Bubblegum Crash

~ BUBBLEGUM CRASH ~

ARTMIC / Naxat Soft

HuCard

1991

The story here didn't really do much for me. A few girls decide to investigate some mysterious bank robberies, so they go from place to place and person to person, finding clues and unearthing truths that really aren't very fascinating.

Sure, many other comics have the player do the same sort of fetch questing, but the quality CD ones usually have superior eye candy to make the location hopping a little more tolerable, not to mention music that isn't a complete afterthought and at least a few effective attempts at drama. Here, my attention drifted because nothing remotely exciting happened until a brief cinematic sequence that preceded an interactive (but simplistic and unchallenging) bike chase.

But as boring as things had been to that point, the worst was yet to come. The final stretch is a first-person maze sequence, a downer of a gameplay element in almost every comic that employs it. This one is even worse than most, though, because it has you partake in random battles that never end quickly but are practically impossible to lose, which makes them feel extremely tedious, unnecessary, and unrewarding. And you'll have to put up with many of these pointless fights (which always pit you against one of only two enemy types) and search dozens of rooms (almost all of which are "labs" or "warehouses" that contain absolutely nothing) before you'll finally solve the labyrinth and face a wimpy final foe.

It's during this maze trek that the game goes from dull to dreadful, and the short, subpar ending sequence does nothing to redeem the by-then-floundering effort.