Super Methane Bros (Amiga CD32)

Developer:

Apache Software

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Release Date:

1994

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Systems:

Amiga, Amiga CD32

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This week on Super Adventures, I'm playing Super Methane Bros on the Amiga CD32!

The game came out in 1994 and there were already a few games with "Bros." in the title by then. First there was Mario Bros., which is its original Japanese title by the way. The abbreviation was there even in Japan. Then afterwards there was Super Mario Bros., Buster Bros. (which is not its Japanese title), Blood Bros., Snow Bros., and Bonanza Bros. And there's one thing that all these games have in common: they remembered to put the dot after "Bros".

Oh hang on, it seems that "Bros" without a dot is the correct way to write it in British English, and Apache Software was British. Actually Mobygames says they were from , but that's close enough. The studio didn't get to make many games before vanishing in the mid '90s, and half their credits are for ports of Sensible Soccer, but they did make the graphically impressive Amiga first-person shooter Death Mask and Mega Drive/Genesis platformer Marsupilami. Plus the sprite artist went on to become the lead artist on some of the Ratchet & Clank games, so there's some bonus trivia for you.

Okay I'm going to play this until I get bored or run out of lives. Shouldn't take long I expect.

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Hey it's got an animated intro! I've played the game before on a regular Amiga, but I've never seen this. This is the kind of thing you can do when you've got 700 MB of spare storage.

I'm not sure why they're all wearing gasmasks on a sight-seeing tour though. Did something happen to the Earth's atmosphere? Does the game take place on some alien world?

Actually, forget that, I've got a new question: who names their kids Puff and Blow? That's actual cruelty. Especially if their full names are Puff Methane and Blow Methane.

That bus driver totally knows they fell out, he just doesn't care.

Hang on, they called this a bus. How is this a bus? Every definition I've seen for the word 'bus' says that it applies to large passenger vehicles, larger than a car at least. Sorry, I'm just nitpicking because I can't think of anything funny to say about this tragic situation.

That shot of them looking up at the sinister tower is so strange. I'm not sure that's how perspective works. 

The bit where they decide it's a good idea to go inside the sinister tower is also strange, but I suppose they are out sight-seeing. Plus it gets them indoors, away from the snails.

Inside they meet a wizard with a watch on his hat that claims it's exactly 3 o'clock. He's also carrying an hour glass, so I'm sensing a bit of a 'time' theme.

He reveals that Puff and Blow were brought here by fate! Or maybe by a weird clock-themed wizard, the guy's being vague about that. Either way they're trapped and the only way they'll get back out is to defeat the Key Keeper at the very top of this ridiculously tall tower.

Man, I've seen this 'climb the tower, each floor is a different level' premise in so many video games at this point. It's in Rod-Land, it's in Tower of Druaga... uh, I can't actually think of any other examples at the moment but I'm sure I'm forgetting something really obvious. Die Hard Arcade, maybe?

Fortunately the wizard's providing them with some weaponry, giving each of them a Methane gun. 

My brain immediately got to work questioning how these tubes fill up with methane, why shooting methane at enemies helps, and where that shine is coming from. But the answer to all three questions is: they were made by a wizard.

By the way, I didn't plan this to be 'the heroes are kidnapped by a wizard who gives them a mission' week on Super Adventures, it's just a coincidence that Pools of Darkness starts the same way. Plus you don't even get any Methane guns in that.

After writing about all those Dungeons & Dragons games it's nice to play a game that I can explain with just a single GIF. This is Super Methane Bros, this is how it plays.

It's like the classic arcade game Bubble Bobble, except I have to suck the bubbles back in and fire them at a wall. The 'at a wall' part is important, I can't just fire them across the screen and expect them to eventually hit something. I was just a little too far away to get that second enemy.

One thing that doesn't come across in the GIF is that there's a bit of a delay on the Methane gun. The frame rate is exactly as it seems though. I haven't cut any frames out this time, that's legit how smooth it runs: 16.7 frames per second.

The game's going for an '80s arcade style, but those shadows under the platforms are very 1994 Amiga. I feel like I'm playing Naughty Ones.

Okay, that's level 1 complete and now I've got all these toys to pick up. Oh, and a giant playing card, I'll have that too. I have to be quick though, as Bubble Bobble rules say I've only got a few seconds before the game drags me to the next arena.

I should stop writing Bubble Bobble in case I accidentally summon it.

Bubble Bobble (Arcade)

Oh, well there you go.

Bubble Bobble really defined this kind of single-screen arcade platformer, where the enemies roaming the ledges need to all be cleared out using a slightly awkward multiple-step process. In Bubble Bobble's case you have to hit them with a bubble so that they're floating around harmlessly (just like Super Methane Bros) and then you pop the bubble by jumping onto it. The tricky part is avoiding the other enemies while you're doing it.

Also fruit keeps appearing and you receive points if you can get to it before it disappears. Other foodstuffs too. I just eat it all, it's probably fine.

I really wish landing on enemies wasn't so deadly in these games, to me. It's not that I want to be able to jump on enemies and kill them, I just want them to be stunned and harmless for a second so I can get down to where I need to be.

The game's not being completely unfair here, I messed up the timing, but it's still more awkward than it needs to be.

Oh, I forgot to mention that when I finish a level Puff (or maybe Blow) fires up a grappling hook from his Methane gun and uses it to pull himself up to the next level. Only 97 floors left to go now!

Can you stop bouncing around with your propeller helmets for a moment and come down here, I've got a time limit! You shouldn't even need them, you're bees!

Oh great, now the time lizard's here... and it's still 3 o'clock huh?

It's common in these kinds of arcade games for a creature to come after you when you've been hanging around the same stage for two long. The game wants you off the machine so another player can start putting coins in.

I managed to finish the level with 1 life left... and immediately threw it away on the next level by standing right where an enemy spawned in. So now I know that the number in the middle of the screen tells me how many continues I have. I've got 5 of them now, so I can keep playing this for a while.

Completing level 6 seems pretty easy, as the blue things are happy to just drive around their walls.

Though the level's called "Switch Hunt" and there's a treasure chest sealed up in a wall over there, so there's something else going on here that I can't figure out. I've been jumping on every floor tile and firing enemies at different walls, but I'm not finding any switches or opening any doors.

I should probably be leaving the chest alone anyway. This isn't my house, that's someone else's treasure in that box and they clearly don't want visitors to come and take it!

That worked out pretty well. I love this candle power up, it gets the job done. Though I probably won't be mentioning that the toys came from incinerated enemies when I sell them all on eBay later.

I'm less impressed by the reward for collecting four aces. One extra life? Seriously? I burn through them so quickly that I won't even notice I have it.

Level 10 introduces a new twist: these grumpy blocks can't be killed, but they can be moved and stacked. Handy if I want to get somewhere higher up, or if I want to accidentally block my escape route when flies are bouncing down onto me. Man, I'm just throwing away lives in this game.

I wonder if these blocks were borrowed from another game, or if they're something they came up with themselves. Reviewers at the time compared the game to 1991 arcade platformer Tumblepop, so is it just a clone of that?

Tumblepop (Arcade)

Tumblepop has a similar core game mechanic as Super Methane Bros, as you jump around single-screen levels sucking enemies up and then firing them out to destroy them. But it's also got other things going on that I haven't seen in Methane Bros, as this grumpy block in the middle is actually an enemy generator that you need to destroy by firing enemies at it.

Also Tumblepop really likes to have areas in the screen fill up with enemies, like that section on the bottom right. The trouble is it's just like Bubble Bobble and Methane Bros in that you can't land on enemies, so getting in there is a bit of a challenge.

Level 12 introduces clowns. I hate clowns, especially when they're throwing their juggling clubs at me. I don't have a defence against that as far as I'm aware. 

All I can do to avoid their attacks is jump up to the next level, and I haven't yet found a way to drop back down again other than dying. So there goes even more of my precious lives.

Level 15's gimmick is that the screen wraps in all directions and the only wall that can kill an enemy is the block in the middle. So I'm quickly gassing all the enemies to give me room to manoeuvre while they're floating helpless. I need to grab one, leap into position, then throw it into the brick.

One thing that's useful is that you can hold the button down to store an enemy in your gun for a moment. I really wish I'd remembered I could do that sooner!

Snow Bros (Arcade)

Here's another single-screen arcade platformer for you: Snow Bros., released in 1990. In this one you shoot fiery snowballs at enemies until they're all covered up. Then you give the snowball a shove and send it rolling around the screen, hopefully hitting someone else on the way down. So it's closer to Bubble Bobble than it is to Methane Bros, but it plays pretty similarly to both of them

The trouble I had with this one is that snowing up an enemy takes a few taps of the button, and you're always snowing up enemies. So you're constantly going tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap...

Collecting upgrade potions helps, but they only last until you get killed and then you're back to being rubbish. I want to like the game, especially as your snowman (Nick or Tom) does a little backflip every time you jump, but the tapping is a bit of a deal breaker for me.

I'm on floor 17 now (only 83 left to go!) and I've still got a couple of continues left, miraculously.

I've also found a secret door that only appears when I'm next to it. Trouble is that I can't figure out how to get it open! I've been going through all the buttons on the controller, but no luck so far. 

... what?

Why am I looking at the title screen, what just happened? Don't tell me that one of the face buttons quits the game. Hang on, I need to check the manual and figure this out.

ONE OF THE FACE BUTTONS IS QUIT! Holy shit, why would they do that? 

They could've at least asked me to confirm my choice afterwards. This is even worse than those DOS games that instantly quit if you tap Escape, because that is the key you'd press when looking for the quit option. This, on the other hand, is the button you press when you're trying to open a secret door.

It doesn't seem like there are any passwords either. Well I guess that's that then.


CONCLUSION

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Does Super Methane Bros suck, or does it blow?

Honestly I've got to agree with all the other reviewers who said "I dunno." Sometimes I liked it, sometimes I didn't, but most of the time I had both feelings simultaneously.

The gameplay is a decent enough variation of a Bubble Bobble/Tumblepop single-screen arcade platformer, with its main flaw perhaps being that it's not as slick as an arcade game. It's a little sluggish, I felt like there was enough lag on the Methane gun to throw off my timing, and it's really obviously not running at a smooth 50 FPS.

Also the visuals are very... Amiga. To be fair that can mean all kinds of things, Bitmap Brothers Amiga games look metallic, Cinemaware's Amiga games had beautiful illustrated scenes etc., but in this case I guess I mean it uses a lot of pillow shading. That's when areas of the art are dark around the outside and get lighter towards the middle. Look at their hair in that title screen up there, you'll see it right away. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but it does come across as amateurish and makes the heroes look like they're made out of fabric. Overall though, the game's suitably colourful and readable.

But my favourite part is that one song that plays constantly throughout every level. Sorry, that wasn't sarcasm, I really do like the music, and it sounds even better on the CD release. I've played a few games which had their whole soundtrack replaced when they jumped to CD, like it didn't even occur to the publisher that a game's music is a part of its identity, but here you're always getting the true Super Methane Bros experience. And there are other songs later if you stick with it.

The game uses a bunch of voice samples as well, saying things like "Gas power!" and "Get a move on, buddy", in addition to all the quacks and train sounds (no fart sounds though, surprisingly). It's always trying to entertain, I just wasn't having much fun with it.

Though I suppose it's competent enough, and it's probably better in co-op. I'm not even dreading the idea of playing it again at some point. I know, I'll give it a ghostly insubstantial gold star. That way I can avoid settling on an actual opinion.

Super Methane Bros was originally only for Amiga 500, Amiga 1200, Amiga CD32 etc., but in 2001 it escaped to PC, with a port officially authorised by Apache Software. At the time I'm writing this its latest update was in April 2026 and it works on Windows 11, Linux and RISCOS.

The project's here on SourceForge, all assets included, so you can download and play it for free. Though it runs at turbo speed and you're apparently stuck with using 'up' to jump. You may find that you have a better time with the CD32 version.

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Alright, I need to get busy with other projects again for a while, so you've got ages to guess what the next game will be.

Oh come on, don't tell me you've figured it out already.