Hey back-to-schoolers, this week’s Old Game That Doesn’t Suck is Boom by Factor Software, an older title that reeks of funtastic Shareware times.

Boom is a mashup of Bomberman and Doom, in the sense that the gameplay is highly derivative of Bomberman and the characters and setting of Doom’s world.  I know I’ll get crap for this but I think it plays better than Bomberman for several reasons.  The first being control and polish of the powerups, which make sense and are much more flexible in Boom than in Bomberman.  The other is that the characters are so much more lovable and adorable.  And the baddies are worth killing because they are annoying and shoot at me.  Enemies are much smarter in Boom than they ever were in Bomberman.

In case you have never played Bomberman or Boom, the game entitles the player to a field of boxes and enemies.  Bombs adjacent to boxes or creatures blow them up.  Reckless bomb laying turns the player into a mushy pile of bits.  Blow up all the enemies to move onto the next level.

It’s available for MAC OS 9 or earlier, so its not as readily available as other Bomberman style games.  But if you dig your old iMac out of the closet and ever boot it look for this title here or elsewhere.  The whole entire game is free, you just can’t save in the shareware version.