through the games I didn't play back in the day.