History of: Bubsy

[Melf]

During the 16-bit era, mascots were a dime a dozen. Unfortunately for many of them, attempting to recapture Sonic The Hedgehog's massive success proved much harder than anticipated, and most fell by the wayside. A few did manage to survive into the next generation of consoles, and one such straggler was Bubsy, Accolade's smart-mouthed bobcat. He didn't get too far though. Relive his torrid past in our latest series retrospective History of: Bubsy (http://www.sega-16.com/2006/07/history-of-bubsy/).

[redrum666]

i only played the 1st on genesis and the 3-D one on PS1 and i hated both the 1st one get boring really fast and it true about the jumps and the 1 hit death it pissed me off to no end

[tim333]

The first one is nigh-unplayable, but I stand by my score of 5 for II. It's nothing special and gets old quick, but it's quite playable and even a little fun for a while.

[TidalTempest]

I've only played the original, and I think it leaves a lot to be desired. The bad collision detection and one hit deaths make this game grind at times. I find most of the levels to be too generic, and mosty uninteresting. It's hardly a poor game, but it's far from being a classic.

[Zebbe]

Alex Kidd in all honour, but the ugliest game character of all is without doubt Bubsy. How I hate that smirk. I've only played his first game, and it sucks harder than back taxes.

[Genesisdoes]

I remember seeing the box for Bubsy 1 for snes or genesis when I was a kid and thinking WTF (or something similar). I downloaded the Bubsy episode... watched about 5 minutes of it . "What could POSSIBLY go wrong?"

[108 Stars]

Bubsy 1 was mediocore, but that was good enough for a weekend.
I haven´t played part 2, but Bubsy 3D made my eyes bleed.
Bubsy is dead, and nobody is missing him. I sure hope that the T-virus doesn´t raise him from the dead someday...

[Obviously]

A select few rose above the others. One of these is Bubsy the Bobcat, who graced the SNES and PSX, along of course with the Genesis.

If you say so. Just because he existed on various systems doesn't mean anyone cared about him. I don't think Bubsy rose above anything including obscurity. He's just another one of those casualties that video game historians will cite when they discuss the 16-bit mascot craze years.


Characters including: Aero the Acrobat, Chuck Rock, Earthwork Jim, Boogerman, Rocket Knight Adventures, and many others. Bubsy didn't get lost in the mix like some other games did, but was unfortunately held back simply because it was compared to Sonic and Super Mario Bros., and just categorized with the other mascot platformers of the era.

Bubsy wasn't lost in the mix? All things considering with the exception of maybe Aero the games you mentioned are far more well known and popular than Bubsy of all things. Bubsy wasn't lost in the mix it was burried by it from my point of view.

Just my two and a half cents.

[tim333]

I have to agree with Obviously there. I was a bit puzzled by the article's treatment of Bubsy as anything more than another one of the casualties of the 90s mascot shuffle.

[Flash1087]

I had the first for the SNES and the second for Genny, and I agree with all counts. Nigh-uncontrollable, but as a kid I looked upon that as part of the challenge, and I was obsessed regardless. I somehow remember watching the cartoon pilot as a youngin, and I used to spend my time in second and third grade drawing extremely crude and mostly unreadable Bubsy comics. To this day, I still want a '!' t-shirt.

And I think Bubsy did alright; I certainly know of a lot more people who remember Bubsy than Aero, Chuck Rock, or sometimes even Boogerman.

[Genesis Knight]

Bubsy 1 was another one of those mindless, stupid, chintzy platformers that plagued my first few months of Genesis ownership.

:horse:

Then I started finding great games like Ranger X, Comix Zone, Gunstar Heroes, Vectorman, and Alisia Dragoon - sort of a videogaming renaissance for me.

[Melf]

Bubsy wasn't lost in the mix? All things considering with the exception of maybe Aero the games you mentioned are far more well known and popular than Bubsy of all things. Bubsy wasn't lost in the mix it was burried by it from my point of view.

Just my two and a half cents.
Bubsy had more sequels on more platforms than any of those games and even had a TV show in the works. How were the others more popular? None of those others (except EWJ) even survived the jump to 32-bits. They all died with the Genesis. Bubsy got nailed because his 3rd game launched the same week as Super Mario 64, which was enough to kill any competition. Bubsy 3D was bad, that's true, but no worse than a lot of the other early 3D drivel that was released between 1995-1996.

[Obviously]

Well Vectorman almost did before Sega cancelled it, and it's found its way into modern day classics collections at the very least. Bubsy survived because Accolade wanted it to though, I doubt it was because there was any sort of demand for it.

I'm not trying to blast the article it's just my opinion on it.

[Melf]

That's true. Creator Mike Berlyn didn't have anything to do with part 2, and he said that Accolade practically killed the franchise with it. He came back for part 3 but it was too late.

[Benjamin]

Bubsy survived because Accolade wanted it to though, I doubt it was because there was any sort of demand for it.

I agree. Bubsy never really seemed to have any real interest from the game players behind it. It was just heavily marketed and crammed down our throats for a short while. I hated the Bubsy game. It lacks a soul. Whoever thought it would be a good idea to make long levels designed to be raced around at high speeds a la Sonic the Hedgehog but make the character so fragile that he dies not only from a single hit but also from long falls when he lands on the ground deserves to be shot.

[j_factor]

the games you mentioned are far more well known and popular than Bubsy of all things.

I don't think so. Bubsy may have sucked, but he was damn well-known. Bubsy 1 in particular had a lot of hype behind it, and Bubsy was a pretty recognizable character. I'd say Boogerman at least was certainly less well-known.

[Melf]

Yeah, I'll have an interview up soon with Bubsy creator Mike Berlyn, and he talks about that very subject. Bubsy's success took Accolade completely off guard.

[Ash]

I think a lot of people already knew that as a developer, Accolade and it's former Ballistic label were not A or B grade quality and never gave Bubsy a chance.

[David J.]

I've played the first one briefly on an emu, and was disgusted. When the game first came out, all of my school friends thought it was crap, and I was lucky I never played it back then, because I would have been scared for life. ;)

[j_factor]

I think a lot of people already knew that as a developer, Accolade and it's former Ballistic label were not A or B grade quality and never gave Bubsy a chance.

Ballistic put out some good stuff, but they were all ports.

[ary incorparated]

Bubsy the Butscat ,Butspleet the Blowjobcat.Bubsy the Flopcat,