Bubble Cats Rescue

Genre: Puzzle

Players: 1

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Review:

(Note: This game is included in Family Games Bundle: My Magic Florist + Pet Shop Snacks + Bubble Cats Rescue, along with My Magic Florist and Pet Shop Snacks. This game is also included in 15 in 1 Family Games Mega Collection along with 2048 Battles, Adrenaline Rush – Miami Drive, Airborne Grannies, Classic Games Collection Vol. 1, Classic Games Collection Vol. 2, Flowlines VS, Go! Fish Go!, Go Kart Mania, Jet Ski Rush, Klondike Solitaire, Ludomania, Pet Shop Snacks, Pocket Foosball, and Quick Golf.)

Bubble Cats Rescue is a Puzzle game where players aim bubbles from the bottom trying to match bubbles at the top of the screen. In other words, this game is a knockoff of Bust-A-Move AKA Puzzle Bobble, but with cats for some reason.

I cannot tell if this game is a mobile port, because there are literally dozens of games on the Google Play Store that use some combination of the words “Bubble”, “Cats” and “Rescue”. However, the visuals here are absolutely spot-on for a mobile game, with a sickly cute style that’s cartoonishly awkward in a way that seems particular to cheap mobile games, along with a throwaway soundtrack. Yeah, suffice it to say, I’m not a fan.

As for the gameplay… well, this is Bust-A-Move, and for the most part they manage not to mess it up. I say “most part” because everything about controlling this game feels extra slow, from aiming the bubble to getting the next one after you fire one off.

In portable mode, the game has an option for touchscreen play, but rather than a pull-release system like some of the touch-enabled Bust-A-Move games have, this game instead goes for a “touch where you want the bubble to go” system, which I’m sure you can understand makes the game a cakewalk… not that this game is especially hard to begin with.

That’s because the entirety of this game is basically a “Puzzle mode” style, where players have unlimited time to think through and aim their shots, and are only limited in the number of shots they can make… but it’s not like the shots are so limited that players are likely to struggle much.

In terms of content, I do credit this game for at least having 100 levels… but then I have to remove that credit for having no endless mode, no timed mode, and no multiplayer mode. Come on, guys, the original Puzzle Bobble had multiplayer 25 years ago… and you can even get that version on the Switch (although, to be fair, it’s twice the price of this game).

In the end, Bubble Cats Rescue is a passable knockoff of a classic Puzzle game with worse controls, a worse presentation, and fewer features. If you’re looking for a cheaper version of the game on Switch, this does the job more or less, but you get what you pay for.

tl;dr – Bubble Cats Rescue is a knockoff of the classic Puzzle game Bust-A-Move AKA Puzzle Bobble, but with a worse presentation, worse controls, and fewer options. It’s still a passable Puzzle game, and it’s cheaper than the Puzzle Bobble games available on the eShop, but you get what you pay for.

Grade: C-

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