ReMix: Puzzle Bobble 'Silver Dragon's Bubbles'

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Also known as 'Bust-a-Move' (not to be confused with the dancing game 'Bust-a-Groove'), Taito's Puzzle Bobble gets its first attention on OCR courtesy of COUCOU. This is a fun little electronica mix that uses a lead synth strongly resembling a duck, to humorous and light-hearted effect. If that sounds a little odd, maybe it is, but when you hear you shall understand. There's a chipper octave bass, some popping bubble effects, filtered analogue arpeggios, and minimal but get-the-job-done percussion. There a great little vibrato synth counter-melody that comes in at the first minute mark that's fun too, preceding a bubble-percussion break and then a variation on the main melody. Towards the end there's a pretty damn cool synth solo that does massive monoglide, and in general a wider variety of synth textures are brought in to keep things interesting throughout. New judge Daniel Baranowsky writes:

"The percussion is a bit more subdued than I would like, and an EQ-fest would more likely fix that than an actual volume increase. E.G., fatness in the snare (~250 Hz), Thump in the Kick (80-150 Hz), etc etc etc. But given the silly-ass nature of the piece, I don't think it subracts too much from it.The synths are well programmed, obviously a lot of care was put into their portamento and timbre in general. The gutteral, analogish bass works great with the more floaty leads. Enter 2:25, the lead solo. Very well done. A bit on the louder side, doesn't blend as well as it could, but still acceptable. I actually like the "Casio Keyboard" sound to it. Mmmm... Nostalgia.

I have to note that despite the intentionally retro feel, very few Casio home keyboards had analog filters or emulations thereof, if any, which is a big part of this mix. Darkesword noted the dry feel to the overal composition and that perhaps some more attention to DSP could have helped, but I'm not sure that this more direct, cleaner approach isn't preferable for this type of happy/jolly/chipper retro-nostalgia fest. At any rate, this definitely captures the pure sugary bubble-gumosity of Zuntata's original and the cute, carefree vibe that permeates the series. Fun.

― djpretzel