Introduction/Story

The story begins with Bubby on a search for hidden treasure around the sea, and finds a vivid land, known for it's colours by the name of Rainbow Islands. The bad news is, that the inhabitants have been kidnapped, and Bubby is the only one around to take a stand to it. So, now Bubby has to help save an entire island, as well as retrieve it's large diamonds, all while trying to collect treasure along the way. It won't be easy, though. 28 stages and 7 bosses stand in your way of treasure hunting success and heroism in this colourful adventure!

Graphics

For a game called "Rainbow Islands", it actually lives up to this name, and then some. The game is littered with vivid colour all around, and actually makes you feel like you're actually there. There is a wide range of graphics and sprites, even for each level's theme as well. The enemies, surprisingly, are all individually sprited. It was all an amazing experience to the eyes, and ceases to hit you with boredom. The graphics are well thought-out for this game.

Sound

While the game excels in graphics, it doesn't do a half-bad job with sounds either. The stage music is a little half-half, though. Stages that have their own music track actually fit the theme they portray and sound exceptionally thought-out. Otherwise, for Worlds 2, 3, and 4, they are all stuck with World 1's theme, as if the developers stopped getting lazy with music after world 4. Otherwise, the sounds are clear and cute, go with the game, and each important action has their own sound effect to let you know you achieved something. The best part is, the music can play ALONG with the sound effects FLAWLESSLY, something not seen very often in NES titles.

Addictiveness

When you meet a platformer that isn't quite like any other game out there, with it's own unique blend of game play elements, something that stands out above the rest, that in itself will keep you going to the same game. Because, only one game has those game play elements that you may love. Even better yet, it's tied together with a cool soundtrack, a very gradual difficulty curve, and lovable graphics and characters (Even the enemies are cute!) that will bring you back to trying to get further into the game. To add to that, you got hundreds of collectibles to grab which makes it fun to bop all those enemies and rack up a gigantic score! Lastly, it keeps the puzzle aspect widely known in Puzzle Bobble, where you need to use your smarts to make rainbow stairs up to where you want to go without getting hurt. If I were a kid and playing this game, I wouldn't put the controller down. It's a fairly fun game for being a platformer, whichever way you look at it.

Story

As fascinating as the game is, it is quite lacking in the story department. The story feels unexplained as world three heads to a Medieval Castle, too a mechanical warehouse, to an Arkanoid tribute? The rather simple story of Bubby visiting an island does not appear to explain all the otherworldly places that he visits. Does all this really fit on islands? And finally, the last world is in space. The game does not explain how he got into space, nor how an island-related adventure takes him into space. All of this feels left undone or thrown together in total.

Depth

For a platformer game, it does have quite a lot of depth into it. It has a full seven themed worlds, bosses for each one, and each of the seven worlds has four detailed stages to go along with them. It can take quite a long while to beat the game from start to finish, and even more to return all seven big diamonds to the island. There's multiple power ups to collect, hidden treasures to find, and plenty of enemies to get rid of. Sure, you are given an invisible time limit, but it's not too restrictive if you keep a good pace.

Difficulty

The controls are quite simple, you move, jump with A and form rainbows with B. The not so simple part is putting your rainbow power to good use. Sure you can walk on your own rainbows, but this can get tedious sometimes, especially when the goal is to keep going up. The limited air movement and air control is unlike most plat formers, where your momentum counts. On the bright side, the game has a very gradual difficulty curve, which allows the player to get used to the controls fairly quickly, and continue to improve. Although this game is difficult, it is quite fair and puzzling. Although, it sort of feels like world 4 to 7's difficulties could use a bit of reorganizing.

Overall

After all is said and done, this game stacks up to be a fairly decent platformer. It's only real downfall is it's insecurity with it's own story and level themes. Other than that, it's a very complete game, with plenty of things to go for, collect, and defeat, while trying to send all of the evil bosses packing and  let the islanders claim their home once more. The graphics are full of rich environments and beautiful colours, the sounds are pleasant to the ears and are informative, the game lets you learn out the game on the first few levels before picking up the pace gradually, and it's all filled together to provide a welcome atmosphere. If you're a gamer who doesn't mind the story, you'll love it to pieces!