Diet Go Go

This isn't a foreword about the game, but about the writing itself.

I finished this at about two in the morning, and wasn't terribly happy throughout, as my original intention was to cover the wackiness of the game, and at the same time also take screenshots of levels to use in a barebones walkthrough, killing two birds with one stone!

Except as I played, I remembered just how... mundane the game is, in comparison to Karnov or something. Aside from the basic concept of the game, there's really very little that's notably wacky or worth pointing out. And then there's also the fact that enemies like to be behind each other or off screen at the beginning of a level, as well as how the worlds are randomised, thus making the walkthrough part a bit difficult.

Ultimately, this means that I start off enthusiastic and attempting to be witty, and then towards the end just go "this game sucks this game sucks this game sucks" on and on, making it a pain to read and write. And I believed this to be the first General Writing in a while that I would be happy with when I began! Oh, the hilarity of irony.

So there you go. Read if you dare!

A foreword about the actual game this time

Steve and I were first introduced to Tumble Pop in a Spanish arcade, and played it for all of twenty minutes before finding a The Lost World: Jurassic Park unit, a game we both absolutely love because it's Virtua Cop with dinosaurs! If a holiday was crap, that was all we needed to make it redeeming. I can't tell you how saddened I am over the fact it never got a port to any console.

Although we completely forgot about Tumble Pop after playing it, I then discovered it had a sequel through the power of MAME, although with a strange twist. Diet Go Go. Let's hear about it!

Story

The bad guy from Tumble Pop is pulling his Dr. Wily impression! But what devious scheme does he have up his sleeve?
 

Flying over the world, throwing cakes, chicken legs and French fries at everyone. Personally, I don't see why this guy should be seen as a villain. Yes, he's feeding countries that don't necessarily need the grub, but, you know, they didn't need to eat it. Unless it's Metal Slug food where you several trays of rice can fall on your head and cause your waist line to expand a mile. In that case, what a bastard.

Also, I love the expression of that woman in the pink shirt. She looks so concerned.
 

With the world made into fatties, who can save us now? Two kids with distorted faces and jogging suits. We're doomed.
 

Even the title screen adds extra story in the fact that even though these two kids are heading out to save us, they are not immune from FATTY ATTACKS. So you kind of wonder why they didn't wear robot suits or something to prevent scarfing a cake down upon immediate contact.
 

Gameplay

It plays like Bubble Bobble, in the fact that stages are one screen with various platforms and hazards, and to defeat the enemies you must shoot stuff at them until they float away, and then collide with them. It doesn't play like Bubble Bobble in the fact that you don't have to wait a year to land from a fall.
Other differences include the fact you can half-inflate your enemies, where they only fly one direction before exploding, or fully inflate them where they can bounce around the room several times before expiring, allowing you wipe out tons of baddies.

While the game is one of those "touch an enemy and you dead sucka" games, some enemies have projectiles that don't kill you, but fatten you up. What this means is that you move slower, your attack is weaker and if you're hit with another projectile, you bloat up so much that YOU DIE.

If anything, it's slightly more pleasant than the bursting in Metal Slug, but neither are all that desired.
 

Items

Of course, you can't just go saving the world without artillery. You could try, but what's the point? Inflating enemies and sending them careening around the screen isn't difficult, but it's so much more fun getting a pump and inflating everything on screen until they explode. That's the best it gets, sadly, so here's the list.
POWER UP increases the power of your projectile, making it fly further and inflate quicker.
SPEED UP makes you run faster and look thoroughly ridiculous. Look at him go!
The BARRIER, well, is a barrier. You're invincible. It runs out after a while. That's it.
BOMBs are badass. Throw out at a baddy and FWOOMP, instant exploding. It just ploughs through them!
SUPER BOMBs are the best ever, but I've already described them at the top. As consolation, have a picture.
SLOT COINs let you start the roulette, which let you get even more items. Mostly points ones, though, which is a bummer.
If you've been fattened by an enemy, the only way to slim down again is either to die, or get a DIET DRINK. A harsh reality.
I'm surprised arcade games even have 1UPs in them.
And the rest of the items are boring points ones. Lame.
 

Levels

The first world you go is candy themed, and the only gimmick it features are those bouncers in the walls, careening inflated enemies around the screen.
Bakers dander around the arena, occasionally sampling their meals and throw them at you upon sight.
Gingerbread Men scout about for you and charge on sight. Sneaky mothertruckers.
Cakes are just like the bakers, except they barf miniature cakes at you. Gross.
Jellies spit up instant killing pink boulders. Also gross.

The boss of this world is some kinda Candy Queen who deploys gingerbread men to attack you, who are just fodder to be inflated with and shot back at her. Strangely enough, upon being hit, she blows four kisses that float through the air, and if they touch you, you get fattened. I've no idea if that's symbolic of anything. Onward!
 

After you complete a world, the boss falls off screen and drops a bunch of items, and you're rewarded with a picture of the title characters getting up to crazy antics, although it's usually just the female character posing as seductively as a twelve year old can (not well at all) while the male is made a fatty for no apparent reason. Yes.
And once you're done admiring the mediocre artwork, you fly off to the next world in your very own hot air balloon. Which is apparently Japan.
 

If so, why does it remind me more of Germany than anything? That's what I'm getting from the costume the puppets have on, and the fact the music sounds like a mix between folk music and a snippet of London Bridge Is Falling Down. It also introduces the ever dastardly spike!
Puppets are the new Gingerbread Men, and dash at you on sight.
Gumball Machines replace the Bakers, and shoot their innards at you to make you ripe for the kill.
And, uh, there are UFOs. I don't know why they're here. They can fly around, but that's it.
Clowns keep up their reputation of being dicks by not only having the ability to teleport, but also shoot their faces at you, killing you instantly.

The boss of this world is a cap wearing marionette who slings bombs around the room that explode to reveal puppets that are used to hit him with. Additional attacks include shifting platforms, and throwing a bomb that contains DEATH FOOD inside. Well, not exactly, it just makes you fat, which seems too minor an offence to have a flashing skull on it.
 

The most boring celebratory art ever.
Now we're jetting off to the North Pole! I wonder what we'll find there?
 

Not much, really. There are patches of ice that make movement slippery and slopes that you slide down, but that's it.
Penguins slide towards you on sight. Boring.
The chunks of ice, however, are most more interesting, as they have projectiles in the form of ICE CREAM SUNDAES. I find that incredibly badass.
Ghosts are the obligatory flying enemies, and zoom towards you when they're near. Jerks.
Snowmen roll snowballs that kill you instantly. Must be the yellow kind.

The only remotely cool boss so far is this ice dragon who barfs those ice chunks around, but that's all he does. He has no other attacks. That's terrible. The North Pole sucks.
 

This artwork is also boring. If Data East wanted these guys to be popular, then they could've worked on fashion sense that didn't personify the 90s.
To the enchanted forest next, located in Russia, for reasons beyond my knowledge!
 

The forest introduces floating platforms, which are rather unnecessary and just make me hate this world. I really am that fussy about minor things.
Mushrooms are the charging enemies, and for whatever reason, only have one eye. Not to say that should require two eyes, but they already have two arms and two legs; the sky's the limit!
Flying Onions suck.
Pumpkin Mans open their capes upon getting close and roll a pumpkin head at you, which fattens you up, and can also teleport. I'm struggling to comment.
Venus Fly Traps can multiply by spitting out a seed to produce another comrade. It kills you on contact. Just like real ones!
 

I think it's time I should tell everyone there's a Bonus Stage in this game! I kind of completely forgot how to access it, see, and it just happened there after the first stage so I'm just going with the flow.
You have to jump from platform to platform, collecting the good items and avoiding the fatty stuff that causes you to fall off cliffs. That's all there is to it, although thanks to sloppy collision detection, it rarely lasts for long.

Upon your grisly demise as a smear on the pavement, the game just commands you to "STOP" and tallies your winnings before continuing as usual. A harsh discovery that nobody cares about your death.
 

The boss of the forest is another one eyed mushroom, except it's as big as a giant baby, and can spawn his smaller brethren. And he can fly, which I guess is to make up for the fact he has no other attacks. I forgot how crappy these bosses are.
 

The girl dribbles her obese partner like a basketball, which either means she's ridiculously strong for what looks like an anime version of Lucy Van Pelt in a work-out suit, or that's just a customized beach ball. Either way, there should be laws against that kind of thing.
And for whatever reason, our next destination is in the middle of a gigantic whirlpool. I'm not driving, so who am I to argue?
 

The bottom of the ocean reveals LACK OF ORIGINALITY, as there are no new features, and the penguins are reused from the ice world. Laziness is a sin.
The bug-eyed coral throw fattening jellies at you. I lack words.
Fish just kind of swim around. It's what fish do.
Crabs blow bubbles that also fatten you up. Must be a hell of a lot of air inside them.

The boss, in another example of unoriginality, is just a giant crab that blows bubbles with smaller crabs and fattening meals inside. The bubbles kill you. I would rant about just how pathetic these kids are, but I don't know the specific details of those bubbles. They could've been laced with cyanide.
 

More abuse of the overweight, this time as a surface to lean on. I'd like to see how she feels when she's weary and bloated and just needs a hug, but instead is used as a surface to lean on. You may be smiling now, girl, BUT FOR HOW LONG
Now over to some scary mountains in America. Or Canada? Geography was never a good topic for me.
 

This level has flying platforms, but those of a different variety: They double as INSTRUMENTS OF CRUSHING YOU. Spikes are bad enough, but being crushed at the same time isn't pleasant either. It's beyond catastrophic when you can't even jump down from them without dying.
Snakes are the new appearance of those enemies that charge at you.
Bats offer the same role, except they fly.
Frankenstein's monster, apparently mass produced, can roll his head at you causing instant death. It's an unfair world. If it's any consolation, he looks hilarious when he's inflated.

Dracula, lord of the vampires, reigns over this world and looks like The Count from Sesame Street with a flesh dye job, and the ability to spawn bats from under his cloak. I'd rather not know.

Definite proof that I think this girl should be locked away for weight prejudice. Leaning on someone is bad but tolerated, and using them as a basketball is more than rude, but falling on your fattened friend and KILLING THEM is OVER THE LINE. Don't play the sympathy game, I'M ONTO YOU. You're just worried people are seeing your chunky thighs. EXPOSED SKIN IS LESS IMPORTANT THAN DEATH.
Flying to the opposite part of the world, it's a jungle! In India!
 

Maybe I'm just being cynical over the fact I kind of regret starting this four hours ago, but the jungle also sucks. The new feature being an utter bitch (the path-following buzzsaw) and two enemies are reused? Get out of my sight.
Carrots charge. Yawn.
The pigs, in a change from overthrowing farms, throw some unidentifiable confectionary at you.
 

In an attempt to make this paragraph more interesting, you have an unseen time limit in levels, and if it runs out, you're told to move your ass and kill the enemies before the wacky demon thing does you in first. It poses no threat at all, though, so the game is still fairly mediocre.

Several worlds in, and it's only now that the bosses become slightly good! A hollowed out tree trunk with mechanical arms and legs that reaches into the stew it is brewing and flings out living carrots and wads of grease that instead of burning you for being flung straight out of the pot, merely fatten you. These guys must have tongues of steel. Or lost their taste buds. Might explain the fact they eat anything thrown at them.
 

This picture frightens me. THOSE EYES WILL SWALLOW YOUR SOUL.
Now we're off to an Indonesian volcano. Is it dangerous? I don't care, I just want this game to end because ugh seriously.
 

Now introducing horizontally moving platforms, the prehistoric level is slightly cool because dinosaurs are awesome.
T-Rexes barf up chunks of beef to make you plump and juicy. Didn't Bonk do the same thing?
Pterodactyls just fly around and pose occasionally. I suppose they want attention after missing out on stardom in the first two Jurassic Parks.

A dual headed pterodactyl that barfs up eggs between pecking you. What is it with Japanese games and creatures that vomit eggs out of their mouths? It's gross and disturbing and it's probably a fetish by now. What if it's applied to mammals? Oh God.

This picture is supposedly showing that the two are good team mates, which may be evident in gameplay if I wasn't playing this alone, but seriously, KILLING her obese partner is just a hate crime.
Now I'm heading to a Saharan skull! Sounds quite the excite.
 

An alien region on Earth? How absurd.
Mars People charge at you. Ho hum.
Blue Beans just sort of fly around.

The boss is a splatter with an eye that deploys Blue Beans and has segmented arms, and is the last reason why this world is terrible.
 

The only parts worth writing about, the intermission pictures, are now incredibly boring. Thanks a plenty, Data East.
To another skull? In Brazil? Delightful.
 

Wait, there was already a horror themed level! As if the reusing of enemies and bland bosses wasn't bad enough, now they're repeating themes. Wonderful. At least there's a spring.
Grim Reapers just sort of charge at you. It's bad enough this is the only new enemy, but they keep replacing the charging enemies. Why not make him throw an instant death scythe, or a skull cake? ORIGINALITY PLEASE.

Today's boss is a giant ghost who, believe it or not, deploys smaller ghosts to murderise you. It's so shocking his only other move is to fire four fireballs and change platforms.
 

I told you so! Little Miss Fatty Abuser has joined the ranks of those she tormented, and is quite moody about it. If only she did take the offering and choked. Then the game could end because we all know they're going to tell us TRY AGAIN WITH A FRIEND upon beating the end bad guy.
Onto the final location. This better be good.
 

More alien wastelands. I hate this level because there are lots of caged off areas where items like to drop, and you can never reach them, ever.
Devils can fire a phantom punch at you. No soul taking in this game.
I was going to find a proper term for those floating goopy things, but screw it, they fly around and looking like floating goopy things.

Giving me further reason to hate this game, the boss is just a bunch of those floating goopy things attached together with a face. It separates as you hit it until it finally dies. Good. Stay that way. That was an uneventful end.

So it appears Miss Fatty Abuser has the power to shrink her victim at will, previous shown when basket balling and coffee tabling him earlier. She is a sick minded freak. Also those are the weirdest legs I've ever seen.
We're not done yet!? Let this be the final level. Please.
 

Another fricking alien landscape, which features a lot of features that will definitely kill you, with only one new enemy, but it's a doozy.
The Atomic Runner, Chelnov! The lead character of a game that I was going to say was much superior, but, well, it isn't really! But Chelnov! He even throws the fireballs at you from his game! Radical! Maybe I'll cover his game someday when I'm actually funny and have sufficient patience.

The boss is a stupid looking UFO who teleports and spawns smaller ones, but due to the large amount of UFOs available, can be killed quickly with a combo deal. But where's the scientist man?

Right there! He flies around in a jetpack and fires food, but one shot of your weapon causes him to inflate to ridiculous proportions and ... scatter.

That's what he does.
 

You're not funny. But neither am I, so touché.
 

And thus rolls the credits to an uneventful game. There are more examples of partner abuse in having him tied up, fattening him to ridiculous proportions and rolling him, and then making him act as a sled dog. Despicable acts from a despicable woman.
And that is Diet Go Go. Final thoughts?

Final thoughts (about the game)

The main problem I find with Diet Go Go is that, quite simply, it's not as good as it initially sounds. I mean, it's not a terrible game, as it's more tolerable with a second player, but, well, it's just not that great. The world has been fattened, your characters travel all over the world to save it, and it doesn't even take advantage of that, like having an overweight Statue of Liberty or anything. It's silly things like that that could've made me appreciate it more, but instead we get a marionette with a skull and other such rubbish that could've been in any old game.

My other primary nag is that a lot of the time, there's too much going on for you to see where you are or if a projectile is approaching you; in the latter case, it can be difficult to tell if a projectile will kill you, because they may move slower and have crapper attacks when bloated, but they don't look drastically different from the skinny version. Even if all it took was to make them look like balloons or flash occasionally to indicate they're more vulnerable, it would help in some way. And also making the projectiles bigger, too. You can barely see those sliding cakes on cluttered platforms.

So yeah. Diet Go Go is an okay game, but definitely doesn't deserve much more than this badly written page. If you absolutely must play every Bubble Bobble clone ever made, give it a shot.