Bubble Bobble Neo XBLA.

[CMcK]

Bubble Bobble Neo is up on the UK XBLA marketplace. And it may not be the must purchase fans would assume. I downloaded the trial fully intending to buy it after a quick shot. But the controls are a sticking point. Your bubble dragon seems to have a lot more inertia than the original games making things feel slippery. Pin point accurate jumping is way more difficult than classic Bubble Bobble.
Still it's all good news otherwise. The updated graphics are faithful to the original and the upgraded animation is not over the top.
And, of course, you'll be humming that tune for days!

I'm going to play this some more before I write it off. I'll need to try the multiplayer with the good lady and that may swing it for me.

[Gradius]

I've just tried the demo too and can't decide whether to purchase.

I'm also not convinced the controls are quite right. Flicking left and right directions seems to make bub move about too much, i even plugged in my arcade stick and its still the same.

That said, this game is timeless. I was always a big fan of this in the arcade and even had a Jamma board (which has now sadly expired). 800 points seems pretty cheap these days and them achievements are no pushover. Most likely i will purchase.

[Mr Ono]

Agreed with the above.

It's a nice spit and polish job and I'll probably buy it later. I bought Track & Field after all dammit!

[Womble9]

Hmmm I'm a little disapointed to be honest. Whilst I think it looks and sounds ok (and is possibly more appealing to new players of it) I'd have been happier with just a great port of the original. Oh and is it just me or is the whole gameplay faster on this version? I'm sure it is .

[JamesS]

I think it's just the animation of the 3D model that makes it look like there's a bit of inertia. The underlying controls themselves seem fine to me. If you actually slid at all, you wouldn't be able to get out of narrow wells, like in level 12 (where you need to turn on the spot against a wall to give yourself room to blow a bubble).

[SuperBeatBoy]

Really don't like the way bub or bob move in this. Does the full game come with the original? Not that keen on the remakes music either.

[ZipZap]

Agreed, I would much rather have just had a port of the original with online high score boards etc. That would've been an instant purchase for me and would probably have kept me playing for ages!

The updated graphics are fairly ugly anyway (I'd have preferred the pixels!), but the way you have to clear the levels is also different. I'm not an amazing Bubble Bobble player at all, but I know my way through the first 20 or so stages of the arcade game reasonably well and using my normal tactics in this version fails pretty often.

[Brodie]

Level 72. NNNNNNNGGGGGG.

The controls are defiitely nacked for this part. It's possible, but not with my old hands.

[CMcK]

Tried to convince myself that this doesn't have any problems with the controls but there really is a serious lag between your button presses and the character doing anything. C'mon Taito fix this lag and it'll be an essential purchase.