Bomberman 64 is a video game developed by Hudson Soft, published by Hudson Soft in Japan and published by Nintendo in North America and Europe for the Nintendo 64. The game was released in Europe on November 27, 1997 and released in North America three days later. While the game never saw a release on the Wii's Virtual Console service, it was eventually released on the Wii U Virtual Console in both Europe and North America in March 2017 followed by Japan in June 2017. Bomberman 64 is the first 3D game within the Bomberman series. It implements a different single-player mode by incorporating action-adventure and platforming stages instead of arenas in which enemies or other elements must be destroyed. This new variety of single-player game was well-received by critics for its imagination and depth, though most critics also deemed the multiplayer mode to be lacking compared to previous entries in the series. Three more Bomberman games were released on the Nintendo 64: Bomberman Hero (1998), Bomberman 64: The Second Attack (2000), and Bomberman 64 (2001). Gameplay This game is featured in full 3D, thus the directional controls change. Bomberman is able to walk in eight directions with a rotating camera facing in eight directions and with three different zoom levels. His bombs have a different effect than in other games of the series; the bomb's explosion waves have a spherical pattern, rather than the traditional cross-shaped ones. In both single player and multi-player modes, Bomberman always has the ability to kick, pick up, and throw bombs, without the need of power-ups, as in previous games. A unique feature of this game is that Bomberman can "pump" a bomb while holding it, which will make the bomb's explosion more powerful. A pumped-up bomb cannot be kicked or picked up again. Unlike most platform games of its time, Bomberman cannot jump, nor can he swim in water, although he can wade in shallow water. Since Bomberman lacks the ability to jump, higher areas that do not have a path leading to them must be reached by bouncing across bombs - typically this requires the "remote" power-up to avoid the normally timed bombs exploding early. "Bomb jumping" is actually required to fully explore most levels, retrieve certain power-ups, and cross many obstacles. If Bomberman runs into an enemy NPC, or is hit on the head by a small object, such as an