ULTIMATE GUIDE BUBBLE BUBBLE

LET US JOURNEY INTO THE DEADLY CAVE OF MONSTERS ONE MORE TIME AUBERGIN AS RETRO GAMER PRESENTS THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO TAITO'S MARVELLOUS BUBBLE-BLOWING EXTRAVAGANZA. CUE THE MUSIC...

- GRAEME MASON

Despite being responsible for the coin-op videogame that helped instigate the arcade revolution – Space Invaders, in case you were wondering – Taito was struggling by the mid-Eighties. A string of below-par or ill-received games had diluted the company’s reputation, and it desperately needed a hit. Then, in 1986, thanks to newly joined designer Fukio Mitsuji, it got one, complete with a twisty denouement that even M Night Shyamalan would be proud of.

Bubble Bobble is the tale of two squat and cuddly dragons named Bub and Bob. Bub and Bob happily enjoy life with their puzzlingly human-like girlfriends when Baron Von Blubba kidnaps the lasses, ferreting them to the deepest, furthest grotto in the Cave Of Monsters. The scaly pair have no choice but to venture into the caverns, each infested, as the name suggests, with Baron Von Blubba’s monstrous henchmen. An alternative plotline involves the girls wandering into a magical forest and stumbling into the Cave Of Monsters, whereupon they encounter Super Drunk, with the same result.

Bub and Bob can jump and – yes! – blow bubbles. Should a bubble come in contact with an enemy monster, it encases them, instantly negating their mass and causing them to float helplessly around the screen. Left alone, eventually, the monsters escape their translucent prison; however, the dragons can pierce the bubbles (with either their pointy back scales or by jumping on them), sending the enemy spinning across the level. Once the pair have eliminated all the monsters, it’s on to the next screen, until a showdown with the game's humongous final boss, Super Drunk. Defeat him, and Bub and Bob are reunited with their girls. Ahhhh.