He has five hearts (six in Hard Mode), the highest amount for a "bigger" boss like Spellmaker. His weakness is his shadow, and Bomberman must kick bombs at the shadow to damage Spellmaker. This is not quite as easy as the fight with Cerberus, as Sirius does not give Bomberman Remote Control Bombs for the battle. Getting Spellmaker's gold cards is difficult; however, it is possible to get them by chance without even trying, however semi-unlikely and random.
Infos[]
Target Time: 20000 (Normal/Hard)
Hearts: 5 (Normal) - 6 (Hard)
Cards[]
Spellmaker calls his attacks using a rainbow-colored deck of eight cards; each is one of the Major Arcana of the standard Tarot deck. In the Japanese version, Spellmaker also says the name of the card in English as it is played, but in the Western releases all eight cards have the same "ah ha ha!" cue. The cards and attacks are as follows:
Sun (red, a picture of a white circle on a shield-like design) - A five-pointed circle of Spellmaker masks appear and descend to the ground, summoning a fiery dragon which slowly follows Bomberman around and will damage him on contact. The dragon is invulnerable and vanishes by itself after a set time. Spellmaker will play other cards while it is in play.
Star (yellow, a picture of a star) - The same five-pointed circle appears, but this time rises into the air, followed by a giant foot appearing to crush the area below.
Lover (pink, a picture of a heart inside an 'X') - Spellmaker disappears and a giant Spellmaker
Spellmaker's cards in the order they are listed. The green card is not shown.
mask appears, spitting out a series of random power-ups. Taking any of these removes the Gold Card given for free at the start of the battle; they include all normal power-ups, as well as bombs which explode, heavy weights which crush Bomberman if they land on him but are harmless once on the ground, yet, the Skull power-ups normally only seen in multiplayer, and a few other seemingly useless items. After this attack completes, Spellmaker will rise up from the floor, which is the best time to attempt to destroy his hat for the Gold Card.
World (green, a picture of the Earth surrounded by a swirl) - The room fades out to an image of space with the Earth and Moon visible, and dozens of stars fall all over the arena. A hit will stun Bomberman. The attack isn't dangerous in itself, but it will make him more vulnerable to any attack, lethal or otherwise, as Spellmaker will usually play two other cards before it plays out.
Justice (green-blue, a picture of a dagger) - Spellmaker throws slow-moving cards at Bomberman's current location, which cause a brief swirl of energy before exploding like a normal bomb; the explosion is the only part that deals damage. Essentially, Spellmaker is just kicking bombs at you that don't stun you if they hit you.
Moon (pale blue, a picture of a crescent moon) - Giant fists appear one at a time in the air above Bomberman briefly, before dropping to the ground below them, crushing Bomberman if he's caught underneath. The attack can consist of anything from two to seven fists, and Spellmaker will often play another card before it ends.
Devil/Evil (dark blue, a picture of a ram's skull) - Spellmaker's shadow extends towards Bomberman's current position and forms a hand that grabs the ground where he was standing. The "arm" doesn't count as part of Spellmaker's shadow for purposes of damage, and the hand only takes hits for purposes of getting the Gold Card; hitting it does no damage to the boss.
Death (violet, a picture of two crossed scythes) - Spellmaker's shadow appears behind it holding a scythe, then vanishes, a green arc sweeping across the ground a short distance in front. If Spellmaker is forced to evade, he will perform the attack as soon as it lands. Only the arc deals damage; being between it and Spellmaker is safe. A kicked bomb that is hit by the arc will stop.
Spellmaker's card choices aren't completely random; he can't play a card if the effect of the same card is still in play (for example, he cannot have two Sun dragons in play, or a double star shower from playing World twice), and certain cards have limits to what cards can follow (for example, he only plays the final four early-match cards during World's effect). Spellmaker typically won't play the first four cards until he has taken about 50% damage, and seems to have a lower probability of picking these cards than the other four even when they are in play.
Strategy[]
Spellmaker, like Cerberus, will evade kicked bombs, this time by flying through the air. He can also evade thrown bombs by vanishing, leaving his cape fluttering in the air. If he does this, he will peek up from below the ground for a moment before rising up, making it an ideal time to attack Spellmaker's hat for the Gold Card.
The Lovers card can be exploited to power up Bomberman; since the power-ups are carried over from life to life, as long as Bomberman isn't on his last life for the current continue he can grab them, die, and return to a state of having the "no items" Gold Card.
Spellmaker has five hearts, and each one is equivalent to two hits from a regular bomb. Once defeated, Spellmaker is completely destroyed, except for his mask.
Gold Cards[]
Already given from the start, but do not take any of the items to avoid losing it
Burn his hat
Burn his cape
Leave a bomb in the Devil/Evil card's hand so it explodes before it closes.
Defeat him by target time
Trivia[]
The US and EU versions contain unused, re-recorded voice clips of Spellmaker calling out the card names for his attacks (with The Devil called out as "Evil"), but for whatever reason, it only uses a single generic "ah ha ha!" cue for all of them. It is possible that the non-naming of the Devil card was part of a failed attempt to get around Nintendo of America's notoriously strict stance on religious and occult references in games at the time. However, even when Nintendo of America softened its strict stance on religious and occult references in games due to the release of Kirby: Star Allies, the voice clips still remained unused.
Interestingly, however, in the Japanese version, the way Spellmaker calls out The Devil card in Japanese actually translates to "Devil" due to the similarities with the Romaji and English translations.
