Very
few games have managed to capture my attention for more than a month or two.
This game however has pulled it off effortlessly since 1990. I can still
enjoy it for hours if I’m playing in 2-player mode with a buddy. Bub and Bob
are as addictive as…well, things that are addictive. They went on to star in
multiple games, such as the Puzzle Bobble series, Bubble Memories, Bubble
Symphony...the list goes on. The game begins with two dinosaurs, Bub and Bob, having their girlfriends been captured, the goal of the adventure is to rescue them; you will have to guide Bub and Bob through over 100 levels of bubble shooting bliss. The games simplicity is its most attractive feature. It’s simple to pick up with a friend and get right into it.
Upon starting the game you immediately are thrown into action where you blow bubbles across the screen and attempt to capture the bad guys in them. Notice the orange bad guy in the bubble; he looked just like the other robot before I captured him...(or her, you ladies can be bad guys too...)
When a bad guy (or gal) is captured in a bubble, they begin to float toward the top of the screen.
You
then have to burst the bubble by making bodily contact with it. You don’t
have a lot of time though, the more you progress thru the game, the less
time you have to burst the bubble before the bad guy escapes and comes out
angry. If you do manage to make contact with the bubble, the bad guy will
*pop* and turn into a piece of fruit or a veggie, you can get a real nice
bonus if you can grab it before it disappears. These guys don’t like to be
left alone, if you have only one bad guy left on the screen and he isn’t in
a bubble, he gets flaming mad, speeds up and chases you until one of you
kills the other.On the screenshot below, notice the letters, you try to collect the letters to spell "EXTEND". If you complete the word it will allow you to skip to the next level.
As you progress through the game, the actual game play never really changes. The maps become increasingly more difficult and the bad guys move faster. Playing the game is much like playing Tetris, not too complicated but an acute challenge and highly addictive. While Bubble Bobble isn’t one of the greatest games on the NES, its still one of my favorites. I highly recommend adding this classic to your collection.
