Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

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RatsTheDonkey
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Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby RatsTheDonkey » November 18th, 2024, 3:01 pm

NOTE: This review is specifically of the Sega Genesis version of the game. The SNES version is identical in gameplay, with subtle differences in graphics and different sound quality.

Bubsy, a platformer series created by the late Michael Berlyn and published by Accolade, is one of those infamous video game characters that had a lot of hype built up for it back in the day. His debut actually got a lot of press and even some positive reviews, selling relatively well for a third party platformer. But the series quickly fell off the radar due to a triple whammy of a lousy sequel (Bubsy II, a game held together by duck tape and made by a dev team that openly hated the character), a lousy cartoon pilot (such so that even the voice talents of Rob Paulsen couldn't salvage it) and an abysmal 3D venture (plus an oft forgotten reboot from a few years back) but for some odd reason, the series has gained the reputation of being both a cult classic and an internet punching bag at the same time. It's a strange phenomenon to say the least. So I figured I'd pop the game back into my Genesis so I could play a platformer that isn't my millionth playthrough of Sonic and it's ilk. The results are...a very, VERY mixed bag.

I'll give credit where credit is due, because Bubsy does do 'some' things right. One thing I like is that the camera pans directly ahead of Bubsy when he's running at top speed. None of the classic era Sonic games (with the exception of Sonic CD when he's charging up the spin-dash or super peel-out) did this. Even the Sonic games could have benefited from having it since those games LOVE to blindside you with cheap hits and traps, such as the infamous Inescapable Pit Of Despair in Sonic 2's Mystic Cave Zone (this is part of why I like the inclusion of 16:9 widescreen in the Sonic Origins remasters), and it's especially helpful in Bubsy due to the ludicrous speeds he reaches combined with the somewhat cramped FOV. Having ANY chance to anticipate an obstacle ahead, even if it's within milliseconds, is better than none at all. Unlike Sonic 1 and 2, Bubsy also has a password feature to let you pick up where you left off, though it's tucked away and requires a button prompt to pull it up on the title screen.

Another thing that I appreciated is that when you leave the title screen sitting for a bit, a tutorial will pop open to show beginners the ropes on Bubsy's moves and goals. While Sonic is elegantly designed enough to show most of the basics without one, it would have benefited from having even a basic one in-game (be it in attract mode or a short info screen) to teach newcomers some aspects of gameplay that aren't immediately apparent. A good example is the spin-dash in Sonic 2 and on: what kid could have figured out how to do that without looking at the manual or having a friend tell them? (As an aside, check out a young Melissa Joan Hart's disastrous attempt at playing Sonic 2 on Nick Arcade, as she was never told that Sonic could do the spin-dash at all) Similar applies to Bubsy's gliding move, which is crucial to playing the game, yet the player would have been left to figure out on their own that you can do it at all without the devs giving a basic rundown.

In terms of aesthetics and music, Bubsy tries to look, sound and feel like a 1930's cartoon, with wacky cartoon visuals (presented with basic but appealing graphics), cornball humor and some rather catchy jazzy music. It's so deliberately corny and old-fashioned--even back in the 90's!-- that it made me realize that Bubsy is almost certainly meant to be an Anti-Sonic--a character who thinks he's cool, but is really the butt of the joke ala Chuck Jones Daffy Duck. The fact that Bubsy is subject to many ridiculous pratfalls when he dies and has many a catchphrase (as an aside, I was surprised at how many voice samples were stuffed into the cartridge) only reinforces this. Bubsy is infamous for being an annoying character, but that's the entire point. A good idea on paper...but the problem is that the joke wears thin fast when you're forced to see those gags and hear those catchphrases over and over again! If nothing else, Bubsy at least tries to have its own identity to set it apart from being a mere Sonic or Mario clone in aesthetics, and for better or worse, that's probably why the character still lingers in memory years later in a way that other execrable Sonic clones like Awesome Possum haven't. Bubsy is memorable at the very least. But does that make his game fun to play?

Sadly, not really.

Bubsy is, at the most, a very odd duck in terms of gameplay flow, and at worst it can be an utter mess of a game. It simply lacks the polish and nuances of the characters it's riding the coattails of. Bubsy's design philosophy can be summed up as "Square peg meet round hole"--it's basically a Mario clone with Sonic's speed (and Knuckles gliding) shoehorned in, with combat that just doesn't mesh well with the speed of a Sonic type game. (As an aside, the Sega Genesis port of Zool had a similar issue, since the original Amiga game was NOT designed to be played as fast as he moves in that port).

I did some background research into the development of Bubsy to get some insight as to why the game is the way it is, and dug up some interesting stuff. Michael Beryln, who was tired of working on text-based adventure games, wanted to do something different, and like many others, he really liked Sonic The Hedgehog 1--he played it for a solid week straight and wrote a document about why he thought it was a great game so he could get his boss to greenlight the first Bubsy game. Berlyn kind of 'got' that the point of Sonic was that you had to play it over and over again to get better at it so you could get into the games rhythm and learn the skills to beat each level faster. (A correct assumption, as Yuji Naka deliberately designed Sonic 1 with the idea of encouraging the player to play over and over again to figure out how to get to the end as fast as possible while also rewarding players who experiment and explore off the beaten path.) I also have to give credit that Accolade made the most of their limited resources for this game--Bubsy was their first ever platformer game and they did NOT have the resources and manpower of a big company like Sega/Sonic Team. In fact, Bubsy almost bankrupted Accolade because they underestimated just how much money and manpower it takes to successfully market a mascot platformer to the degree of a series like Sonic--the game thankfully sold well, but it's not a surprise that they shied away from making any more platformer series beyond Bubsy. This would explain a lot about why Bubsy is as oddly put together as it is--the dev team aimed high, but were simply in over their heads trying to make a game that could truly compete with its inspiration.

Speaking of which, Berlyn also misunderstood one fundamental thing--the reason that Sonic 1 worked is because the levels were (mostly) built around Sonic's abilities, and the game didn't punish you too harshly if you screwed up thanks to the Ring system (Mario's power-up system works in a similar way). Bubsy, on the other hand, is totally unforgiving--it goes out of it's way to screw you over if you make ANY mistakes at all. He has one hit point, will die almost as easily as NES Silver Surfer if he runs into virtually ANYTHING that isn't a power-up (that he dies from hitting a wall too fast is just sadistic--Sonic 2 almost had this same feature, and they wisely scrapped it specifically because it was so annoying to deal with) and he has no reliable means of building up his defense--not even the hard to find Invincibility power-up can save you from all of these! And that includes if he falls too high from above without gliding! Also, Bubsy generally does a poor job of giving players feedback of what exactly they did wrong and expects them to learn purely thru trial and error. The game occasionally has Bubsy react If he's about to make a great fall, but it's just too inconsistent to be reliable. If Sonic or Mario tried that (or rather, relied entirely on it), it would have completely killed the flow of their gameplay and discouraged newcomers from improving. Bubsy's platforming DEMANDS that you play on defense at all times despite Bubsy's high speed and gliding (which in itself suffers from arbitrary ways of building momentum that can make him hard to control). Imagine if Sonic 1s level design was entirely built like Marble or Labyrinth Zone or Metropolis Zone from Sonic 2--that sums up what Bubsy's all around design is like. Its counterintuitive and exasperating to play unless you REALLY know the levels and how Bubsy's bizarre momentum and slope physics work in and out. But whereas Sonic is rewarding to better yourself at and is still consistently fun even when you slip up or have to deal with some level design dips, Bubsy is just straight up punishing in its all around design. Another problem with Bubsy besides the frustrating stop n go combat is the downright maze like level design. The levels feel like they were built randomly, there's hardly any sense of progression or direction and as a result, the flow is all over the place. Combine that with the odd hitboxes of the Woolie enemies, and that the camera doesn't move along with Bubsy's jumps for some reason, and you realize that Bubsy is a game held together by duct tape and good hopes.

It's sad, because when I play Bubsy, I can tell that Berlyn and co. really wanted to make a good game, and there were appealing glimmers of potential in it. It's far from "Horrible game" material (I'll gladly take it over truly abysmal games like Mega Man X7) but Bubsy is a noble failure at best with far too many flaws stacked against it to consider it a truly worthwhile venture beyond curiosity and a cautionary tale of how 'not' to design a platformer game. It's unique for sure, but it simply isn't very fun to play.

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Stalvern
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby Stalvern » November 18th, 2024, 4:07 pm

The "physics" and instant deaths truly kill it. Moving anywhere feels like you're fighting a magnet and suddenly break free. You can be safe by staying in the slow zone and constantly gliding, or you can run around and die. The enormous and convoluted levels, another sign of the excessive ambition you point out, would be a slog even if the mechanics didn't demand playing them at half-speed.

Your charitable analysis of the character's purpose is refreshing, even though I'm not convinced. I think we're supposed to groan at his jokes but be charmed by his chutzpah. He never loses his composure like Daffy Duck; his cocky attitude (if not his wit) is all Bugs Bunny. He gets into pratfalls like Daffy and Wile E. Coyote and all the other cartoon losers, but that's only because the game has failure conditions and that's how Looney Tunes approaches failure.

The developers were stuck with an impossible character type: a character who had to be both the unbeatable Bugs (the one they wanted him to be) and the very beatable Daffy (the one necessitated if the player ever made a mistake). In making him so miserably inadequate to the challenges he would face, they ensured that his smarmy overestimation of himself would be as resentable as possible, and he is accordingly resented.

Also, I should point out that Bubsy was actually hit by a quadruple whammy of failure after his first outing. He got to be in the Jaguar-only Fractured Furry Tails too!

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VideoGameCritic
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby VideoGameCritic » November 19th, 2024, 7:43 pm

I find this very fascinating. And whenever I read threads like this it just makes me want to play the game right NOW - no matter how bad it is!

That's really the whole point of the site. No review is "right" or "wrong" per se, but they tend to elicit conversation. We get to discuss all of the old games and they are a heck of a lot of fun to dissect!

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BlasteroidAli
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby BlasteroidAli » November 20th, 2024, 2:58 am

What is shocking to see is that the Atari Jaguar Bubsy is the cream of the crop as far as the critic is concerned. Getting a very respectable D.
Genesis has 2 Bubsy games. First one gets a solid F. The sequel which looks lamentable gets an F-.

Then the pinnacle of the series, the PS1 3D one gets a deserved F-.

Back in the day I think it was like this B1 got good reviews. Back then, most games were impossible. So Bub being rubbish did not harm it too much. Then Bub 2 oh well. I never got that one as the first game was not great.

I got the Jag version which I thought was a solid B. Given the Jag had very few of these type of games, it is easy to see why it would be so. The ps1 game looked so bad I avoided it and it seems good that I did.

Rats review. Lovely. The extra detail is fabulous. If you sucked up to it. Atari might have put the review in the up-and-coming retro collection. Yep, Bubs is getting the Atari 50 treatment, after they bought the rights to the Accolade games.

By way of a wee joke, I thought I would colour Bubsy as yellow. The same colour as vomit.

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Anchoa79
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby Anchoa79 » November 20th, 2024, 9:16 am

VideoGameCritic wrote:I find this very fascinating. And whenever I read threads like this it just makes me want to play the game right NOW - no matter how bad it is!

That's really the whole point of the site. No review is "right" or "wrong" per se, but they tend to elicit conversation. We get to discuss all of the old games and they are a heck of a lot of fun to dissect!


Critic, you should review Bubsy 1 and 2 for SNES and close the "circle of horror".

MaverickMoPete
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby MaverickMoPete » November 20th, 2024, 9:17 am

It tries to be too may things at once. It's like it was trying to be a "jack of all trades" game but couldn't get anything higher than "deuce of all trades."

RatsTheDonkey
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby RatsTheDonkey » November 20th, 2024, 10:16 am

VideoGameCritic wrote:I find this very fascinating. And whenever I read threads like this it just makes me want to play the game right NOW - no matter how bad it is!

That's really the whole point of the site. No review is "right" or "wrong" per se, but they tend to elicit conversation. We get to discuss all of the old games and they are a heck of a lot of fun to dissect!


Thank you! I appreciate that my writeup inspired such a thing! :D

RatsTheDonkey
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby RatsTheDonkey » November 20th, 2024, 10:19 am

BlasteroidAli wrote:
Rats review. Lovely. The extra detail is fabulous. If you sucked up to it. Atari might have put the review in the up-and-coming retro collection. Yep, Bubs is getting the Atari 50 treatment, after they bought the rights to the Accolade games.



Thanks! I am genuinely curious about the Jaguar Bubsy game, but I'll wait for the upcoming Bubsy collection to try it out since I do not have the means to shell out for an Atari Jaguar just for one game! I've never played Bubsy 3D, but it seems that EVERYONE agrees that it's a complete disaster of a game.

MaverickMoPete
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby MaverickMoPete » November 20th, 2024, 11:21 am

RatsTheDonkey wrote:Thanks! I am genuinely curious about the Jaguar Bubsy game, but I'll wait for the upcoming Bubsy collection to try it out since I do not have the means to shell out for an Atari Jaguar just for one game! I've never played Bubsy 3D, but it seems that EVERYONE agrees that it's a complete disaster of a game.


I have played Bubsy 3D. It's a shame I'll have to live with for the rest of my life.

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BlasteroidAli
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Re: Bubsy In: Claws Encounters Of The Furred Kind (1993, Sega Genesis/SNES)

Postby BlasteroidAli » November 20th, 2024, 2:57 pm

RatsTheDonkey wrote:
BlasteroidAli wrote:
Rats review. Lovely. The extra detail is fabulous. If you sucked up to it. Atari might have put the review in the up-and-coming retro collection. Yep, Bubs is getting the Atari 50 treatment, after they bought the rights to the Accolade games.



Thanks! I am genuinely curious about the Jaguar Bubsy game, but I'll wait for the upcoming Bubsy collection to try it out since I do not have the means to shell out for an Atari Jaguar just for one game! I've never played Bubsy 3D, but it seems that EVERYONE agrees that it's a complete disaster of a game.

Back in the day I had 2 Atari platform games. Bubsy and Zool 2. Zool 2 was better but the Bubster had a special place in my heart. It has great graphics, but the one life mechanic from the previous games rears its ugly head. I view it with rose-coloured tinted specs as I know it was not much fun, but I love it for the nostalgia. I replayed it and yeah it has superb graphics but the control .... wow. It is atrocious. What were they thinking? d/F
Try it yourselfhttps://www.retrogames.cc/jaguar-games/bubsy-in-fractured-furry-tales-world.html Beware of pop ups using this site.
Oh Imagineer did the conversion to the Jag. So I think they might own the rights to it. As such, it is not on the forthcoming compilation. I am not sure of the merits of putting out 5 trash games from yesteryear. There is a game boy game as well


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