I've been waffling about whether my final thoughts posts should be in the Loved/Hated format or in a more article based format, but for Ghostbusters I'll use Love/Hate as I think it makes more sense. If you are one of the 5 people who read my blog and have an opinion one way or the other, please be sure to let me know.
Loved
- Writing. Ghostbusters was written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis... and it shows. The writing is absolutely top notch. The story was engaging, interesting, and in perfect harmony with the Ghostbusters movies. They could have EASILY made some minor modifications to the script and turned this game into a movie. In addition to the story itself, the game is full of witty banter between the various cast members that feels 100% Ghostbusters authentic. I was completely blown away by who engaging this game was.
- Voice Acting. Not only was the game written by original cast members, but they managed to pull together practically the entire cast to reprise their roles as well. Having the original actors lend their voices was amazing. I'm positive that the game would have been quite lacking with sound-alikes. As it was, they all delivered great performances and felt totally in character. You can tell that they all have a soft spot for Ghostbusters; not a single one of provided a "phoned in" performance.
- Weapons. If I were to ask you to name Ghostbusters weapons you would probably come up with the two I would have come up with: the Proton pack and the ghost trap. Bonus points if you also named the PKE meter. While these are without a doubt the quintessential Ghostbusters weapons, if they were the only weapons in a game of this magnitude, I think it's safe to say we would all be disappointed. I was definitely a little bit concerned by the additional weapons; I really wanted to them feel like they belong to the universe. I'm happy to say that my fears were unfounded. In addition to the weapons previously mentioned, you also have a Proton ball you can launch from your Proton pack. From there, you can switch your pack to Dark Matter mode (a shotgun like weapon and a stasis slowing beam), Slime Mode (slime spray for Black Slime enemies and a slime tether for physics puzzles), and finally Meson mode (a high damage blast/marker and a high speed marker seeking mode). Everyone of the weapons had a use and all were perfectly suited for a Ghostbusters game.
- I'm a Ghostbuster! This game just did a remarkable job at making you feel like a part of the Ghostbusters team. They compliment you when you do well, they give you grief when you fail, and they pick you up when you get injured. In addition to that, you spend the whole game wrangling ghosts into traps, watching Venkman get slimed, and you even get to fight iconic ghosts like the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man. It really was just a lot of fun to get to rub shoulders with the Ghostbusters for a handful of missions.
Try as I might, I can't seem to come up with anything about this game that I hated. While I don't want that to be a sign that I thought this game was perfect, there just wasn't anything that was obviously bad. Even though the game wasn't very long (10 hours or less) it was solid all the way through. The controls game was definitely put together with a console in mind (even with the sensitivity turned all the way up it was still too slow for me), but it really wasn't that bad. Quite honestly, this game was not only a very enjoyable game but a solid addition to the Ghostbusters universe.
If you have even a passing interest in the Ghostbusters franchise, you owe it to yourself to play this game. If, like me, you have fond memories of playing some of the original games (NES version FTW), this will be a very delightful return to ghost ridden New York. Let me put it this way: playing this game so strongly got me in a Ghostbusters mood, I added both movies to the top of my Netflix queue. I seriously hope we see more movies and/or games soon before those involved get too old to participate.
Posts
Ghostbusters was indeed a loving renewal of the frachise, and I dug every particle of its being. Except for a few particles I didn't like. But they were few, and overlookable.
ReplyDelete1) Murray overplays his role in the first half of the game (though he finally gets his Thespianship back and mellows out later).
2) The rest of the team chatters inanely about what you're supposed to do to solve the level. WHILE YOU'RE DOING IT. And they don't help you out, most of the time. A few of the puzzles are time-based, and the Ghostbusters stand around with their thumbs up their butts. Not a team effort, guys.
It's one of my favorite games to come out lately, that's for sure. Feels more like playing a movie than just about any other game out there, including Origin's classics.