Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back

Unlike most, I'm not going to leave an ironic review here, so if you're just reading reviews of this game for the funny then feel free to skip mine. Or read it. Up to you. I'll add some background to this review just for context, and because I think it's an exemplary case of the age-old adage, "One man's trash is another man's treasure." I first played this game years and years ago about 2 years after it released or so, maybe 1 year after, and I'd picked it up from a local game store. The game was sold for a mere 15 dollars or so, barely more than the price of a large meal from some fast food joint. I had been convinced to pick it up for a couple of reasons. First of all, I had been watching a YouTube reviewer named the LJN Defender, whose reviews I actually tended to agree with, and I enjoyed his (now her) more laid-back style of review. Not really any exaggerated persona to tear into games, just honest analysis and a will to give maligned games a fair shot. I remember watching Morgan's review of Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back and thinking to myself, "hey, if I get the chance, I might pick that game up." Lo and behold, there it was in my local Retro Replay. I was living with my mom at the time in a trailer park, and budget for games was low, needless to say. I was still a Nintendrone at the time, so I had no PS4 games of my own, but I wanted to have one to play on my brother's PS4 that he kept at my mom's place. So, all these combining factors, gaming on a budget, disliked games usually being cheap, and it being recommended by one YTer that was willing to give the most hated of games their fair shake, plus my own curiosity and feeling most comfortable with platformers at the time despite the wide variety of genres on display on the PS4, I picked up Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back, and I had a blast with it. I have a good bit of sentimental attachment to this game, and my time playing it on Steam is hardly my first rodeo. That said, Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back is pretty underrated. Everything is mechanically solid, Bubsy controls really well. He's extremely maneuverable in the air and has responsive movement on the ground. Yarnballs are satisfying to collect, mainly thanks to their dopamine-generating popping sound upon contact. Levels are well-designed with some obscured areas you'll potentially need to move the camera around to find if you're a completionist type, and 100%ing this game isn't too hard, actually pretty fun considering how there's only 11 achievements. TWSB doesn't suffer from cheap deaths like some of the older Bubsy games do thanks to the inclusion of shield shirts, which are functionally just the Super Mushroom from Mario but a bit flashier, imo anyway. In this game, Bubsy's glide disappointingly doesn't carry his momentum like in Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind or Fractured Furry Tales, games w/ a heavier emphasis on momentum like their Sonic game inspirations, but it functions more like a double-jump. The difficulty progression in this game is fair, but it never reaches the levels of hard any of the previous entries do, possibly as a byproduct of feeling so much more streamlined. Of course, I think much of the hate this game receives is just because... well, it's named Bubsy. Any 1/5s or 5/10s or worse for this game (thinking of that one abysmal MonsterVine review) are hyperbolic and ludicrously exaggerated. Besides Bubsy 3D and Bubsy 2 for Game Boy maybe, no Bubsy games are contenders for the worst games of all time. Hardly. Now, granted, The Woolies Strike Back has still got a couple of issues that I can understand making people not think much of the game. For one, all of the bosses are UFOs of one kind or another, progressing in difficulty with each successive one. Not much of interest there. There's nothing really wrong with them technically, people just mind find the bosses a snoozefest. Secondly, the enemy variety in this game is extremely lacking, not just bosses. Most of the enemies in TWSB are just Woolies, the main antagonists of the first game and Bubsy 3D. Their inclusion is fine of course, but the only enemies other than them are the bees, who don't appear past the second, desert environment in the game. Compared with literally any of the classic games, be it Claws Encounters, Bubsy 2, or Fractured Furry Tales, this is very lacking, and can possibly contribute to a feeling of repetition to many players. And the game's biggest issue is its length. It's only around 2 to 3 hours long, depending on how thorough of a player you are. I have as many hours as I do cuz I have some nostalgic attachment to this game and want to rise on the leaderboards cuz I'm an obsessive freak, but most people won't get that much time out of this game, even if they're going for 100%. Technically, there're 14 levels, but 1 of those is the tutorial stage and 3 of those are boss stages, so really, there's about 10 standard levels. If that's the crux of some people's disdain for this game, I guess I can get it, but I'm of the opinion that it's better a game leave me wanting more than overstay its welcome. Like I've said, I think this game is actually fun enough for anyone to enjoy, but considering the length is barely longer than Sonic Forces, I recommend picking it up on a sale. Don't just let the name "Bubsy" scare you off, I say. And hey, go into the upcoming Bubsy 4D with that same mindset.

I'm not gonna complain about this game's length. Some of the best games of all time are under an hour long. But I will complain about how trivial it is. Say what you will about the rest of the Bubsy franchise, the games put up a fight, and they make you actually try. No such luck here.

I hate Bubsy

You've heard of Say Gex, but what about Cat Punt? :3

The good about this game is that the music is good, has interesting level design, and that it's alright for a Platformer. The bad is that the bosses are both stupid and insane at the same time, the cutscenes are dog water, levels can be repetitive at times, The game is way too short as well, and Bubsy, Oh BUBSY. HE NEVER SHUTS UP, AS HE HIMSELF IS BASICALLY A DISTRACTION MECHANIC. Thankfully there is a slider for that. Overall i think this game is mid.

this bobcat ♥♥♥♥ is somehow still more alive than megaman

I sat down to write this review and thought to myself "really? Am I really about to review a Bubsy game?" I want to start this off by saying Bubsy didn't deserve and of this. Even poor Bubsy didn't deserve a game this underwhelming and bad. Like the entire game is too short, too random, and at times difficult to the point I question if any time went into play testing this game. Three bosses. One of which is a quick bout. The second was overly difficult and so so long. Way too long. The third boss was honestly way too long but as the final it gets a pass. The controls take some getting used to but are fine after a while. The pounce move is dumb and can be hard to use at times especially when breaking rocks. But other than that It was easy to fly through each level. Sure you can TRY to get all the "collectables" but with a game as bad as this one. Why would you want too? To quote a blue muppet, "Collectables should either be fun to collect or have some incentive for the player." Nothing in this game was fun or gave me any incentive to want to go out of my way to collect them. The real kicker is that Bubsy has no hit points. You get a shield but that's it. That is a way too outdated mechanic in platformers to have one hit KO's. The shield only does so much. Frankly I'm concerned about how in the 8 years this game has been out, it has never been patched. For example during the boss fights. You get one shield. That's it. If you die and respawn the shield shirt doesn't. Something so basic was not included in this game. You do get 9 lives each level which basically serve as Bubsy hit points. After 20 years you'd think the developers would have put so much more effort into this game. But they didn't. Just because it's a Bubsy game doesn't mean you have automatically make it bad.

[h1][i]“I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed.”[/i] ~Mark Darcy, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason[/h1] Bubsy's back! And so is Black Forest. And it is... kinda awesome, really. I mean, come on. We all know Black Forest for bringing back The Great Giana Sisters. And it was, like, an epic comeback. I know that lots of people who only had personal computers back in the day will call it blasphemy, but the original Giana game was just a crappy Super Mario Bros. clone. Everything that was good—aside from, maybe, the surprisingly neat soundtrack—was stolen, while the rest was just haphazard level design with the odd enemy placement, occasional glitches, collision issues, and so on. It was a messy game made with only one goal in mind: to make money from somebody else's hard work. Reminds you of anything? Yeah, the original Bubsy, while not being [i]that[/i] messy until the Game Boy version of its second installment (yes, Bubsy started to become a mess before the infamous Bubsy 3D), was still just a not-so-good clone of Sonic the Hedgehog. Let's get back to Gianas for a second, though. Despite the original game being... well, whatever it was, Black Forest managed to turn it into a gem. They weren't the first ones to bring back the Sisters (Bitfield's Giana Sisters DS will always have a very special place in my heart), but they did it [i]with style[/i]. Twisted Dreams and its sequel are among those games that I keep buying on every platform they come out on, while some of their music tracks are in my daily playlist to this day. You may say that we're not talking 'bout Gianas here, and it's true. What I'm trying to say is that Black Forest reviving Bubsy makes, like, all the sense in the world. So, enough with the long intro; let's finally take a look at the first Bubsy game since the infamous Bubsy 3D. And you know what? After I finally managed to start this game (we'll get back to that in a bit), I instantly got the feeling. You know, [i]the feeling[/i]. The one that you get while playing Twisted Dreams. The visuals, the mood, even the music are an instant throwback. And I mean, no surprise here. Jean-Marc Haessig (Twisted Dreams' creative director) is back, Rolf Beismann (level designer) is back, Stefan Schmitz (audio designer) is back... Like I said, the feeling is there. Does that mean that we got ourselves a new Twisted Dreams? Well... no. First of all, let's ignore the technical part for a little bit longer and take The Woolies Strike Back as a spherical cow. The design is not nearly as interesting as what we had in Twisted Dreams. That certain “it's so cute I want to hug, like, everything in this game!” effect (I'm pretty sure it's Bitfield we should thank for it, but still) is gone, while there's nothing to replace it with. We've got that Bubsy bobcat (who was pretty uninspired to begin with), we've got some evil UFOs, and we've got some generic aliens. That's it. Sure, that's how Bubsy games always were, but still, the game desperately needs something to look like the real deal. More importantly, though, Bubsy was always revolving around a single character. I mean, they did add characters like Arnold Armadillo and a couple of generic nephews in that animated pilot (the characters even stuck around and came back in the game's sequel), but... what I'm trying to say is that there was no place for the “duality” concept. Giana Sisters DS brought up that idea about the original Mario and Luigi rip-offs being not two separate people, but two personalities of the exact same character, and Black Forest continued going that way. In Twisted Dreams, while switching between Giana's personalities, we also switched between realities. The entire level design changed, and even the music got heavier “punk rock” vibes to reflect the so-called “Punk Giana” (chiptune gods Machinae Supremacy were involved, which made the impact even more palpable). Now, Bubsy? It doesn't have that. And again, Black Forest didn't come up with anything interesting to replace the “duality” concept. Don't get me wrong, though; I'm not trying to say that The Woolies Strike Back should have what Gianas had. My problem is exactly that: they didn't add anything unique. And without the unique touch? What we ended up with is just a generic side-scrolling platformer. Pretty dumb, too, to be honest. We [i]are[/i] supposed to collect some T-shirts for completion, but honestly, all of those (and I do mean all) are hidden in the plain sight, and even if you'll manage to miss one or two during your first attempt, you'll sure get 'em on your second try. And aside from that? Well, you can collect the balls of wool and the keys to unlock vaults (the whole purpose of which is just giving you more wool), while beating the level without dying also counts toward completion, but honestly, that's it. And guess how many levels there are? 14. Which includes three boss areas that have nothing but a boss in 'em. Super Mario Bros. 3, for example, had 90 levels. In 1988 (1990 if we are talking about America). Ba-dum-tsss... OK, OK, but maybe, just [i]maybe[/i], The Woolies Strike Back is a perfectly made game? Like, fine, it has only 14 levels (which aren't even that long and don't have difficulty selectors, which means the whole thing is beatable within only an hour), but maybe those are, like, the perfectly polished definition of a gamegasm? Not really, no. Those are just short, dumb, and rather cheap levels full of the old clichés. Which, I guess, finally brings us to the technical side of the problem. See, The Woolies Strike Back feels rushed, unfinished, and half-broken. Wait, wait, wait, I know what you're thinking. And no, we don't have a Bubsy 3D situation here. The game's fully playable. If you want it. Here's a short summary of what's wrong with it. The launcher (yes, for whatever messed up reason this game needed its own launcher) may not start at all; DirectX 10+ support is broken and can render all the wool on levels invisible (V-Sync has the same problem about it); leaderboards appear to be broken, while the controls are a bit buggy and can play some dirty tricks on you. Nothing major, nothing game-breaking, but at the same time, combined with overall simplicity, it gives you a very unpleasant feeling. When Twisted Dreams came out, it was a blast. It was charming, it was stylish, and it had some unique features. Well, maybe not [i]unique[/i] unique since we did have “duality” in video games before, but you know what I mean. The Woolies Strike Back? It's the exact opposite. It's dull, boring, and uninspired. Not because it doesn't have character switching, not because the Machinae Supremacy wasn't involved, and not because it's Bubsy. Just because it feels like something forced. Something that was made for some quick bucks. There are lots of confirmations of that, too. The fact that the launcher claims that the game wasn't updated past its 1.0 release, the fact that Black Forest doesn't talk about this game and doesn't even include it in their portfolio, the fact that for the next Bubsy game Accolade did the exact same thing (asked some successful devs to make a quick “more of the same” with Bubsy in it)... everything here screams “publisher's fault.” One way or another, the result is the same. Black Forest just took Twisted Dreams and used it to make a crappy quick release. Without Black Forest and some Twisted Dreams leftovers, there wouldn't even be anything to talk about here. And it's sad. Like, seriously sad. Like I said, Black Forest proved before that they can bring an old and half-broken franchise back with a bang. But it looks like the Accolade wasn't really interested. I mean, they were... but they also weren't. It looks like they [i]thought[/i] about bringing the Bubsy franchise back, but weren't sure enough to invest serious money in it. The result was predictable. It does look like Black Forest did what they could. But it clearly wasn't enough. Dixi.

Great game! I love the Bubsy series, I can't wait to play Bubsy 4D!

Medíocre e com jogabilidade execrável, como todos da série [i]Bubsy[/i]. Dito isso, nostálgico.