Bubsy in Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind Longplay (Mega Drive/Genesis) [60 FPS]
496Developed by Solid Software and published by Accolade in 1993.
Having seen the popularity of the Sonic the Hedgehog games released for the Mega Drive, Solid Software were keen to develop a game to capitalise on the popularity of the platform genre with their own take on the genre.
The result of this development was the creation of Bubsy, an anthropomorphic Bobcat who went on to start in multiple games across a range of platforms.
Here, in the original game in the series, an alien race known as "Woolies" have invaded Earth with the explicit purpose of stealing the world's supply of yarn balls. As Bubsy has the biggest collection of yarn, he sets out to reclaim his stolen yarn and to defeat the Woolies across sixteen different levels of platforming action.
Bubsy is a pretty decent character, is well designed and benefits from well-directed art and some nice incidental animations (idle, getting wet etc.). Each level opens with a short sample of digitised speech that helps give the character a degree of personality and is a nice touch.
Anyone who has played a Sonic or Super Mario game will find themselves in familiar territory. The object of the game is to reach the end of each level whilst avoiding/killing enemies and collecting yarn balls (analogous to Sonic rings or Mario coins) for points.
Each of the game's levels is vast in size and can be completed via a number of different routes. Many secrets and bonus points can be accrued by going off the beaten track, although the player has to keep a careful eye on the time limit imposed for each level.
Each level is teeming with hostile Woolies and other minions, each of which must be avoided or defeated by jumping on their heads; standard platforming stuff. In later levels, the Woolies are armed with piles of eggs, many of which get hurled in Bubsy's direction.
Although not explicitly stated, the game is organised into multiple, themed worlds, each consisting of three levels followed by a boss fight very much in the same way that the Sonic games were designed.
Graphics and sound are well above average, but don't reach the standards set by Sonic 3/Knuckles.
On paper, the game has everything required to be a great platforming game, but the reality is less than perfect. The game really is "death by a thousand cuts"; a collection of poor design choices simply suck a lot of the fun out of the game and leave a bad taste in the mouth.
Firstly, coming into contact with any enemy means instant death. Unlike Sonic/Mario games, there is nothing to offer Bubsy any protection from damage (aside from the occasional invulnerability t-shirt). Since Bubsy moves so fast and the play area is relatively small, running/jumping into enemies is such a common occurrence that the player gets forced into creeping forward a little at a time to make sure that all enemies are spotted soon enough.
The second annoying flaw is the fact that running into objects/scenery at maximum speed will knock Bubsy out and result in a life lost; not since Little Big Adventure have I played a game that continuously punishes the player for trying to run in a game!
If the player jumps whilst running, it's impossible to control Bubsy due to the considerable inertia that continues to propel him in the direction jumped. This makes it impossible to avoid collisions with enemies, or mistiming fiddly jumps that result in Bubsy landing on spikes or falling to his doom.
I could continue with many listing my annoyances with the game, but suffice to say that Bubsy fails to be a great platformer due to this collection of poor mechanics. Instead of being great, one can only describe this as above average and is a real shame.
Bubsy isn't terrible, but is simply too punishing to be really fun.
#retrogaming