Reviews

One of three games written by Japanese company Hudson Soft for Sinclair, this quietly introduced the concept of what was later to become Bomberman to the Spectrum.

The idea is fairly simple. You wander around a maze and can drop bombs; the bombs explode taking chunks out of some of the walls opening up the maze and killing anything that's in its path. The aim of the game is to use the bombs to destroy the floaters which inhabit the maze allowing you to pass to the next level. If this sounds simple, that's glossing over a huge degree of subtlety that allows you to manoeuvre your opponents into positions that allow you to blast them safely, perhaps through gaps you created earlier. To keep you on your toes there are also auto bomb dropping levels where you've got to keep moving just to stay alive.

This isn't a game without problems though. Control is a bit jerky with some serious slowdown when there's a lot of action on the screen. It's also lacking the multi-player option that made later versions of the game into a true classic.

Overall, a great concept but just not quite the finished article.

1984 Sinclair Research Ltd (UK)
by Tanaka and Sasagawa

Eric and the Floaters was originaly released as 'Bomberman' a year before. This newer better known version includes a few changes which I think dont add up much to the game. I prefer the original with the balloon smile characters, but 'Eric' version seems slightly faster.
Anyway, this is another great little game from the Japonese software house who also brought us Cannon Ball (aka Bubble Buster), Itasundorious (aka Driller Tanks) or the great 'Stop the Express' all from the same year.
'Eric and The Floaters' is highly addictive even with such simple programming. It's not as smooth or fast as later games would be but what counts here is the addictiveness of the gameplay. I think everyone has played this game at least once, because like almost all Hudson Software games they have all been cloned along the last decades. I myself have spent hours playing it and I never got tired of the explosions or cruising around the mazes looking for the exit.
This is one of those simple looking games with far from good programming skills that still manages to keep a gamer hooked for long.
I would definitely rate this higher if only the game was better polished. For instance the speed delay whenever a bomb blows up or some of the simple graphics, also the game with gain greatly if later levels had different enemies or background tiles.

3,75 points

A poor Bomberman lookalike which never really takes off. The dull looks of the game do not help holding your attention more than a short time. The game itself soon becomes tiresome and boring.

Eric and the Floaters -apart from sounding like a pop band name- is a superb game , if only diminished by its simplistic and primitive looks .

In this game you can smell the peril with each bomb you leave behind . you can kill yourself many times and become your own worst enemy . that´s a diabolical aspect of the game .

the sound fxs are also a nice feature ... and the death sequence is one of the most impressive and dramatics I´ve seen on a Spectrum by far .

An above average game with a character of its own and a remarkable title in the little history of the sinclair zx spectrum .


If it wasn´t for the poor graphics , I would give this a 5 .

Now we all should know Bomberman should we? But did you know that Bomberman's roots lie with the humble Speccy? Yes it does, because Hudson Soft themselves ported the original MSX version to the ZX Spectrum and then in 1984 Sinclair Research re-issued the game for proper commercial release as Eric and the Floaters. And it's exactly what you'd expect from Bomberman, ok the controls are a little fiddly and unresponsive but it's 1984 after all and perfection was a near impossible thing to achieve in those days, it's still Bomberman nonetheless and still great fun and any fan of Bomberman should look at this game.

So for now on when you play Bomberman on your SNES, your Game Boy, your DS, your 360, or even in your sleep, please be sure to give thanks to Eric.

If it wasn't for the horrendous slow down this would've scored a 5. Think of it as an early Bomberman prototype except here you're trying to blow up balloons! It also has one of the best names for a game ever!

A funny maze game. Use bombs to kill enemies and reach next level. Activate bombs wisely or you'll kill yourself!

It's Bomberman distributed by Sinclair Research who then removed the programmers names and renamed it Eric and the Floaters. It's essentially the same game but it can now be controlled with a joystick which I map to the cursor keys and the tab button, and I found this much easier to control than the usual keys. So by a nose this is the better game, but both are really good and worth playing.