Bomb Rush Cyberfunk Review – The Concept Of Love

Bomb Rush Cyberfunk’s core goal is to remind players of how awesome other games used to be. Jet Set Radio Future and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater are the games most reminiscent of. The problem is, by choosing nostalgia as its sole focus, Bomb Rush lacks an identity of its own – it only reminds me of why I’d rather play those other games instead. 

Bomb Rush is Sega’s attempt to rectify one of its greatest sins: that we have gone 21 years without playing a Jet Set Radio. Jet Set, for those who are unfamiliar, was an action-sports series where you controlled a group of rollerbladers that terrorized the streets of Tokyo, painting every flat surface. For dominance of the city, you fought against other gangs as well as the police. Its striking cel-shaded graphics, incredible electronic soundtrack, and general finger on the pulse of late ’90s and early aughts Japanese street culture still make it a standout of Sega’s catalog – up there with the greats of the time, such as Rez, Seaman, and Space Channel 5.

Bomb Rush is a game that demonstrates this influence. This is an action-sports game where you control a gang rollerbladers, skateboarders, and BMX riders who terrorize the streets in New Amsterdam. They paint every flat surface that can hold paint. All of this can be copied and pasted and directly applied to Bomb Rush. This is either a sincere tribute or a copycat game with little originality. The latter is my preference.

There are still some areas in which the game excels. The game is mostly mindless, but fun. New Amsterdam has a lot of levels, so tricking around them to rack up millions and millions of points is fluid. This is enhanced by the tagging feature, which stops play for a mini-game based on drawing. The ability to swap between different gangs members was a great way for me to try new skateboard tricks and BMX stunts. 

It never forces the player. It’s obvious that there is no balance meter (which was also not present in Jet Set Radio but nonetheless), so you can either grind or manually play the game without having to use any skills. It’s fun to play tricks, but I found that after 8 hours I didn’t have to really think about my actions onscreen. This is exacerbated by the fact every level has more or less the same mission structure – tag an area, beat a rival gang in a combo contest, avoid cops or fight them with bad combat, rinse, and repeat. After a while, it becomes monotonous. This is altered in the end-stage stages that are dream sequences which pushes the player’s capabilities, and these parts make the game great.

Bomb Rush is a great example of a game that has taken the Jet Set aesthetic and made it their own. Thanks to cel shading, Jet Set looks fantastic. Although its soundtrack is excellent, you may hear all your favorites too often due to the limited playlist. Hideki Naganuma – of Jet Set fame – also has several songs here; unsurprisingly, they’re rad.

Bomb Rush has been a big problem for me. I’ve used “Bomb Rush”, “Jet Set”, and the same number of words in this sentence. You can’t discuss Bomb Rush without discussing its inspirations. 

Bomb Rush seems to be aiming for the ultimate goal of making players say “Hey Jet Set Radio was cool!” Yes, Jet Set Radio was a cool game. Jet Set Radio rocks! Would I have liked to spend more time playing that? 

It’s a problem that is common to all media based on nostalgia. They are so focused on wanting people to recall how wonderful something was in the past, they lose their own sense of identity. Bomb Rush does not feel as fresh, original, or sincere as Jet Set, which was released 20 years ago. The product feels derivative, unimaginative and like the better ideas of someone else were recycled. Bomb Rush does not add any new information to the discussion. It doesn’t want to make new memories – it’s the guy in your friend group who’s still obsessed with talking about high school. Jet Set Radio still comes on every now and then. Bomb Rush will never be a game I play.

This is a shame because there’s a fun game here – it’s just trapped in a hollow shell. The game’s last sin is that it has a terrible story, which is hardly worth discussing. Let’s just say it is bad and boring. There’s room for games that want to recapture some old glory – to remind you how cool games used to be – but to do that, you have to add something new to the conversation. Neon White, a fantastic example of how to do this correctly. Bomb Rush has no interest in adding new features. It wants the same conversation we have had for years. Jet Set Radio It is a good idea to use cool. Play that instead.