Bub and Bob Bounce Back- Space Bust-A-Move

Most gamers should have at least a passing familiarity with Bust-A-Move. Since 1994, the title has inspired a host of sequels across arcade cabinets, consoles, and portables, catapulting the game’s two dinosaur stars into the videogame pantheon.  While many diversions have drifted into obscurity over the years, the title’s stream of releases has attempted to evade extinction as much as its prehistoric protagonists.

Like most classic diversions, the game’s concept is deceptively simple. Players launch colored bubbles from the bottom of the screen toward a steadily descending mound of similar objects.  Once the gamer fires a like-colored orb into a group of two or more, the whole string cascades off the screen.  Additionally, bubbles can be rebounded off the borders of the screen, allowing for angled shots recalling the geometries of billiards.  Once gamers clear the screen of all the diminutive spheres, they are shuffled to the next, more challenging, level.

Although 2005’s Bust-A-Move DS brought the popular diversion to Nintendo’s handheld, the incorporation of system-specific mechanics diluted gameplay. Players were forced to aim their bubbles across the gap between the portable’s two screens, obscuring the title’s requirement for precise shots. Additionally, using the stylus to slingshot orbs into the playfield felt like a superfluous addition. Luckily, players longing for a more traditional port of the game can look toward the recently released Space Bust-A-Move.

Although the game’s setting may be distinctive, Space Bust-A-Move’s gameplay delightfully isn’t. The developers at Taito have created a back-to-basics version of the puzzler, which should delight long-time aficionados, as well as series newcomers.  Unlike the 2005 iteration, this interpretation of Bust-A-Move wisely allows the game, not the hardware, to be the focal point.

Players can select from one of several single or multiplayer game modes that range from the game’s story mode, CPU challenge, an endless variation, to local and even Wi-Fi multiplayer. The title’s amount of variation is inspiring; it encapsulates nearly every diversion that has been presented during the series’ extended history, save for a level builder. Considering the game’s twenty dollar MSRP, Space Bust-A-Move ranks as one of the top values currently found in the DS library. After playing for a week, I have yet to both unlock all of the game’s collectables, and exhaust the amusement found in Story mode- I found myself retrying levels just to better my score. Yes, my bubble-busting passion was invigorated by this title.

Graphically, Space Bust-A-Move wisely confines its main gameplay to the bottom screen, eliminating the dual screen difficulties found in the previous version. While boss battles are an exception, replacing the score information on the top screen with a large foe, they typically don’t require single pixel precision. Visual fatigue is skillfully offset by the addition of gentle background animations, and the ability to purchase new skins for the game’s bubbles. Sonically, the game wonderful recreates the delightful 16-bit tones of the game’s predecessors; arcade veterans will notice the inclusion of the original Bubble Bobble theme.