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Posted in: Games, Review, Taito, Video Games | Tagged: Puzzle Bobble Everybubble!, Review, Taito
Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble! Review: Now Spin On Familiar Suds
We sat down and played Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble! from ININ Games and Taito on the Switch to see how this new entry plays out.
ININ Games and Taito Corporation recently released the latest game in the Bubble Bobble franchise, as Switch players can now own Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble! The team has been slowly bringing the series back to prominence in recent years with a few different releases, with games such as Bust-A-Move Journey, Bubble Bobble 4 Friends, and Puzzle Bobble VR: Vacation Odyssey. Each of them brings something different to the concept in different ways, for better or worse, depending on the type of gamer you are. But ultimately, always experimenting. This latest entry brings about a different kind of puzzler concept, featuring familiar characters and settings but with a twist. We tried the game out for a quickie review, and here's what we thought of it.
The game is pretty simple as it takes on more of a block puzzle theme but has more to do with bubbles because of the franchise behind it. The game has a very loose story behind it told in flashcards in which the four main characters arrive on Rainbow Islands, where a character named Miniroon (who looks a lot like Bub) lives. He starts blowing a bunch of bubbles that cover the island and causes problems for everyone living there, and now you gotta clean it up. That's it! If you're looking for more depth in a puzzle title, look elsewhere. Every level and puzzle you deal with moving forward on single-player has to deal with helping out residents or clearing out areas to move the story along.
As you may have suspected from the genre, it's totally a match-three where any combination of the same color of three or higher clears all the connected bubbles out of the way. The challenge isn't in clearing the board; it's in how you do it, as the game wants you to complete challenges in certain ways or in a specific amount of time. You get some help in the form of a bubble bomb that clears out an area or a star bubble that will clear any one specific color, but the majority of this is figuring out the puzzle and clearing it. That challenge goes over to multiplayer modes as well, as you can tackle the story in four-player mode, along with three other modes, including Local Match, Baron's Tower, and Puzzle Bobble Vs. Space Invaders. Each one presents a unique challenge to see who is the best at clearing out bubbles and taking out opponents or trying to succeed at a specific goal in the game.
The fun in Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble! isn't in completing the game, although it was satisfying doing it in my spare time over the course of a week. The fun is having crazy challenges with friends as you attempt to show each other who the best is. The game is chaotic enough to have you returning for multiple sessions, and not so repetitive that it becomes predictable as to who will win. However, it does lack in Story Mode, which feels like it was tacked on here halfway through development to give it an extra mode and a challenge for single-player owners to try out in their spare time. It's a really fun game, but it could have been a bit better.
Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble!
7.5/10
We sat down and played Puzzle Bobble EveryBubble! from ININ Games and Taito on the Switch to see how this new entry plays out.
Credits
Publisher
ININ Games
Developer
Taito Corporation
Release Date
May 23, 2023
Reviewed On
Nintendo Switch
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