Bubble Bobble Universe - Review

 

As a kid one of the first games I played on a games console was Bubble Bobble. It had cute baby dinosaurs that could blow bubbles to trap enemies, eat cake and sweets. Each level was quite short, but don't let that fool you though, they are not easy and get tough, really tough, if I am honest I have never been able to complete it. Pursing the shelves of CEX the other day I came across Puzzle Bobble Universe one of the shoots of the original and thought for €10 why not?

Sherbet Fountain, does anyone remember these from their childhood? Small yellow tube, filled with  lemon-flavored cocaine-esque powder, with a black stick of licorice use to pull it out. It was kind of fun to eat and tasty not like lemon but something else.  I tried it in my late teens and you know what I discovered?  It tasted terrible, was a pain to eat, and the packet seemed to just fall apart. Playing Bubble Bobble Universe I found myself asking was it like the Sherbet Fountain I remember enjoying as a child or the one I tried as a teen?

Story

The story is that some bad guys have imprisoned your dragon friends, your mission is to play some crazy bubble game, unlock keys and free your friends and that is all she wrote.

There is no story, it would have been nice but not truly necessary for a puzzle game. 

Visuals

The visuals are cute and colorful but are in need of much work, and the background of each level differs little from the next. They feel quite flat, I don't mean the 3D version I mean the standard visuals which were disappointing. 

Overall the visuals are underwhelming and lackluster, and while the 3DS is unable to provide top-of-the-line graphics they can certainly do better than what this game offered.

Music

The music in the game like the visuals is quite underwhelming. The first couple of songs seems fun and upbeat but as the music progresses each track seems to be quite derivative. This seemed unusual as the creator Japanese composer Jun 'Setzer' Kadoma has a rich body of work creating; 'Final Fantasy Life Of Ishgard', 'High School Of The Dead' and 'Beyond The Entity'. 

The soundtrack is just shy of thirty minutes. It's hard not to be harsh but there really was nothing standout about the soundtrack. Overall disappointing. 

Gameplay

There are two modes, story, and challenge mode. Each area is divided into ten stages, each one can be completed in anywhere from thirty seconds to around three minutes. You need to match three or more enemies together to make them disappear, and this is done by firing bubbles at them. Think columns but with a bubble canon.

When firing bubbles off you have a little line like a dot scope or the ones you used on Mini Clips Pool Game, meaning you can bounce bubbles off of walls to position them in the best place. It is not as accurate as it could be but isn't bad. For every few bubble enemies cleared you to unlock a special ability, such as changing the enemies bubbles in an area to the same type or creating a bubble that will match with any other. 

There are over eight levels but you will fly through them very quickly. Once you are finished there you can move onto the challenge mode which really just feels like a free play, not bad but nothing exciting.

Overall the gameplay is the strongest element of the game but still is a little underwhelming even when you have the boss stages which are very meh. 

Final Thoughts

So, after four hours how did I feel? Like I could have spent them better. The story just is not there, the visuals and music are very underwhelming, the gameplay is the strongest part of the game and even that was disappointing. All in all a very poor experience, this one gets a 1 out of 5 

Until Dawn - Review

There are numbers of games I wanted to play this year & Until Dawn was one of them.  I am normally not huge into horror-esque games but this one caught my eye.  I think it was not only the visual aspect that intrigued me but also the setting that was chosen; a log cabin in the middle of nowhere, with no escape.  I saw it for under €20 the other day in CEX & thought now was the time to give it a go.


Curries are awesome, correction they can be.  If a curry is done right it can be the perfect blend of spices, vegetables & meat.  It is great for opening up your airways, especially if you have a cold or just need something nice & warm.  Throw in some rice, naan bread, maybe a cheeky bhaji & you have the perfect meal.  However, some curries are, well, just outright bad.  Some curries use cheap ingredients, the meat & vegetables are about to go off & then to make up for the poor quality & taste tons of spices are added to it.  The result is a powdery tasting mess.  Playing Until Dawn I found myself asking was this the perfect meal & cleanser that I needed or was I going to be left with a bad taste in my mouth, pain in my stomach & a tender behind?

Let me set the scene, eight friends (sort of) decide to go up to a mountain lodge for a weekend to get away from it all.  As you can imagine a bunch of teenagers out in the middle of nowhere, with no adult supervision is only going to go one way really.  Naturally, everyone loves everyone & there are no feelings of ill will towards anyone, okay maybe some ill will.   Eight high school teenagers + log cabin + badly thought out prank = grim beginnings.


Fast forward one year later, everyone one is trying to deal with the tragedy from the previous year.  Of course, the best way to deal with it is to go back to the cabin where it all happened?  This time around there is lots of melodrama & everyone has been playing relationship musical chairs.


So who are our eight characters? Ashley, Chris, Jess, Josh, Matt, Mike, Sam & Emily.  Each has a certain quality about them & until about 60%-70% of the way through the game I found it hard to find any of them that likable.  The two characters I liked the least were Emily, AKA Bitchy McBitch Face & Matt AKA Mr. Meathead which in fairness I thought was inaccurate - Mr. Fade into the Background was more accurate.


The story is pretty solid & is only spoiled by a couple of so-so characters & the games slight indecisiveness to decide what kind of story it wants to tell.

This game is visually impressive in so many ways,  the snow effects look great & it really feels like you are on a winter getaway in the mountains.  Normally I would reserve this next statement when discussing the story but I feel the two are intertwined in this case, I won't discuss the look of the different parts of the game as I feel it would spoil the experience of it.


The character looks amazing if not slightly generic, let me clarify.  The facial expressions of the characters look very realistic even down to their eye movements. The outfits worn by the characters look real & actually look like they are being worn rather than simply imposed onto a model.  While they are visually impressive the characters themselves are not.  Supermassive Games decided to go with an atypical Hollywood view of teenagers; pretty, similar weight, height & it is not believable that any of them are under the age of twenty.


While I may have ripped on the studio's lack of character diversity I cannot flaw the overall visual impressiveness of the game.


The music used in the game is eerie & very atmospheric, bone-chilling use of strings & startling use of brass create a very claustrophobic feel.  While listening to the score it made me reminisce about the work performed by James Horner & Jerry Goldsmith on the movies Alien & Aliens.


The composer for this score of darkness is Jason Graves, some of his works include; Far Cry Primal, Order 1886, Dead Space & Fear 3.  Listening to the score you can certainly hear influences from Dead Space & Fear 3, sounds designed to make you feel a sense of dread which was perfect for this game.  Outside of this a rendition of the traditional American folk song 'O' Death' is covered by Amy Van Roekel which is used in the opening & ending credits of the game.  She has mostly worked in Operas & Concerts including ; Lost Childhood, The Marriage of Figaro, The Telephone, Midsummer Night's Dream & The Machine to name just a few.


The score comes in at just over an hour which I found to be the perfect considering the length of the game itself, my favorites pieces include; 'Final Confrontation', 'Shadow of the Mountain', 'Run or Hide' & 'Chris & Ashley'.  Overall a great score which really helped create a chilling atmosphere.

It's that time, onto the meat!  The first thing you need to know is you will have to make lots & lots of decisions, due the butterfly effect being a big part of the game even small decisions can have major ramifications later on.  There are useful collectibles that are actually relevant to the gameplay rather than just being there for the sake of it.  Something I really liked were the totems which help give you a glimpse into possible things that could happen depending on decisions you make, you never know how these actions can be triggered so stay vigilant.


The games constantly has you playing as each of the eight characters which makes it feel like you are part of a movie rather than a game.  While for the most past I liked this I did feel it stopped me a little from fully engaging with some of the characters & feeling perhaps more attached to them.  Decisions, decisions & more decisions, your actions don't only effect the story but how you are seen by the other characters.  Some actions will see you becoming closer with them while others will push you further apart.  There are multitude of character traits including; bravery, romance & honesty, each can be of major benefit in the short & long term.


'Don't Move', was one of my favorite actions in the game, at certain points your character will need to remain perfectly still.  The only way to do this was to not move the controller even a little, if you do then someone may just lose their life.  It added a great amount of suspense & even had me holding my breath at certain points.


The gameplay was really good & the only minor thing that bugged me was the constant story recaps which made little sense as the game was not being told in an episodic way unlike Alan Wake or Tell Tales The Walking Dead for example.




So after little over 8 hours how did I find my experience?  Very good, surprisingly so.   The game started with me feeling really annoyed by each of the characters but as time went on I slowly started to like some of them.  Sure the game has it's flaws but the good things in the game far out weight this.  I was tussling with what I would score this game but when it comes down to it the decision is not that hard to make, I give this one 4 out of 5