In the hallowed halls of the greatest platformers of all time, there’s one name you definitely won’t see – Bubsy. But just like an aging sports star who refuses to take no for an answer, maybe Bubsy still has a shot at the Hall of Fame. Well, not right now, but Bubsy 4D sure puts the maligned mascot on the right track, with a short but sweet platforming experience that feels like a speedrunner’s dream, while also just being a lot of pure fun. You didn’t have to try too hard to be the best Bubsy game of all time, but Bubsy 4D is unequivocally a damn good platformer, no caveats.
Since the 1996 release of Bubsy 3D, often regarded as one of the worst platformers of all time, the poor bobcat has only seen two games in three decades – and sadly, those didn’t fare much better. This new Bubsy game is very loosely related to the rest of the series in terms of story; there are a lot of familiar characters, and the bobcat once again finds himself having to take on the alien Woolies after they steal all of his Golden Fleece. As you might imagine, that means he and his little crew have to fly to alien planets and engage in a bunch of platforming hijinks to get it all back.
Perhaps the smartest thing Bubsy 4D gets from the very beginning is making Bubsy himself the punchline of the game. Everyone either has no idea who he is, or knows that he kind of sucks – even Bubsy himself. But that self-depricating humour is often incredibly funny, as the bobcat unhigedly talks about how collectibles fill the void inside him, or breaks the fourth wall, asking you not to touch him with those “disgusting hands” if you’ve been snacking. In short, Bubsy is a shmuck, the game knows it, and it runs full steam ahead with that idea – to great results.
“Bubsy 4D sure puts the maligned mascot on the right track, with a short but sweet platforming experience that feels like a speedrunner’s dream, while also just being a lot of pure fun.”
But that humour is taped on top of a genuinely brilliant momentum-based platformer that gives you wild amounts of freedom in how you traverse and finish levels. At the center of this is a fantastically dynamic core set of moves, with the game giving you all of Bubsy’s various tools and abilities right off the bat, and then a host of modifiers to unlock and make things even more interesting.
Bubsy can double jump with a little Yoshi-esque feet bump, wall jump, dash forward with catlike speed, and spread his body out to float down. These are all features from past Bubsy games, but given much more refinement and feel this time around, injected with a sense of momentum you find in platformers like Sonic. But the key addition in Bubsy 4D is what’s called Hairball Mode, letting the cat turn into a giant sphere that barrels along the ground at high speed – with the game oftentimes giving you tracks to race down.
All of these abilities interweave with each other in brilliant ways, creating a platforming system that’s consistently a joy to play around with. Bubsy 4D is one of those games where there’s a way you’re “supposed” to finish levels, but if you’re smart with your abilities, you can often bypass entire platforming sections instantly, or speed through them at breakneck speeds. It typically feels like you’re supposed to take your time, explore, and collect everything on a first playthrough, with the game then challenging you to do speedruns afterward. And that means there’s a lot of motivation to replay everything, which is good because Bubsy 4D is surprisingly short.
“Bubsy 4D is unequivocally a damn good platformer, no caveats.”
My playtime clocked in at roughly seven hours for everything, with three main planets (made up of five levels) that each have a drastically different aesthetic: a world made of wool, one of school supplies, and a trash world. Each of these worlds also introduce their own gimmicks and twists, like the crafting world having top-down Zelda-like segments. While there is some nice variation, my core problem is that I found myself wanting more.
I don’t mean that Bubsy 4D’s runtime is a problem; I love short, focused games like this. But there is a lack of variation that I think slightly holds the game back – each level in the same world has the exact same music track, and by the last stretch of the game, I felt like there was a distinct lack of truly challenging platforming. That’s genuinely a shame because I truly think the core systems of Bubsy 4D are fantastically fun – and pushed even further, could be even more. There’s a fascinating mixture of self-referential humour and dynamic platforming that just makes this game pop, scratching an itch that not a lot of games do right now.
Bubsy 4D, miraculously, breathes life into a series I honestly have never cared about, or thought I ever would care about. But I can say now that I’d love to see another Bubsy game from developer Fabraz, something with even more budget and room to experiment. What’s there now is great, but the promise of what it could be is even greater. And with a distinct lack of non-Nintendo platformers in the modern age, ironically, Bubsy could be looking at a bright future. If Bubsy 4D is proof of concept, just take my money now.
