Konami 1991

Bells & Whistles is a wonderfully-presented vertical shooter by Konami, who have never made a bad game that I know of.  Except for their light gun games, of course, which are all shit.

You pilot Twin Bee, a somewhat popular Japanese cartoon icon, in this sequel to 1985's Twin Bee (known as "RainbowBell" in North America).  Bells & Whistles also goes by the names of "Detana!! Twin Bee" and "Twin Bee '91," with the former translated to "Pop'n Twin Bee" for the console release.  WikiPedia also informs me that the original 1985 Twin Bee was originally to be released as Bells & Whistles, but the default title was changed to Twin Bee for reasons unknown (while a DIP switch could flip between titles, a la Dynablaster/BomberMan).  Does it help that the Japanese release used two buttons for bombs and shots, while in the European release there's one button for both?  Confused yet?  Or shall we just skip the symantics and play the bastard?  Hit "Read More" for the full review.

Bells & Whistles is quite probably the cutest and happiest vertical shooter in the known universe, with the catchiest music and most colourful sprites.  Strawberry ice cream oozes from the coin mech when you turn the cabinet on, and there's a basket full of kittens inside that are awarded for high scores.  Well, I exaggerate, but you get the idea.

The wonderful presentation almost - almost - makes the game a lot of fun to play.

The problem with Bells & Whistles is in the infuriatingly fiddly powerup system.  You start off with a standard one-shot pea-shooter; to upgrade your weapons you have to shoot clouds, from which bells are released.  Shoot the bells to change their colours (and bounce them up the screen a little), collect them to receive the upgrade.  Problem is that the bells remain gold (for bonus points) for about one shot out of five - accidentally firing another shot at them will change them right back to gold and make you swear.  Not that the powerups are that good, anyway - you get the odd double- or triple-shot, a tail-shield, shadow craft that shoot with you, that sort of thing.  There's also a completely useless shield to protect you from enemy fire while increasing your hit area by a factor of four.

Add in the lack of a keep-weapons system, and what all this adds up to is that if you lose a life, you'll go straight back to the pea-shooter in a screen full of (admittedly cute) enemies, and lose the other two lives within a few seconds.  This makes the later levels a frustrating test of stamina rather than skill.

Co-op mode is interesting and fun, with extra shot types available when a player tries to fire "through" his partner.  This adds a little variety to the weapons system, and is noteworthy to this series of games.

You'll have noticed by now that I'm not doing marks out of five any more.  I'm glad of that, 'cause this game probably would have ended up with an unfair score no matter what it got.  The presentation is perfect, the music brilliant, the anime cutscenes adorable.  The weapons are crap, the later levels frustrating, the whole game seeming a little too long and unfair.  But this is one of those rare games that has serious flaws, but is still a genuine joy to play, like happiness in a can.

In short - play it, but in your local arcade rather than on an emulation, and not with completion in mind.  Your pockets will tell you when it's time to call it a day.

Bells & Whistles is a strange and beautiful mess of a game, and will always be endearing to me even though it's a bit of a bitch to actually play.