Bubble Bash 2
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| Bubble Bash 2

What is the fascination with bubbles? All any bubble amounts to is a bit of soap and water and a whole lot of nothing, but pump a load of the things into the air and you’ll soon have a crowd of people gawping at the sky in wonderment.

Perhaps it’s this appeal that’s lead to their ubiquity in video games. Bubble Bash 2 is the latest in a long line of match-three puzzlers to have the floaty baubles at it its core.

Like the prequel, Gameloft’s game owes a huge debt to Taito’s Puzzle Bobble series, with a similar system of pinging coloured bubbles into a cluster to try and match three or more. When you achieve this the cluster disappears, taking you one step closer to the ultimate goal of a total clearance.

Where Bubble Bash 2 advances the formula (and continues where the original left off) is in the neat implementation of physics. Here, the central clusters are often attached to a helium-filled balloon, so changing the load affects the height and movement of the whole bunch.

You also have levels where the whole bunch is balanced along a central pivot, meaning that any additions or subtractions to either side will tilt the whole lot.

The game’s full of similarly interesting variations which, along with a healthy scattering of special-use bubbles (such as explosive and chameleon bubbles), make Bubble Bash 2 more than a mere Puzzle Bobble clone.

Bubble Bash 2 may not have the style (we’re not sold on the bland character design or the ‘African adventure’ setting) or immediate appeal of the excellent Puzzle Bobble Evolution, but it plays well enough and differently enough to warrant a purchase regardless of how many bubbles you’ve popped in the past.

Bubble Bash 2

Bubble Bash 2 continues where the original left off, introducing some neat physics-based spins on the old Puzzle Bobble format. It lacks the charm of its inspiration, but offers hours of varied bubble-popping action
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Jon Mundy
Jon Mundy
Jon is a consummate expert in adventure, action, and sports games. Which is just as well, as in real life he's timid, lazy, and unfit. It's amazing how these things even themselves out.