Boulders and Bombs

Boulders and Bombs is a digging game in which you must get three men across the screen, through tunnels that you make either by using your auger or bombs. You can alternate between the auger (a fancy word for an automated shovel) and the spelunker by pressing the joystick button. Your digging may be hampered by rocks - the higher the level, the greater the number of rocks that you have on the screen. In an emergency, you can plant a bomb by twisting your joystick clockwise in a circle.

Meanwhile, the sky above is infested with a hostile flock of birds - a mother and her three offspring. This is where the multi-player capabilities come in. Up to three other people can control the baby birds, which drop either nuclear rods or rods that turn into fungus when they reach the tunnel. The birds can drop rods through any terrain, though they are greatly slowed down by rocks.

This is a sound premise upon which to build a game. Unfortunately the designers failed to provide an exciting challenge. After the novelty wears off you notice the details, like the spelunker's complete ineptness at dropping bombs. After swinging the joystick around, I finally managed to plant one. I keep practicing, but unfortunately this didn't result in greater proficiency in bomb planting, only in the swift and unfortunate demise of my favorite joystick. And while the screen graphics are very beautiful, they never really change that much, just new boulders in the same old places.

If you are playing one of the birds, just plant a fungus in front of the spelunker, and after that he is finished.