OK, so I got a camera and my Genesis emulator portable, and got ready to take pictures, but as it turns out, the portable generated a different level than last time I turned it on. I reset the portable, went through the main and SD card menus again, and booted up Bomboy yet again, and it generated yet another different level. Took a picture of that. Then reset, went through menus, loaded Bomboy, generated different level, and took a picture yet again. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Feel free to add these screenshots to the first post if you like.
Here are my results.
Spoiler: click to toggle
All these photos are of
Level 1-1.
(keep in mind that the player always starts on the very first tile, I just moved my player character to the right on the second screenshot)
So, the
AtGames Sega Genesis Ultimate Portable randomly generates a completely different level for Bomboy upon each bootup, unlike other emulators. And yes, it does that even when you input passwords for different levels. Huh. I wonder if the original intention of the programmers was to "make each playing experience different" by having randomly generated levels upon each time the Genesis is powered on. We also have to consider
the back of the Bomboy box with screenshots of the same plain layouts (probably test levels), but different textures.
And yes, I checked, the demo level is still the same as the one in the screenshot.
I do have to give Bomboy credit, though, for practically making a procedurally-generated game combined with a (main mode) Bomberman experience (be it intentionally or not), which does sound like a lot of fun, really, and something that former official Bomberman owner Hudson Soft (and current owner Konami) had yet to provide (to current knowledge).
(EDIT: OK, so soft-resetting does give you different levels. Fusion still gives diagonal levels, but at least they're
different diagonal levels each time. Hmmm.... could it be that Bomboy in its entirety relies on procedural generation without even any pre-made levels? And its effects are different for each emulator?)