Bomb Jack

Bomb Jack is a platformer arcade game released in 1984 by Tehkan (later known as Tecmo), and later ported to various home systems. The game was a commercial success for arcades and home computers. It was followed by several sequels: the console and computer title "Mighty Bomb Jack", the arcade game "Bomb Jack Twin", and "Bomb Jack II" which was licensed for home computers only.
Gameplay.
Bomb Jack is a hero who can perform high jumps and float in the air. His goal is to collect all red bombs on the screen. The game's antagonists are enemies such as birds and mummies which, once they drop in the bottom of the screen, can morph into things like flying saucers and orbs that float around the screen, making Jack lose a life if he touches them. Collecting bombs will increase the bonus meter at the top of the screen (collecting lit bombs increases it more). When the meter is completely filled up, a circular bouncing "P" appears, and when collected, it will turn all the enemies into bonus coins for a short period during which Jack may collect them. Other similar bonuses are the "B" (Bonus) which increases the score multiplier (up to 5x), the "E" (Extra) which gives an extra life, and the rare "S" (Special), which awards a free game. There are five different screens in the game, each featuring a distinct scheme of platforms (the fifth has no platforms at all). There is a special bonus for collecting 21 to 23 lit bombs in a row, out of the 24 bombs of each round.
Ports.
The Commodore 64 version uses Jean-Michel Jarre's "Magnetic Fields Part II".
Reception.
In Japan, "Game Machine" listed "Bomb Jack" on their May 15, 1984 issue as being the third most-successful table arcade unit of the month. The Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum versions topped the UK software sales chart in April 1986. The following month, the Spectrum version was at number 2 on the UK sales chart, below "Green Beret". Two years later, "Bomb Jack" returned to the top of the UK sales chart when it was re-released on the "Encore" budget label.
"Crash" magazine gave the Sinclair ZX Spectrum version a 92% rating with the comment "a great arcade conversion, don't miss it", while "Zzap!64" was less enthusiastic for the Commodore 64 version giving it 47%. "Commodore User" gave the Amiga version 6 out of 10 citing that the Amiga should be well capable of doing better on a then four-year-old arcade game.
Legacy.
Sequels.
"Bomb Jack II" is a licensed follow-up developed for 8-bit home computers by the British games publisher Elite Systems in 1986. The game went to number 2 in the UK sales charts, behind "Leaderboard". The music featured was the theme from the "ThunderCats" animation - as odd a choice as that may seem, this is because the game was originally meant to be a tie-in for that series, but was reskinned to follow on from "Bomb Jack".
"Mighty Bomb Jack" was released in 1986. The game was largely identical to the original game in almost all factors, except that the same screen layouts from the first game in the same sequence were now linked in a map-like continuous form by scrolling passages. "Mighty Bomb Jack" got less favorable reviews than the original game.
"Bomb Jack Twin" was released in 1993 by NMK. In this version, two players could play simultaneously.