The Taito Milestones collections combine ten Arcade Archives titles into one lower price compilation. Similar to the first two Milestones titles, Taito Milestones 3 features a smattering of excellently emulated arcade games. This compilation mostly focuses on action games but it isn’t without variety.

The standout title has to be Bubble Bobble, the iconic co-op single screen action puzzle game featuring two cute dinosaurs and their bubble puking mouths.  While the NES port was probably more popular, this arcade version looks and plays just as well.  Plus that earworm of a looping theme never let’s go once it takes hold. A timeless classic.

Rainbow Island: The Story of Bubble Bobble 2 released a year later and is the often forgotten sequel to Bub and Bob’s original adventure. Instead of playing in their dino forms and blowing bubbles, Bubby and Bobby use rainbows to climb platforms and battle monsters. Personally, I was never a fan of this colorful sequel, much preferring the original. Who wants to play as a chubby kid when you can trap monsters in your dinosaur puke bubbles? Still, it isn’t terrible.

Cadash is a side scrolling action game with multiple playable characters and co-op play. Although it is a little slow and clunky, it is deeply impressive for a 1989 arcade release.

Rastan Saga is another action platformer featuring a Conan buff dude who swings big weapons. This is another game that holds up better than you might expect for a 1987 release and reminds me a bit of classic Rygar.

Although Rastan Saga 2 is a sequel, it is a prequel from a narrative perspective. In comparison to the original, this title is much slower and methodical. Also, the sprites are much bigger and impressive for a 1988 game. While I think I prefer the original, this sequel as its merits.

I must admit, I enjoyed Champion Wrestler way more than expected since I am not a fan of wrestling. For a game that only uses two buttons, there is a lot of depth. Even if you button mash, unexpectedly cool things will happen. There is a large character roster too.

Runark looks and plays like a 4-player Double Dragon. This beat’em up offers quality, mindless fun especially in co-op despite having a weird name.

Warrior Blade is actually the third game in the Rastan series only this time gameplay is a dual-wide 2-player beat’em up. This game also plays better than you think thanks to slightly moderate difficulty factor. 

Thunder Fox is a Conta-ish run-and-gun loaded with vehicles. Basically a Rambo simulator that offers some straightforward, mindlessly fun action. Think Rush’n Attack but faster and with more pizzazz.

Dead Connection is probably my favorite game in this compilation… and I thoroughly enjoy Bubble Bobble. But you never played Dead Connection it is a single screen action shooter that almost plays like a light gun game where you control an on-screen cursor. Here, your cursor is a machine gun-wielding detective and almost everything in the environment is destructible. The aiming system also works impressively well for only using one button and an analog stick. This game is pretty awesome, actually, and wish I knew about it sooner.

Since these are Arcade Archive releases, all the emulation features you want are here: scanline filters, save states, it is possible to customize the controls, and your score gets posted to the online leaderboard upon game over. The emulation quality is also great. Spot on, in fact. All this is wrapped around a simple, nothing fancy but gets the job done, interface. Plus, it is possible to quit and revert to the main menu game selection screen at any time. There is even a built-in instruction manual that informs the player how to play. It isn’t anything overly complex or flashy but gets the job done. Granted, there are no extras, like viewable cabinet art or development diaries, but the games in this compilation are all entertaining.

At first glance, I thought this compilation was going to be little more than a Taito history lesson as I only had experience with the two Bubble Bobble games. However, I am pleasantly surprised regarding the quality of these late 80s, early 90s arcade titles. While some games are better than others, there really isn’t a “bad” game in this group especially if you take advantage of the local co-op features. Also, at the time of this article, about half of these games are only available in this compilation; they are not sold individually.  Plus, the cost of this compilation is lower in price than if they were available separately.   

Also Play: the Neogeo Pocket Color Selection Vol.1 and 2

Be Sure To Check Out: the wickedly awesome Taito DS Paddle accessory

Don’t Forget About: the Single-Pak link multiplayer mode in the GBA version of Bubble Bobble

By: Zachary Gasiorowski, Editor in Chief myGamer.com

X/Twitter: @ZackGaz

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