Buck Bumble

by Nintendo

Product Features

• Nintendo

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B0000296ZI
• Item Weight: 8 ounces
• Media: Game Cartridge
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #17,955 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

GameSpot Review

Argonaut's Buck Bumble has the look and feel of a first generation Nintendo 64 game that missed its boat. Simply put, the game is a mission-based, character-driven adventure/shooter that attempts to ape the Super Mario 64 world, but ends up making a bit of a monkey of itself instead.

Buck Bumble is a big game, no doubt about it. There are 20 missions of varying size and depth (some longer and more complicated, some shorter and time-reliant), but all of them are rather frustrating, with the exception of the boss levels, which can actually be quite challenging and fun. The gameplay is linear, so you work your way through each level by utilizing teleporters and destroying generators to open Herd Gates that lead to the next area you need to visit. The problem with the way the missions are set up is that your progress means little unless you finish the mission with just one life. You can save the game once a mission is completed and you do have three bees to beat the game with, however, if you die, you start at the beginning of the mission, and all of your progress is lost.

The actual mission objectives find you destroying enemy satellite uplinks, planting explosives under targets, transporting nuclear devices to safe detonation zones, and so on. But besides reaching your goal, you have to gather items for points (ten thousand points earns an extra bee), fight off enemy spiders, weevils, wasps, bees, water worms, exploding mines and pods, and even wall sconces and gargoyles that shoot things at you as you work your way through. Encountering these creatures, especially the flying ones, is somewhat annoying at first, largely because when they attack you, you're unable to fight back or flee for a fragment of a second - a fragment that frequently means the difference between life and death and you going back to the beginning of the level.

The developers have emphasized the fact that when the going gets tough in the game, players will always have a way out, in any given situation - a trait the company considered "unique" among games. Well this feature is surely the bee's sting and honey. Yes, you can gather nectar from readily available flowers to increase your life, hide on a leaf to try to snipe at wasps with your limited freedom of movement, or crawl on the ground where some of the enemies won't attack you, but this type of gameplay promotes Darwin's antithesis: survival of the weakest. If you run, hide, cower, and take advantage of those "outs," you'll spend an inordinate amount of time trying to complete your missions, and you can forget about doing so in the allotted bonus time for extra points. And you won't want to avoid the enemy insects, because by killing them, you often get extra ammunition for your pretty decent assortment of weapons. On a positive note, this collection of guns, each with a limited ammo supply, is diverse and works quite well. If you plan your attacks by carefully situating yourself on a rock, ledge, plant leaf or any other prop in a high traffic zone, you can take out your enemies, which are fairly predictable, and clear a path to complete your task at hand.

General gameplay aside, the bee's handling is not very commendable either. You can get a pretty decent speed going, if you're flying, and after several hours you'll be zipping through tunnels and around plants, but on the ground, forget it. You hobble along extremely slowly, so you'd better learn to stay in the air and like it. When dealing with the controls in battle, you'll exercise a lot of duck and cover. Fortunately, you can use the shoulder buttons to do a 360 degree loop up, over, and around to the back of the insect pursuing you, because the horizontal turning radius is a joke. For instance, working your way through a somewhat narrow section of a level with explosives in tow while trying not to hit the walls and other structures, amounts to an exercise in futility, until you die several times from bumping a gate opening or doorway, start the mission over, and eventually end up getting the hang of it. The key to everything seems to be going at a snail's pace, but what fun is that? This isn't a challenge at all, it's a curse - it's not a matter of learning to use a well-functioning, complex feature, it's a matter of making lousy game mechanics work just well enough so you can get by. Yet even though when standing on a ledge, in the air, or on the ground you don't have a lot of freedom of movement to place your sight onto targets around you, the cameras work moderately well over your bee's shoulder, allowing you to at least move your line of sight from side to side if not up and down. You can also focus in tighter on your subject, into a perspective that is fairly comfortable. --Lauren Fielder
--Copyright ©1999 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of GameSpot is prohibited. GameSpot and the GameSpot logo are trademarks of GameSpot Inc.

Product Description

This is the game Buck Bumble for the Nintendo 64. This is cartridge only and is used or preplayed. All of our N64 nintendo games are cleaned comma tested and guaranteed to work. We stand by our products and offer a 60 day guarantee. If a game does not work within 60 days from the time you receive it we will gladly exchange it for you

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not a bad game, November 10, 2000

By 

jasenao (Dothan, Alabama, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Buck Bumble (Game Cartridge)

"Buck Bumble" is a pretty good game. In the one-player game, you have to make your way through several long, but fun missions. You play as Buck Bumble, a bee who's mission is to kill other insects that were created by a strong nemesis. Buck can carry and use several cool guns and other weapons to use against his enemies. In some levels, you mainly just have to kill other insects and find the end of the level, and in others you have to do things such as carry a bomb without dropping it and landing it on a safe pad before time runs out and it explodes. There are also fun levels where you have to go up against a boss. The only bad thing about the game is that most of the levels are overly difficult, especially after you get past Mission 8. So get ready to have to find a lot of extra energy which is in the form of a drop of honey on the tip of flowers in each level. Buck is a terribly slow walker on land, but you'll have to walk on land in order to defeat several of the enemies and bosses.

The graphics for "Buck Bumble" are done pretty well, especially the other insects and the landscapes. The controls aren't as good as they could've been, but they're good enough. I thought the sound and the music for the game was the best part about "Buck Bumble" other than the fun factor. To have something to do once you get tired of playing the one-player game, there's also a 2-player soccer game in which you and somebody else can compete against each other in a soccer match, which can also be a lot of fun. I recommend anybody to give "Buck Bumble" a try.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Like the ad says, BUCK IS THE BEE!, January 10, 2000

By A Customer

= Durability:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars  = Educational:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Buck Bumble (Game Cartridge)

I love this game. There's just not enough I can say about it. Buck is a character with as much personality as the video game world has seen in a long time! I mean, a cybernetic bee that can carry weapons that, probably, could kill off any super-powerful enemy in Doom or Quake, and levels that, while they are grainy, are still great fun. Multiplayer dogfight (or should I say beefight?)mode isn't the greatest, but the soccer mode is more entertaining. Play control, despite what others say, is still really good. Anyone who enjoys games like Space Station: Silicon Valley, Goldeneye, or Jet Force Gemini should play this.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Betta bee ready, February 12, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Buck Bumble (Game Cartridge)

this is a cool game because the format and look of the game is so cool it should be done more often,and the bee is pretty cool too.The controls are very easy to get used too as well is the fact that your in a free roaming world.though this is not the best game,if you can get it under $...(and you can) then buy it you'll enjoy very much P.S its much better than i put it.:)