137. The Fairyland Story (Taito, Arcade (PS2), 1985)

The Fairyland Story is an early action platformer from Taito, predating Bubble Bobble by a year, but coming after 1983's Chack'n Pop. You control a witch who can shoot a short range magic beam that turns enemies into cakes. Cakes can either be destroyed by shooting more magic or pushed off of the edge of a platform, where they will crush any enemy they land on. It's a great feelign when you manage to crush multiple enemies with a cake. I love a cute arcade game, and the graphics are very simple but cute (enemies are various animal warriors), in addition to the premise.

That said, none of the action itself feels very good. The Fairyland Story's jumping is fine, but the movement doesn't feel as precise or interesting as I would like. There is a powerup to increase the distance of your beam, and there are a good variety of enemy types and stage layouts to keep the game interesting. One big gripe that I have is that there are no continues, so you really have to memorize the game to make any progress. Bubble Bobble improved on so many of the ideas here (co-op, continues, better feeling gameplay), but it's neat to see an earlier game with some of the same ideas.

3/5, a decent action platformer built around a cute cake-dropping mechanic