A remarkably faithful conversion of Taito's Bust-A-Move 2 arcade board. The port preserves the original's smoothness and pure addictive flow, packs in hundreds of boards and a versus mode that remains a delight. Likely the best Bust-A-Move on the system.
Your verdict
Category
Puzzle2 players3+
Description
Nintendo 64 adaptation of Taito's arcade classic Bust-A-Move 2, the pure and addictive bubble-matching puzzle. Published by Taito, released in 1998 in Europe and North America. Hundreds of progressive stages, solo and versus modes, and the iconic Bub and Bob characters.
Bust-A-Move 2 - Arcade Edition review
4/5
Art direction
★★★★★
"Striking"
3/5
Music
★★★★★
"Memorable"
1/5
Story
★★★★★
"Anecdotal"
Bust-A-Move 2 (Taito) dresses the bubble shooter in an adorable, colorful cartoon aesthetic: chubby dragons Bub and Bob, glossy bubbles in tangy colors and pop backdrops of perfect clarity. The art direction favors playfield clarity and the cheerful energy of the Bubble Bobble license. A crisp, joyful art direction, instantly endearing.
Gameplay
"Excellent"
Fun
"From the very first seconds"
Bubble-shooting in its purest form: you chain colour clusters, set off satisfying collapses and hold back a ceiling that threatens to crush you. The versus mode tightens the mood and turns thinking into a twitchy race. Colourful, immediate and fiercely addictive, a puzzle classic that never wears thin.
Addictiveness
"Obsessive"
Knocking down a whole cluster with a well-placed shot and watching the screen clear in one go delivers a satisfaction that drives you to the next board. The puzzle mode multiplies the brain-teasers while two-player face-offs ramp up the tension. The formula stays close to its siblings, but the balance between reflex and strategy keeps all its pulling power.
A fiendishly addictive bubble puzzler where you aim to pop clusters of colors and bury your opponent under the overflow. The two-player duel rewards a sharp eye and the perfect angle, in a jittery rivalry where one well-felt ricochet flips the whole thing. Easy to grasp and impossible to put down, it spawns endless "one more" and challenges that drag on for hours.
Is Bust-A-Move 2 - Arcade Edition still worth playing in 2026?
Bust-A-Move 2 - Arcade Edition adapts Taito's arcade classic to N64, a bubble-shooting puzzler of exemplary purity and addictiveness. The brilliant simplicity of the concept, the gradual rise in difficulty and the excellent versus mode make it one of the best iterations of the genre on the machine. The generous content and competitive replayability greatly extend the interest. For fans of timeless arcade puzzlers and two-player challenge, it is a success that has lost none of its effectiveness over the years.
