Together Retro: Bubble Bobble

[AppleQueso]

The reason is that sadly Taito has lost the source code for this game a good while ago.

Sadly, this is a very common issue with Japanese companies in general.

[ExedExes]

Another thing - in the article you may notice I avoided referring to any home versions as arcade perfect. The reason is that sadly Taito has lost the source code for this game a good while ago. I'm not sure if the FM Towns port is truly arcade accurate.

The issue is with subtleties like item appearance conditions and such. It can be important at later levels where bubble behaviour and jumping on bubbles is tuned to work to high precision and if something is slightly off it can affect the stage significantly. Also I never really noticed most of these myself as I never played it at an actual arcade but true veterans have spotted the difference.

Even MAME has only managed to reproduce it perfectly since about 2006, after cracking a particular chip that controlled (among other things) enemy AI behaviour, you can read about that here:
http://mamelife.blogspot.co.uk/2006/08/ ... -last.html

The creator of MAME (Nicola) is credited in the Taito Legends compilation, which may mean that the TL version is also emulated from the original arcade version and therefore may be entirely arcade perfect - but I am not sure.

Ivo.

I saw Nicola in the credits and I thought they probably used MAME or a good amount of MAME know-how in some of the games. Taito Legends on PC even has game ROM files in the game directory like MAME.

But since Taito Legends was released in 2005 on all platforms, I can safely say that it was probably the bootlegged MCU they had to use for the TL ports.

[ExedExes]

How Low Can ExedExes Go?

A bit lower, thanks to an umbrella item pickup. Score took a hit though.



The bonus Taito Legends game I played this go around was the shmup Tokio!

This is the demo screen map, I actually made it somewhere between Shinjuku and Yoyogi on the right side. That's the farthest I've ever made it. (anybody remember Yo Yogi on Saturday mornings?)

[dsheinem]

How Low Can ExedExes Go?

A bit lower, thanks to an umbrella item pickup. Score took a hit though.



The bonus Taito Legends game I played this go around was the shmup Tokio!

This is the demo screen map, I actually made it somewhere between Shinjuku and Yoyogi on the right side. That's the farthest I've ever made it. (anybody remember Yo Yogi on Saturday mornings?)

am i right in thinking scoring is basically random?

I've not made it below 22 so far, but my best point total (250K) was on a 12 level run.

[noiseredux]

I don't think I'm even gonna focus on score. I just wanna see how far I can make it. So far my best run(s) have all been to level 15.

[Stark]

I can't see Bub and Bob without getting the song stuck in my head ....

[Ivo]

Someone else asked above about the scoring... In what sense do you think the scoring is random? There are intricate rules that control most of the things that affect scoring.

I wanted to comment another thing: I tried the Mega Drive game - I emulated it, it is a bootleg game so I'm now less surprised I didn't know about it before. It is not very good.

Also, I guess this as good place as any other to ask, particularly given the discussion a few posts ago about it being likely the only arcade accurate version: what MAME versions are people here running for the arcade original? Apparently the last time I used MAME for something was around 2009, I still have MAMEUI32 0.136...

[Hatta]

I'm using MAME 146, but I haven't upgraded my roms since 136. It does complain about missing three .bin files, but they must not be that important since it still plays.

[Retrodude]

I don't think I'm even gonna focus on score. I just wanna see how far I can make it.

Yeah, same here. I have the Taito plug and play arcade stick that has (I think) 10 games on it, so I'll play BB on that.

[ExedExes]

am i right in thinking scoring is basically random?

I've not made it below 22 so far, but my best point total (250K) was on a 12 level run.

For the most part, scoring is random, but that's the beauty of this game too. By performing actions and other secrets, scores can get better. Obviously popping more enemies at once get more points, but the amount of bubbles on screen can also influence how many point items you may get (for example, trap all 3 enemies on Round 1 and then blow about 10-15 more bubbles before popping them, and all those extra bubbles turn into cherries) Of course, the random items that appear on each round are also various amounts of points. There are tons of techniques that I'm not even aware of that can get even more points. This is more true on Rainbow Islands & Bubble Symphony on Taito Legends 2.