Bubble Bobble was and is a superbly playable and fun game developed by Taito. It was released in 1986. Pretty soon after it was coded for numerous home computers and game consoles. Bubble Bobble the game features two Bubble Dragons, Bub (Japanese "Bubblun") who is a very fetching green with yellow spikes and horns and Bob (Japanese "Bobblun"), who is blue with cyan spikes and horns. These dragon dudes journey through the Cave of Monsters to rescue their girlfriends. They move over a system of platforms, busting and pushing bubbles, avoiding enemies and collecting a variety of power-ups.

The main reasons that many computer or game console ports of this game - even when released several years after the original - can seem lacking and incomplete in some aspects is because the original arcade game, despite its apparent simplicity, features some rather complicated and convoluted game mechanics.

Each level (or round) consisted of a single screen, with no scrolling or flipping, similar in a way to asteroids. The dragons move around the levels by walking on platforms, falling through empty space, jumping through platforms from below and falling through holes at the bottom of the level in order to reappear at the top, or vice versa, see the gameplay techniques below.

Apart from jumping, the characters have the uncanny ability (possibly due to drinking washing up liquid) of blowing bubbles. Bubbles also float in from the top or bottom of the screen in many levels. They pop after a certain amount of time, when they hit the dragon's spiked back, if they're squashed against a wall or another dragon or if they're fallen upon. If you hold down the jump button, it is possible to bounce on top of bubbles, which is sometimes necessary to reach platforms. The main objective of the game is to trap enemies in bubbles, and burst them, destroying the enemies. Defeating several monsters at once awards a marvellously large points reward.

Each round also features invisible air currents and custom bubble physics, causing bubbles to move in strange but predetermined trajectories, such as converging to a certain point, moving ever so quickly or very, very slowly, being pulled down as if by gravity etc. etc. and with notable effects on a levels difficulty.

Some levels have very short bubble popping times, so that bubbles pop almost as soon as they emerge. This becomes very extreme in later levels to the point of only being able to kill monsters by 'kissing' the little buggers... i.e blowing a bubble so that it is immediately squashed against you and the enemy causing instant death to an enemy. To do this you obviously have to be very close. Time limits are also used to increase the game's difficulty, two rounds having no time limit, some levels are almost impossible to finish under certain conditions (single player, lack of certain bonuses etc.). When the time limits expires the player does not die instantly, but rather an invincible 'Skel' (see below) enemy dude appears for each player, and all enemies become 'very angry', with a change in colour and an underpant filling increase in speed.

There are a large variety of enemies, they move about in different patterns. Contact with an enemy (or the missiles fired by some) will kill a dragon. The dragons' job is to complete the level by killing all enemies in it. If this is not achieved within a time limit, the message "Hurry up!" will flash across the screen. When this happens, enemies become "angry" (making them red and move faster thus making them more dangerous). Approximately ten seconds later, one or two Skel enemies appear on screen. Enemies also become "angry" if they escape from a bubble that is not burst quickly enough by one of the dragons. They may (but do not always) calm down when one of the dragons dies. When in Super Mode, most enemies get swapped with a counterpart, e.g. PulPuls replace Monstas and vice versa.

There are 8 kinds of normal enemies, plus the final boss and two kinds of invincible monsters that appear after the "Hurry up!" limit, each with their own names. Bubble Bobble produced a number of sequel games. Now you know all about the fantastic Bubble Bobble you had better play it.