The bell power-up system is a “love it or hate it” issue, because it takes a lot of hits in order for the bells to color cycle into something useful. You cannot equip the Options and the shield at the same time. A blue bell is a speed up, the white bell powers up your weapon with a double shot, the red bell will create a shield and the green bell will add “bunshin” mirror Options that mimic your ship’s fire. However, if you shoot them, they’ll change colors and become useful power-ups. Regular yellow bells will add points to your score, and grabbing several yellow bells in succession will increase the bonus. Whenever you shoot a cloud, a bell pops out of it. The other departure from Xevious is the power-up system. However, taking a direct hit will still destroy the ship outright. (They can still shoot their main weapon, at least.) When they’re fully incapacitated, a little ambulance comes out from the screen, ready to resuscitate them, if you can catch it. This emphasis on teamwork was undoubtedly why the title of the game is TwinBee.Īlso, instead of getting killed outright by enemy bullets, your TwinBees will lose their limbs, so they cannot drop bombs. Perhaps more fun and effective, one ship can push the other to produce a spread bullet shot. TwinBee and WinBee can also interact in several ways: they can unite by holding hands to shoot a powerful fire bullet. Gradius and R-Type were both strictly single-player experiences, and most of its competition still relied on letting the two players take turns. This is common nowadays, but it played a big role in its success at the time. The other most innovative feature is its two-player mode. It works slightly differently, in that there’s no targeting cursor on screen, but instead your ship will automatically lock onto a ground target if you’re at the appropriate distance. As in Namco’s classic, the ship can fire forward with a button and drop bombs (using their tiny arms) on the ground with another. Outside of the visuals, the core gameplay is very similar. The invincible flipping tiles of Xevious have been changed to spinning spiked clubs. The major exception, at least in the first TwinBee, are the bosses, which are typical spaceships, although they’re usually colored more brightly than other shoot-em-ups. Instead of turrets on the ground, there are pine cones. Most of the enemies consist of flying fruit, knives, octopi, and other silly objects. Their goal is to defeat the invading army of the evil Lord Spice. The ships, TwinBee and WinBee, are cute little things, colored blue and pink with little arms on the side. Its main distinctive feature is the cute fantasy setting. Rather than mimic the sci-fi aesthetic of all of the other games, TwinBee went for a more original route. While Konami had worked on other vertical shooters, TwinBee is undoubtedly their most popular take on this style of game. Many other companies tried their hand at similar games, including Capcom’s Exed Exes and SNK’s Hal 21. In 1984, Namco’s Xevious, the first vertical scrolling shooter, was one of the most popular games in Japan.
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