I’m not the most objective person when it comes to anything Ghostbusters. I was an avid fan of The Real Ghostbusters when I was a little kid, and I may or may not have built a screen accurate proton pack and wired it for lights and sound with parts from around the house and some plans from the Internet.
Most recently my obsession with the franchise led me to buy an Xbox 360 just to play the game when I realized my PC wasn’t up to the task of running anything more taxin than Warcraft. And as a die-hard fan of the series who has had a chance to play through the first couple of missions I can now safely say that the game is nothing short of awesome with a few minor reservations.
Single Player:
Ivan Reitman once described Ghostbusters as a simple story about starting a business that just happened to involve the paranormal, and the best Ghostbusters games of the past have centered on that theme to varying degrees. The original Commodore 64 Ghostbusters game focused on building your business and amassing enough wealth to buy the ultimate weapon to defeat Gozer. The Genesis metroidvania take on the franchise in the early 90s focused on busting ghosts to build your business and buy better weapons that exploited various weaknesses in level bosses, Megaman style. The pen and paper Ghostbusters International game of the late 80s was built around the idea of creating a new franchise in your location and having adventures.
The less said about any other game with the Ghostbusters license on any other system the better.
The new Ghostbusters game incorporates some, but not all, of these elements. Powerups to your equipment can be purchased from the pause screen on the fly from anywhere in the game without the necessity of backing out of a level and going to a separate item store, which is a refreshing and convenient design decision. Other than breaking things and collecting money for upgrades, however, there really isn’t any other hint of trying to build your franchise as you go along with the story busting heads in a spiritual sense. While this might be disappointing to the me demographic who thinks that resource management simulations improve almost any game, this was undoubtedly a sound design decision for the population in general who just wants to go in with proton guns blazing.
Busting makes you feel good.
And boy do they blaze. Ghosts go flying across the screen at breakneck speeds as you creep down dark passages creating a sense of unease that certainly belies the motto “I ain’t fraid of no ghost.” Reanimated bits of the environment jump out at you with little to no warning, and the only thing between you and a one-way ticket to the other side is your trusty proton gun and a variety of assorted upgrades that you get to play with as an “experimental equipment tester.” Each ghost a set amount of psychokinetic energy (a stand in f or the health bar) that you must drain with some ghosts simply dispersing while others must be wrangled into traps for safe keeping.
That ghost wrangling is really where the game shines. Capturing ghosts is embodies the essence of good game design: easy to learn but difficult to master. It’s entirely possible to go through the game on Casual difficulty with nothing but the proton stream, but taking the time to master some of the tricks from the upgrade weapons is the only way to shine at higher difficulties and online.
So is Ghostbusters worth the price? Definitely. The single player campaign provides solid gameplay with plenty of replay value, and the humor and Ghostbusters 3 plot are icing on the cake for anyone who grew up in the 80s or early 90s.
In the next post I’ll tackle the online component and see how fun busting is with three of your friends.
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