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Bubble up that gum and prepare to take on the evil Baron Von Blubba and his cronies.

Firebird has done an ace job of converting Taito's hit coin-op Bubble Bobble to the likes of the Commodore 64. You get the simultaneous two-player option with those two bubble-blowing dragons Bub and Bob, water shoots, magical objects, fruits and treasure.

You start at the bottom of the screen and the monsters race down from above. Your only weapons are bubbles which you shoot at the oncoming nasties. The bubbles surround their bodies and they start to float to the top of the screen. After a few moments they'll be released but if you get to the bubble and burst it first they fly around the levels and turn into fruits. If they manage to escape, the bubbles turn red and you'll have to go after them again. If you're slow at completing a level, and catching all the bullies on it, Baron Blubba, a fishy fellow, appears and he chases you round the screen.

The screens get more complex as you move downward from one to another. Sometimes you drop down a random number of levels but you can take some comfort because the first moves of the bullies on each level are always the same, so you can easily build up strategies for avoiding and bubbling them once you memorise the layout of each level - and that's not difficult.

You have one added advantage over the bullies - the game movement does not have the same spring or speed as the coin-op so, on the one hand the bullies move slightly slower and on the other your bubbling mechanism is also slowed up.

As you advance through the levels the bullies - or should they be bubblies - change. At first they're clockwork powered mouths, then the white sheeted ghosts appear, the fish and springy creatures. All of them are affected by your bubbles but all have different attack movements which will remove one of your three lives if you lose concentration for a moment.

You can get some of those lives back by bubbling the letters that spell EXTEND as you move through the levels. You can also destroy the magical targets the occasionally appear. The bubble up sweet will, for instance, launch a storm of bubbles from your mouth, the shoe will speed you up and the 1-up symbol means extra lives.

It's unlikely you'll ever discover or master all the features in Bubble Bobble. If you're not finding ways to dodge Baron Von Blubba or finding the best place on the screen to burst a group of bubbles, you'll be working out how to collect all the fruits and treasure on the screen before the time runs out. The game's as addictive as bubble gum and as long lasting.