Bubble Bobble – Retrospective

Bubble Bobble – Retrospective

Revisiting Bubble Bobble for this article was the easiest decision I’ve ever made, I’ve always loved it. The only trouble is now during every waking moment I hear the music. I know talking about music is not the usual way to start a retrospective but, if you didn’t know, Bubble Bobble plays the same song over and over again throughout its 100 levels and I just can’t get it out of my head. I’ve even found myself singing conversations to the catchy tune.

So heed this as a warning if you’ve never played this game and fancy trying it.

Bubble Bobble Case

Originally released as an arcade game in the 80’s Bubble Bobble has since been ported to countless different consoles and spawned dozens of sequels and spin offs, two of the best being Rainbow Islands and the Bust-A-Move series, Both of which I have spent countless hours with.  Back to Bubble Bobble though and I must say it is fantastic playing on a big screen with colour, as a kid I played this on the good old fashioned huge brick of a Game Boy, instead of the arcade original.

Unfortunately, arcade culture in the UK has never really hit the heights of other countries, like the USA or Japan and that makes me sad. Japan’s arcades still thrive and whilst I love them every time I get to visit I do wish I could have experienced them more when I was growing up here. I would have loved to have played classics like this, Gauntlet or Pacman in the arcades. I’m not saying we had nothing at all, we used to have a Sega Park where I live and I did get to enjoy games in the arcade, mostly of the light gun variety.  Time crisis, House of the Dead and my all time favourite, Point Blank.  I guess there were some good times; unfortunately they didn’t last as Sega Park and the other tastes of arcades we had all closed down, leaving us with ticket spewing seaside amusement arcades, filled with 2p machines and one armed bandits.

Thankfully, we have always had, and still do have, the home console ports of beloved classics to play. Bubble Bobble is possibly my favourite arcade port of all time. This was the only version of the game I owned, and I would spend hours and hours playing this wherever I went. I have absolutely no idea how my family didn’t go crazy from the sounds and throw my Game Boy through a window. The job they did on porting it over was outstanding and seemed to have been done with care, not like some of the shoddy, shoddy ports we are forced to endure these days. Sure, some changes were made due to portable hardware limitations, but nothing that ruined it. The levels couldn’t fit on one screen, sometimes half of the bubbles wouldn’t show on screen either, although the enemies trapped in a bubble looked adorable, I prefer that part of this version. The black and white picture even added charm and I’m heading straight online to buy that version in a second. The Game Boy was such a huge part of my childhood and this was just one of the many, many great games I was lucky enough to play on it, so maybe less time at arcades wasn’t such a bad thing after all. Anyway, I should probably tell those of you who are uninitiated about this wonderful game, the way it was supposed to be played.

 

Bubble Bobble Poster

Players take control of twin dinosaurs Bub and Bob (clever huh) as they try to rescue their girlfriends from the clutches of evil and in typical 80’s style the only way to do this is to go on a huge killing spree. In fact the more I think about it the more I feel that these girlfriends are imaginary and the killing spree is brought on by the bloody music. Anyway, as I said, to rescue these girlfriends our apparent heroes must traverse 100 levels killing everything in sight. A simple button press will cause the little dinosaurs to breathe a bubble that can be shot towards enemies to trap them. Jumping on, or hitting these bubbles with the spikes on their backs pops the bubbles, killing the bad guys and turning them into some delicious treat to increase the high score. These poor enemies have no quick release of a bullet to the brain; they are trapped in the bubbles waiting for their demise at the hands of 2 crazed dinosaurs. I imagine it very much like being frozen by liquid nitrogen and smashed into a million pieces. It’s no wonder that if the bubbles aren’t popped in sufficient time the enemies will escape and become angrier, faster and more aggressive.

The simplicity of the whole thing is absolute genius. Each level is played out on one screen, with differing platform layouts to jump and bounce around. Killing everything in sight allows passage to the next level. The difficulty increases thanks to new enemies and level designs and power ups that you can, and sometimes have to collect to finish a level. I don’t want to ruin the fun for you guys by going into detail but some of the later levels have you stuck in impossibly small spaces, trying to blow bubbles in a pixel perfect space to enable you to bounce off of them for an escape or to reach a power up bubble that can kill the enemies. To make matters worse is the time limit, taking too long causes the game to taunt you with a hurry up message. The music quickens and a ghost enemy, Baron Von Blubba, appears in order to hunt you down, if it touches you before you clear out the bad guys you die. There also secrets and hidden levels to be found that, once more, I’m not going to talk about as you must try and find these on your own.

It’s not all doom and gloom though. Grab a friend and you can go through the whole thing together, making it easier and also more fun. Collecting hidden items and power ups enable you to clear the levels more efficiently, with a greater kill power and popping enough letters in certain bubbles even lets you skip levels.

Bubble Bobble Arcade

Remember when I said it’s not all doom and gloom?  I kinda lied. Reaching the boss after besting all those levels feels brilliant. Getting killed by that boss and having to start again is soul destroying. Getting back to and killing the end boss is akin to killing a difficult boss in dark souls, the sense of joy is immense….while it lasts. See, If you don’t fulfil certain requirements you won’t reach the proper ending and the game sends you back to a certain point that differs depending on a number of factors and forces you to fight your way back to the boss again. It’s tactics like this that were purely designed for the arcade, forcing kids to plow in coin after coin in the hopes of reaching the end. Can you imagine playing a game like this now with the £1 a go arcade machines? You could wave bye bye to your house and personal belongings.

In a world where video games are labelled as violent all too frequently and are wrongly blamed for certain crimes, it was nice to go back and remember that games have always been violent, but are just an escape from real life problems, not the cause of them. But that’s an argument for another day. In summary Bubble Bobble is a simplistic, difficult and sometimes unfair game based upon the murderous jaunts of two cute dinosaurs, set to extremely repetitive music. Yet it’s also really addictive and great fun to play, alone or with a friend. I will always enjoy this game and I’d urge anyone to give it a try.

 

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