Twinbee For Amiga? – Gunbee F-99: The Kidnapping Of Lady Akiko –

Gunbee F-99: The Kidnapping of Lady Akiko is the game’s full title, though many may still remember it by its original name—Amibee. The name changed when the project shifted from a shareware release to a full commercial title. Whether this was at the request of their publisher, APC-TCP, or simply a creative decision, I can’t say for sure. What I do know is that Gunbee definitely has a much stronger ring to it than Amibee.

The jump from Amibee to Gunbee was a huge one. The difference is immediately noticeable: Gunbee feels like a proper, full-fledged game with a polished intro, plenty of tweaks and refinements, and yes—five full levels in the complete version.

What’s particularly interesting about Gunbee F-99 is its system requirements. Officially, it demands 4MB of RAM (though that’s not entirely true, as there are actually two versions—one needing only 2MB), along with the AGA chipset. A 68030 CPU is also recommended. Yet, at first glance, the game doesn’t exactly look like something you’d expect from a medium to high-end Amiga setup.

As for distribution, the game was released in both floppy and CD formats. They’re identical in terms of content, with just one key difference: the floppy version must be installed on a hard drive, which is most likely why it specifies the 4MB RAM requirement.

The copy I own is the floppy disk version (see box shots above), which comes packaged in a standard CD jewel case. Interestingly, a handful of other Amiga titles were released in the same way too—Tin Toy Adventures, Forrest Dump, and a few others.

What makes this release even more special is its place in history: this was the very first commercial Amiga game produced in Peru. Initially a one-man project by Lobsang Vogel Alvites Szaler (better known as Mr. Byte/TEG), the game eventually came to life with the help of various contributors under the Team Eagles banner.

Oh, and one more thing—Gunbee is essentially a clone of Konami’s hit Detana!! TwinBee, a game that gained a huge following in Japan on the PC Engine, among other platforms. Outside of Japan, it was also known as Bells & Whistles.

The game opens with a surprisingly charming anime-style intro. While it’s not entirely faithful to the original style, it’s still impressive considering how much they managed to squeeze onto an already crammed floppy disk set. The visuals are colourful and appealing, the animations are minimalistic but effective, and the soundtrack carries a subtle yet upbeat vibe with that unmistakable classic ’80s flair.

The game itself features five massive levels packed with boss fights and swarms of tough enemies. At its core, it’s a fairly standard vertical shoot ’em up, but with a quirky twist—the unusual bell system. Here, you collect differently colored bells to either upgrade (or sometimes downgrade) your arsenal.

The biggest issue most players will face is the constant feeling of being underpowered. Upgrading your ship is brutally difficult, as the system requires you to shoot the bells multiple times before you might get a worthwhile upgrade. Miss that opportunity, and chances are you’ll be stuck underpowered and outmatched for the rest of the run.

Another frustrating part of the upgrade system is how it works with the bells. Once you spot the one you want, you actually have to stop shooting—because if you hit it again, the upgrade disappears. It usually turns grey/black at that point, which you definitely don’t want. Instead, the goal is to grab the blue, green, and orange ones (at least from what I’ve worked out so far).

If you ever manage to truly master the game, you’ll eventually uncover its variety of levels and boss fights. The design and style are consistent and polished—though admittedly a bit on the childish side. That said, I honestly have no idea how anyone could realistically finish this game without using cheats.

I had to resort to screenshots from Hall Of Light and a Longplay video to see it all, as I simply can’t get past the Chapter 3 Boss.

Technically, the game runs fine, but it doesn’t really feel like an AGA title. My very first impression was that the “ship” moves far too slowly and feels seriously underpowered. Once that frustration set in, I started questioning the entire power-up system—was there even any real logic to it?

Eventually, once you figure out how upgrades actually work, it does begin to make sense. But the whole system feels unnecessarily punishing right from the start, as if the developer wanted to make the player suffer before rewarding them. For me, that approach just didn’t click, and it quickly killed my enjoyment.

I’ve attached a Longplay video below—see for yourself.

 

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