Once the final job is complete, you get your ending!

Not much of one, I'm afraid, but you'll have to make do.

The blimp from the intro appears and hosts projector screen, showing the boys and the bad guys having a grand old time. There's even authentic film scratches!

Unfortunately, we can't show it you animated- it relies way, way too much on flashing the screen to show.



The Mega Drive uses a similar, if less annoying technique, alternating between the normal image and a dimmed version.

These static shots will have to do, I'm afraid.

Sadly, neither the arcade nor the Mega Drive version actually lists the names of people who actually worked on the game. Some of the other ports of the game do use this opportunity to list the staff who worked on those ports, but that's all. Fortunately, as mentioned all the way back on the first page (remember all the way back then?) the excellent resource tome Sega Mega Drive / Genesis Complete Works interviewed many current and former Sega employees, including Manabu Kusunaki who was interviewed for his work on the arcade version of Bonanza Bros. as the graphic designer. We'll be exploring some of his comments pertaining to the aesthetics of the game in the final summary below, but one thing I definitely want to point out is the movie influences on the game- The Pink Panther, ¡Three Amigos! and The Blues Brothers are noted as films that Kusunaki watched and "brought their mood and atmosphere into the game". The most important detail here is this direct quote, presented in full: "For the two main characters, Robo and Mobo, we always had the image of The Blues Brothers in mind, so they absolutely had to wear sunglasses."




The boys are now living it up with all the money they made for a job well done- we've finished Bonanza Bros.

This is a really interesting study for an arcade game, given that its premise seems like it'd be more likely to show up on a home computer around that time (and that's what was studied during its development). So, let's try and figure this out, is it successful at its approach towards stealth? That's a tricky question, because what would be considered a successful stealth game at home simply would not work in an arcade. Bonanza Bros. is a slow game in many respects, but it could never be allowed to be too slow in an arcade. As such, it has a bit of a hodgepodge solution, with a somewhat inconsistent execution. Enemies will usually forget you pretty easily if you lean up against a wall or head down some stairs and don't pursue you aggressively too often (they'd rather have a gunfight with you). This plays into the game's favour somewhat though, as it keeps things moving along- sure, you have to be patient and lean up against walls to wait for guards to get in position, but you can also use deft joystick manipulation to scoot by them at times or get the drop on them, so things do keep going with the odd lull here and there. By the same token however, sometimes enemies just seem to spot you at times you swear you were out their field of vision, and specifically in the arcade version many enemies will just fire the second they see you which feels a bit mean. This can make the arcade game somewhat frustrating at points, which is something I'll get back to.

While I'm belly-aching, the level layouts are a little inconsistent too, mostly with regards to co-op play. I suppose the designers had a difficult task here, designing maps that would both encourage players to split up to cover more ground, but also not frustrate solo players by making them go all around the Wrekin and making sure they can be reasonably cleared within the time limit. Some of the earlier ones absolutely achieve that aim- I'd point to the Millionaire's Mansion, the Mint and later on the Pyramid as being stages that really encourage players to divvy up tasks and cover more ground by themselves, while also having obvious optimal routes for solo players (even if the Pyramid cuts it a little close). However, many of the stages inbetween those are very linear, with only one proper route throughout, which is a little disappointing- you'd figure these kinds of levels would appear early on in the game rather than later. Related to this, the arcade version does perhaps have a few too many levels and you can definitely see why some of them were cut for the Mega Drive port. Some extra enemy types would've spiced things up here and there, but that's more extra garnish than anything else.

The game itself then does a decent job at adapting stealth gameplay to the arcade, albeit with caveats. However, it's the presentation that does a lot of heavy lifting, because not only does it not play like many other arcade games of the time, it doesn't look like one either. In the SMDGCW interview, Manabu Kusunaki points to Hiro Yamagata's silk screen artwork as being a huge influence on the game's visual style especially when it came to colour usage, and looking at pieces like Robbers, Perrier and Key Cargo City Lights, you can definitely see a throughline- vivid colours and a focus on skylines (the blimp the boys escape from each job in was directly inspired by Yamagata's work) define the backdrop of the game, and it works amazingly well (with even some mild world-building- multiple buildings have names, and many are astronomy-themed for no reason other than 'why not?'). Beyond that though, while other System-24 games use the enlarged resolution to display small, finely-detailed sprites on lavishly-detailed backdrops, Bonanza Bros. goes the opposite direction, focusing on colourful, gradient-heavy backgrounds and well-animated but highly abstract characters. The citizens of Badville are very toy-like with features either missing or merely implied (headgear and glasses cover where the eyes should be) which gives them an inherent charm, and the attention to detail with just little silly things- the fly that appears when you lean against walls too long, the deeply-satisfying scrunch when you slam a door into an enemy's face, the panic of the waiter whose plates clatter and smash all around... These all go a long way to creating the playful atmosphere of this comical 'reaction' game.

However, there was a reason I played both the arcade and Mega Drive versions this time- I'd like to make a case for the Mega Drive port being the better of the two. You can read more about that in the short reviews of each version, but let's just cover this here too. Obviously, this port can't compete in terms of visuals- the loss of resolution and animation frames makes it an easy win for the arcade- but this version really does its best to capture the spirit of the arcade game's aesthetic, something I think it achieves fairly well, using the animation frames and colours it has to keep things looking as nice as possible. In terms of play control, the arcade version definitely feels smoother- flitting between the foreground and background, whether you're walking or jumping, is very quick and flows nicely, and you jump immediately after pressing the button which makes dodging bullets considerably easier. The Mega Drive version, in contrast, does sometimes feel slightly stodgier when moving between lanes, like there's a slight pause, and there is a noticeable delay when jumping so you have to be very careful if you want to use it to dodge stuff. It's not that it controls badly, far from it, it's just the movement doesn't flow as nicely, and this can make things like quickly switching between planes to out-flank a guard a little tricker. You get used to it in time, but it's still worth noting.

However, it's the enemy AI and their numbers that makes me prefer playing the MD version. A game like this has to play a delicate balancing act, affording the player a little leeway because the rules of when the enemy can and can't see you can be, well, a bit vague, and I feel the arcade version leans a bit too far against the player. The fact that a lot of enemies fire at you the second they spot you makes it a pretty frustrating game at times, and not getting spotted is sometimes out of your hands- one great example is the Mint, one door near the exit leads to an apparently-abandoned hallway, but there's a shield guard at the end that fires as soon as he scrolls on-screen. Things like bomb-throwers being able to spot you even when it looks like they're not looking in your direction (and in the Millionaire's Mansion, spotting you as soon as you swing in from the zipline forcing you to hide as soon as you regain control otherwise you get hit) really don't help. However, the reduction of enemies and their tendency to stall a little before acting after spotting you gives you that extra bit of leeway in the Mega Drive port, making it less frustrating, and more fun to play around with- it feels less rigid, more free to allow you to engage in what approaches you can take to each level. There's also the chance this makes the game a little too easy for some- guards are way easier to knock out because of these changes- but it will still take some work to get a one-credit clear on this version, even with these alterations. So, while it still has some of those level design quibbles of the arcade game, and you'd need to practice a little for a co-op session seeing as there's limited credits, I would personally vouch for the Mega Drive version to be the one to go for.

Oh goodness, I was worried this might happen, I wrote way too many words about this game, I'd better start wrapping up. While I would definitely recommend the Mega Drive version over the arcade original, it's still worth playing some version of Bonanza Bros. because while its implementation of stealth is very arcade-like and a bit here-and-there, it's still a pretty engaging little game of cat-and-mouse, with solid controls and impeccable presentation that would only really continue in the Puzzle & Action series (which is otherwise unconnected, being a set of minigame collections). If you have a pal willing to learn the ropes, even better! Give these boys a chance, I'm sure they've earned completely legitimately and with no kind of thievery involved.


And now, it's that time, folks!
EXTENDED PLAY!


Time to dive right into the home ports. We've actually had to split this into three sections, so get ready!

First, Japanese console / computer releases. This one ain't so bad, so let's get stuck in.

Let's skip over the Mega Drive version because, well, I'm sure you've seen enough of that for one day.



The first port to discuss is the Sharp X68000 port- yes, the boys got a Japanese home computer port!



This is another job published by SPS, responsible for a whole ruck of arcade conversions for the system including The NewZealand Story, Märchen Maze and Pac-Mania, and this is very much in their style- very close to the original arcade game. Some places credit the coding of this port to Dempa but I've found no actual evidence for this. Pretty much everything is here and accounted for in this port, including music, animation, resolution (the amount of the screen you can see is only ever-so-slightly smaller than the original) and even the Training Stage option should you wish to brush up! I initially thought there were no options settings to speak of, but it turns out reading the manual helps- press F4 before starting the game and you can set the number of credits, select your starting stage, test the music and sound effects and alter the CRT resolution among other options. Now I'll have to go back and test all the other X68K ports I've covered on this site, whoops!! If you happen to have an X68000 lying around- just got a Japanese home computer knocking about in the attic, as you do- this is obviously the premium choice.



Next up is the PC Engine Super CD-ROM2 version, sadly released only in Japan.



This one seems to be developed by NEC Avenue themselves if MobyGames is to be trusted- staff members who worked on this are also credited for various PCE ports like OutRun, Forgotten Worlds and Sagaia, as well as priginal projects like Splash Lake and Monster Maker. This uses the arcade game as a basic template in terms of levels included and treasure layout, and in appearance feels closer to the Mega Drive game with smaller sprites (perhaps more an inevitability than a conscious choice, given the reduced resolution) and far less animation frames (the walking sprites are especially off) but has a much brighter colour palette overall. One notable omission graphics-wise is parallax scrolling- the backgrounds you can see through the windows never scroll. What it does have, however, is a CD-quality soundtrack courtesy of T's Music of Final Fight CD fame, and it's exactly as great as that set of words would lead you to believe, it's top-shelf stuff.

As for how it plays, this seems pretty fine. It's nice and speedy (perhaps a little too speedy in some cases- enemy animations for looking around are a bit too fast and so they move from their post a lot quicker, meaning you have less time to sneak past them or deal with it) and it lacks the lag between pressing the button and jumping present in the Mega Drive version, making dodging enemies and bullets easier. Enemies are also considerably less quick on the draw when they spot you than in the arcade version, so it's less frustrating. This is a nice sweetspot between the arcade game and the Mega Drive port, and add in the fantastic soundtrack and you have an excellent conversion of the game, so if you have the console to play it on, this comes recommended.



Last of the contemporary ports! If you weren't expecting a Europe and Brazil-only Master System port of the game, then you must be new to '90s-era Sega games, bless your heart.



Apparently released some time in 1992 (contrary to the copyright date on the title screen, mostly judging this from the Mean Machines Sega review which dates it to mid-1992), the Master System port of Bonanza Bros. was developed by Sanritsu, later SIMS, frequent Sega collaborator, and is based more on the arcade version... Sort-of. It uses the original arcade intro story text (with some serious embellishments in the manual, we'll talk about that later) and includes versions of the two arcade-exclusive stages, the Department Store (you can even see part of the Mel's sign here!) and the Antique Store, plus the Bonus Stages. The early stages also use the treasure layouts from the arcade version rather than the Mega Drive game. However, the Deluxe Liner and Art Gallery stages have been dumped, and a lot more has changed from there.

For a start, as I'm sure you can see from the screenshots, you now get to see two floors of each building at a time, and during gameplay you no longer have a map visible (you can see it when you pause, but have fun getting out of your chair every time you want to see it). The screen will awkwardly flick-scroll when you go up or down beyond the limits of the screen which freezes everything, and stairs have been changed so they're always two flights each and you have to move between the background and foreground halfway up. Because there's no split-screen anymore, two-player support has been dropped, but at least you can choose which brother you want to play as before you start a game, which is a nice touch (although the boys now have proper human flesh-tones instead of yellow and orange). Generally, the game controls fine- a little less smooth than the other versions, your shots no longer reach across the entire screen, and moving between the foreground and background feels a little more stiff than before, but it does the job well enough.

Far more interesting are the changes to the stages themselves. Most are roughly comparable to the original arcade game but others have undergone a lot of changes (the Millionaire's Mansion has completely changed the loft area, the Antique Store is missing its springboard and needs you to ascendthe right side of the building instead, etc.) and while some enemies like the waiters and bomb-throwers have been dropped, new ones have been added! The Casino gets new magician enemies that try to bop you, the Laboratory is populated by robots that can't be knocked out and scientists who try to hit you with a wrench, the Antique Store is guarded by little ninjas and samurai who can't be hurt when they're hunting for you, and the Pyramid has mummies. This is a neat little touch, and I'm honestly surprised the arcade game didn't try theming the guards to some of the more outlandish locations, it would've added a nice bit of variety! Overall, this is a decent enough version with enough unique elements to it that it'd be an interesting study for those who've played the other versions to death.



Next, we have a remake... Sort-of. It's Sega Ages 2500 Series Vol. 6: Ichini no Tant-R to Bonanza Bros. for the PS2.



This one gets credited to Japan Art Media who have quite the catalogue- as well as the Aretha games, they worked on the two Phantasy Star: Generation remakes also part of the Sega Ages 2500 series, as well as several games and ports in the Lunar series (including, yes, Dragon Song, the one that lives in infamy). We'll skip over the history of the Sega Ages 2500 line as a whole as it's not especially relevant and get straight to the point. As the title suggests, this is a combo pack of the original Bonanza Bros. plus the minigame collection Puzzle & Action: Tant-R which used the same artstyle as Bonanza Bros. but with a completely different setting, pitting two detectives against a series of bizarre minigames. In the style of the Puzzle & Action title, Bonanza Bros. gets the appended title of HARDBOILED ACTION which, yes, perfect.

Let's focus on Bonanza Bros. here, this is ostensibly a remake of the arcade game, using all the levels and treasure layouts from that game, but with various visual embellishments. You can see reflections on windows, there's more background details, all that good stuff. However, the game itself feels a little off. Mostly it's the animation- as well as not quite looking as nice as the arcade game, many animations play too quickly, such as guards looking around, giving you less time to get the drop on them. The soundtrack is also disappointing when compared to the PC Engine port, and feels very MIDI-esque, a stark contrast to some of the other soundtracks in the Sega Ages 2500 line. It's alright, like, but sounds a bit weak. This is really just a slightly-worse version of the arcade game with some minor foibles of its own, so it's definitely not a definitive port or remaster of any kind. You do get the Tant-R remake with this though, so that's a nice bonus (and it includes a cameo from our boys in one of the minigames) and it's easy enough to find- this was included in the Sega Classics Collection released in the West, so you don't have to import it like you do for the other, better Sega Ages 2500 games.



There was also a Japan-only featurephone port at some point around 2007! Can't play this one, but it's only got Robo in it. Sorry, Mobo.



Finally, you can just bring the arcade home- the System-24 version of Bonanza Bros. was included in the Astro City Mini plug-and-play console released in 2021. If you can get one, like. Not a whole lot to mention here, but it seems to be a pretty decent emulation albeit with no dip switch options to mess with and it's only the Japanese version, meaning Japanese text in the tutorial mission.


Next, Gaming Hell's Achilles' heel, its kryptonite, European home computer ports of arcade games, Lord have mercy on us.

Fortunately, I've found a way to make this much easier.

Most of the Sega conversions for home computers were handled by U.S. Gold (although not all- Last Battle, for instance, was published for the micros by Elite) but unfortunately, beyond the Amiga and Atari ST versions which are credited to Syntax, there's no solid company credits listed for most of these games, so I've had to default to U.S. Gold as the developer- almost certainly not the case, but gotta work with what I have. The other thing to bring up before looking at these is an odd trend they all share- they're kind-of not ports of the arcade version. The Amiga and Atari ST version certainly contain some elements from the arcade game, which I'll get to, but several elements of these ports- basic appearance, levels included, treasure placement in some cases- point to the Mega Drive version being what their work was based on. That's a little unusual, but it also makes sense- the arcade Bonanza Bros. wasn't exactly the most common arcade game even back then, so while this is assumption on my part, it's possible the Mega Drive was used as the basis for convenience, or perhaps that's what materials Sega sent the dev teams and they just had to work with it. Whatever the case, consider these Mega Drive ports rather than arcade ports, and they make a bit more sense.

Anyway, to make this process as painless as possible, I've decided to rip myself off. As with The NewZealand Story, I'm giving each game one (1) paragraph of text and two (2) screenshots, made the necessary animal sacrifices and tributes to the many-angled ones to get whatever ramshackle emulators I could find to play nice, and considered the limitations of these systems- for the 8-bit games, the most important consideration is not whether all the content of the original game is present, but more to answer the question, "does it recreate the experience of Bonanza Bros. with a certain degree of accuracy?" to cut them a bit of slack. I'd say I was harsher on the 16-bit micros but, as you'll see, there's not actually that much to say. Time to get this out the way!

System Comments Shot

ZX Spectrum
1992,
U.S. Gold
 Oh boy, am I going to bat for the precious ZX Spectrum again? Oh, you know I am. Much like the ZX Spectrum port of The NewZealand Story, aesthetics are sacrificed here in the name of functionality, mostly- while there's no minimap (a recurring feature, or lack thereof on the 8-bit micros) and everything is presented in monochrome black and white, it runs at a nice speed (while moving in and out of the background and jumping are a little slow, they're still better than in some other versions) and, well, it tries its very best to capture the spirit of the original game. That's what I feel is most important with these computer conversions, and in this regard, this ain't bad. Another bloody multi-loader, though! Polly, put the kettle on for this!



Commodore 64
1992,
U.S. Gold
 This one doesn't look too bad, on the surface. The colour palette is quite nice, it runs at a decent clip, it has the minimap complete with treasure locations, and the controls are certainly better than some versions- movement is nice and smooth and going in and out of the background works OK. Some enemy types are missing though, notably the bomb-thrower. The problem here is that you're going to lose a ton of lives because the collision detection is very much not in your favour (you don't fall to the floor though, you just get some mercy invincibility) and merely touching an enemy results in losing a life. In a game where you need to sneak past enemies and sometimes have to graze them to do so, that's extremely mean! Actually picking up the treasures is also a pain, as the collision detection is very finnicky. Not a great version, despite its appearance.



Amstrad CPC
1992,
U.S. Gold
 I don't think I've ever had a good experience with an Amstrad CPC game, honestly. I'm sure the internet will appreciate that comment, ahem. Anyway, this is not a great version. There's no minimap, just a count of the number of remaining treasures in the level, the action is slow, the scrolling is choppy, and probably the most infuriating thing about it is that it takes half a century to move between the foreground and background, which completely ruins the flow of the game. This is admittedly a problem in some of the other versions, but it is absolutely at its worst in this version. It's a shame because it kinda looks the part- the colour palette is nice and vibrant and they really tried their best with the backgrounds, but it just plays like a dog. Whoof.



Amiga
1991,
Synergy (UK)
 You would expect the Amiga version to be the best of these home computer versions, and... Yeah, it's probably the best. As this machine has specs closer to the Mega Drive than the 8-bits, this obviously captures the look of the Mega Drive game the most (some elements, like the arcade cabinet in the Company building and the target treasure screen, look like direct copies) although some elements of the arcade game appear too (such as the high score table and the Bonus Stages). The character movement is nice and smooth as is the scrolling, and while the enemy AI is obviously not going to be the same, this does a decent job of replicating the experience of the MD game. This version allows you to set the sensitivity of the jump function, so if you feel like the time you need to hold the button down is either too strict or too lenient, you have the option to adjust it a little. If you absolutely must play on a European home computer, the Amiga version is the one to go for.



Atari ST
1991,
Synergy (UK)
 This is, for all intents and purposes, the same as the Amiga version, just with way choppier scrolling and worse music. Sorry. Which came first? I'd love to tell you but I don't know, and I'm so close to finishing this section that it'll just have to remain a mystery.



One thing that has to be mentioned about the European home computer ports is the incredible boxart and packaging.



Via the GameFAQs page for the Commodore 64 version, what you see above is generally what was used for all of these versions, whether in a cassette or big-box, and... These are perfect. The completely out-of-nowhere "WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!!" the brothers are asking each other is one thing, but then you look at the photos on the back and see them skateboarding, at a football game, playing golf, they actually made tiny Robo and Mobo models for these photographs! The newspaper one even gives you a location, South Yorkshire! If there's one thing I will absolutely advocate for, it is the use of real models and props for video game packaging. However, if by some small miracle anyone who worked at U.S. Gold or the Camel Advertising and Marketing Group of Sheffield, Birmingham, UK (they're the ones credited with creating this packaging) back in the day is reading this... Who made these models? Why did they go for this approach with Bonanza Bros.? Most importantly... Do those models still exist? Gaming Hell needs closure on this story!!


The last bit about ports, every time the Mega Drive version's been rereleased.



This should be an easy listing, in theory, but nope, one of the very first rereleases has a confusing backstory to it. That would, of course, be the Japanese version of Sonic Gems Collection. No, really. While the US and European versions only had two unlockable Mega Drive games- Vectorman and Vectorman 2- the Japanese one comes with four extra unlockables, the Bare Knuckle / Streets of Rage trilogy and Bonanza Bros.! According to GameFAQs (it's on there somewhere, I promise), to unlock Bonanza Bros. you need at least 12 hours of playtime on the collection and either play Vectorman 2 once (play the collection for 5 hours to get Vectorman, then play that at least once after 7 hours total playtime) or any combination of the other games on the collection 20 times. That's a lot of work. In any case, the game was cut from versions outside Japan as well as the BK / SOR games, and while the common understanding is that the BK games were cut to keep the collection's age rating down, that doesn't really explain the Bonanza Bros. getting culled. They'd even fit in with that Vectorman bloke with their art style, kinda! Fortunately, in the time since this article was written, the Japanese version of Sonic Gems Collection has been dumped and is easily available online, making it easier to grab the menu screenshot, rather than having an extended bit about how expensive the Japanese version is that included a bit about buying eccles cakes.

Luckily this gets easier from here. Other Mega Drive compilations that have Bonanza Bros. include Sega Mega Drive Collection on PS2 and PSP (comes with a history section plus a scan of the US boxart), Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection on PS3 and Xbox 360 (comes with a repeat of that history section plus heavily-photoshopped boxart and cartridge art, I mean come on, seriously?) and Sega Mega Drive Classics on Steam (as an individual download until it was delisted in 2024), PS4, Xbox One and Switch (comes with absolutely no extras but is the only official release that supports online co-op play complete with rewinding, also delisted in 2024 but physical releases exist) and the Mega Drive Mini 2 (in all regions) so, yeah, this version is easy to find and play. There was also a Virtual Console release on the Wii, but that's long gone now (although the Japanese page for this release is still online at least). As far as I can tell, all these rereleases use the (JE) version of the game with the 'cleaning up Badville' plot and the Woon Hotal error.


Let's have a little fun now, some cameos from our distinguished thieves!



First, Shenmue I & II have three capsule toys based on the lads- one of Robo, Mobo, and the pair together.

Needless to say, those screenshots come from those Neoseeker pages because [insert your own feelings on Shenmue here].



The most notable reappearance of the boys is in Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing, developed by frequent Sega collaborators Sumo Digital and released on Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Wii, PC and DS. A cross-over of all sorts of different Sega properties (plus Banjo-Kazooie on the 360 because sure, why not), the Bonanza Bros. appear as an unlockable pair driving a black convertible called the Get-a-Way Wagon (although in the DS version, only Mobo is shown driving) and are some of the deeper cuts in the roster, alongside Zobio and Zobiko from The House of the Dead EX and Opa-Opa from Fantasy Zone. Like every other character, they have a personalised All-Star Move for when you're really lagging behind, and the boys get to ride around in their escape blimp, with Mobo dropping bombs from behind while a (poorly-clipped) loop of the Stage Clear theme from the Mega Drive plays. Weirdly, their profile card says their species is 'human' which, to be honest, only raises more questions.



Sadly, the boys were cut from the sequel, Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, but cameo as a statue in the Race of Ages track.



Finally... In 2014, the Bonanza Bros. made a cameo in Hi☆sCoool! SeHa Girls just like many other Sega properties. Specifically, they appear (as a static image taken from the arcade flyer) in Episode 9, "Weapon Enhancement Succeeds at a 50% Rate, but It Sure Feels Like 15% to Me" which is based on the mobile game Chain Chronicle, has a scene where the SeHa girls (that's Mega Drive, Saturn and Dreamcast to you) arrive in a tavern trying to hire heroes for their party. The Bonanzas show up, referred to Mega Drive as "the great thief brothers of legend", and they're planning another job!... Except the tavern makes you pay for food before you eat it, so they can't dine and dash. Alas.


Nearly at the end now, next up: the officially-licensed Bonanza Bros. slot machine!



Yep, this is real. At some point in 2010, gambling machine company Aristocrat made a deal with Sega to create video slot machines based on Golden Axe (which even included characters from The Revenge of Death Adder) and Bonanza Bros. and, well, here it is! This doesn't have much to do with the original game, with an artstyle based more on the humanoid art seen on the Genesis and Japanese Mega Drive boxart rather than the in-game stuff. Stil, I guess if you're gonna pick any Sega property to make a gambling game off of, Bonanza Bros. is absolutely the best pick for it. There's a few videos of the game on YouTube (one of them is shown above) and you can also look at an official page for the game here. Repeating again, this is real.


Now, the big finale: every single version (as far as I'm aware) of the plot of Bonanza Bros., with our aim being to answer one question:

Is it true that the Bonanzas are explicitly thieves stealing for personal gain in the Japanese version of the game, with the plot changed for a more sensitive Western market?



So, let's start at the beginning, a very good place to start. The dual-language flyer for the arcade game is our very first source and states plainly that yes, the brothers are thieves, and that they specialise in high-class theft. That's presumably why they rob a millionaire's mansion then downgrade to a department store. This is as unambiguous as it gets...



... Which it's why it's confusing that the game's intro contradicts the flyer! In both languages (admittedly, I had to check the Japanese version in the most ridiculous way possible- use an OCR to get fragments of the text then machine-translate them, but those scraps confirm the English version is a translation) the boys are hired by a mysterious man who communicates via their television (must be the same technology Mr. Acme uses) that they're going to clean the town of Badville up by stealing evidence from counterfeiters, thieving bankers (hey, the boys were ahead of the curve) and cheating casino operators.

So what gives? What's with this contradiction?! There may be an explanation for this, and this is probably where the confusion begins. The Manabu Kusunaki interview mentions that the original intention was indeed for the boys to be 'common robbers', but the president of Sega wasn't keen on the idea of having the bad guys being the main characters, so they were changed into more 'chivalrous robbers, stealing for a good cause'. There's a chance that this flyer's text was written and translated before this change in direction was made, and it just wasn't rewritten in time, or someone forgot, or something. Thus, it's easy to assume that the Japanese intro just calls them thieves, but it's not, it's roughly the same plot that was used for the English release.



The Mega Drive version- the version of the game marked as (JE)- has the arcade intro's story (albeit truncated to fit on the screen, so "thieving bankers" is gone as is "I'm depending on you, boys...")



However, the version marked as (U), presumably the American version, has a new story that is also included in the manual. This time, the Bonanza Bros. are 'two of the most famous investigators around' and the man on the TV is a businessman who's been having trouble with his establishments getting robbed, so he's hiring the boys to test his security forces, offering a healthy reward if they can pull the job off. This story can be found in full in the US manual but the Bonanzas are renamed Mike and Spike. Honestly, I kinda like how this one is written, with the boys convinced it's a set up at first, and Mike asking Spike "Ya think this guy's on the up an' up?". It's just charming, is what it is.

Where it gets confusing- again- is the European version. For years, I was convinced it used the US version's story simply because the copy I own uses that businessman story in both the manual and the intro, and even keeps the names Mike and Spike (it's just a copy of the US manual in fact reformatted to the European manual size, although with the little comic-style pictures reprinted so small you can't read the speech bubbles). However! It turns out there are two versions of the European manual, with an alternate one using the arcade game's storyline!

It actually elaborates on it a little, calling the brothers Robo and Mobo as well as "the infamous thives", and that the person hiring them is in fact the Chief of Police of Badville- if the boys don't co-operate, they're doing time. The poor guys. Since this is (roughly) the plot that shows up in the (JE) ROM set (which has the Woon Hotal error), my suspicion is that the 'cleaning up Badville' plot was the first released one, then it was replaced with the US version, changing the manual and game intro in the process. Confusing things even further, both versions have the same text on the back of the box, calling the brothers "the clumsiest thieves around" and that they need your help to "avoid becoming jailbirds".



Moving right along... The Mega-Tech system- a Playchoice-10-esque arcade Mega Drive set-up where you buy time with coins- had the Mega Drive Bonanza Bros. as one of its available games, and the second screen with story information reproduces the story text from the arcade flyer, making it only the second version of the plot to call them thieves outright.



The Master System version is different again. In-game, it uses the arcade intro for its story (with new art), but the back of the box uses a different blurb from the Mega Drive port, directly referring to the Chief of Police hiring the boys and threatening to put them in jail. In the manual though, the plot is greatly elaborated upon- the Chief of Police is powerless to stop the corrupt businesses in Badville, but one day gets "a terribly crazy idea [that's] so crazy, in fact... that it just might work". His offer to the boys is that he knows enough about the Bonanzas to land them in jail, but if they collect the evidence for him, he'll erase their records and let them walk. Amusingly, this story also refers to Robo as "the more intelligent of the two".



The home computer versions have a plot- in-game in the Amiga and Atari ST versions, in the manual / inlay in the others- based on the Mega Drive's 'businessman needs help' plot, but elaborates a little in its intro, referring to Robo and Mobo as 'the reformed villains'. The inlay also has tiny character profiles, saying that Robo Bonanza (I guess that is his full name, after all) is "The smarter of the two brothers [who] relies on his stealth and brains to achieve his aims" and of Mobo Bonanza, "Mobo doesn't have the brains of his brother, just muscle. Unfortunately it is between his ears, but comes in useful when in a tight situation". Poor Mobo!

The Sega Ages 2500 version has no intro in-game, and the Sega Classics Collection manual only refers to the boys 'sneaking into a building' so it's pretty vague.

(It also mispells Robo's name as Lobo so even the localised manual was made on the cheap!)



Our troubles with the plot of Bonanza Bros. really begin when the game started to show up in collections of Mega Drive games, because of one little bit of trivia that the poor lads simply couldn't shake off. So, the version of the plot given in the Sega Mega Drive Collection (PS2 / PSP) and Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection (360 / PS3) is based on the plot involving the Chief of Police hiring them from the European Mega Drive / Master System manuals, and how he'll send them to jail if they don't succeed. However, a piece of 'trivia' included in these descriptions says that in the Japanese version, the boys are thieves which, as I hope has been emphatically proven here... Isn't true, from a certain point of view. Well, they may have been thieves, but they're not thieves in the game itself. I imagine this is some kind of Wikipedia effect, where someone on the internet said it once and it's just spread like wildfire, unchecked, because this is Bonanza Bros. and it makes sense if you don't dig into it too much. Like I did. Don't be like me.

Thus, the web of the plot of Bonanza Bros. has been mostly untangled. I hope you found the answers you were looking for here.




To end, I commissioned friend of the site Pauli Kohberger to draw this.

The Bonanza Bros. meet the Gamesoft Gals of Gaming Hell for a nice little drink. That's a nice way to end things, right?

And now, the Bonanza Bros. live off their ill-gotten gai- I mean, their COMPLETELY LEGITIMATE EARNINGS- forever.