Ghostbusters

[darksnowman]

On 05/05/2020 at 2:29 PM, darksnowman said:

It is a game I'd be curious to try out, especially for about a tenner I could download it and leave it til the Halloween season rolls around. 

Looks like I did this, just three years later. Got Ghostbusters The Videogame Remastered during the summer for a few quid (thought I'd be better pouncing but it's still going cheap if anyone's interested) and left it for this past week.

I had to retry the early streets part time and time and again. Kept getting one-shotted by offscreen ghosts and gargoyles. It was tough to take it on the chin because it seemed unfair. I finally took Ray's chatter on board, and after reading through the menus I figured out you can press L to slam the ghosts you won't be capturing which helped get them out of the way and turn the tide, because trying to whittle them down with the blast stream takes a good while. I noticed the other Ghostbusters actually pull their weight so I put more stock into keeping them alive rather than trying to zap n trap everything myself. It wasn't too much of a great time there when it was taking longer to reload to the checkpoint than the time I was able to spend trying to bust those ghosts, but when I figured out these aforementioned things it got me through and stood me in good stead for the rest of the game... even if I still got tangled up with the buttons now and again... and had to die and retry at various points later on too. With the various upgrades it became more of a shooter and less the Luigi's Mansion sort of experience I expected.

It felt great to roll out with the Ghostbusters. The atmosphere, the settings, the cutscenes and in-game banter. Just having a nosey around the firehouse (the employee of the month board, haha) was fun and interesting, as was looking around the various levels. The way you can read notices and placards right there without the need to press A and listen to information on the exhibits in the museum. The way it makes you feel like you're right there is really well done. Then when you're in first-person mode with the PKE meter it's like a horror game. The sound effects had me on edge.

A rudimentary character editor might have been nice because the Rookie you play as is as generic a placeholder as they come. A bit of personalisation may have gone a long way. 

It was a fun time that didn't outstay its welcome. Well worth the couple of quid. Wonder if the Rookie went on to open up his franchise...? I was expecting it to end with a Lylat Wars-style invoice because we absolutely laid waste to everywhere we went.  

[Helmsly]

I'm glad you enjoyed it @darksnowman The game always felt like the third Ghostbusters movie we never got (until we kinda did a couple of years ago) and like you said, it's fun but does not outstay its welcome. It's a game i seem to revisit once every year because its a fun experience to play through. Hearing the Ghostbusters naturally chat with each other as you wonder around is looking for ghosts is just a joy.

I really liked the Slime-tether upgrade and I wish they did more with it, I remember having fun sticking random objects to the ceiling, like trash cans and planks of wood just to mess around with the physics. its such a cool upgrade. I also enjoyed walking around the fire house nosing around and seeing the easter eggs they put around.

Also, It's funny you mention a character customisation option, the latest Ghostbusters game (which just came out on switch) has that, although that game is multiplayer focused.

Edited November 1, 2023 by Helmsly

[darksnowman]

Thanks, Helmsly. Yeah I liked the way it follows on from the first two films. They pulled it off pretty effortlessly. I noticed in the credits Dan Akroyd and Harold Ramis were part of the team of writers so it's cool that they were on board with it and didn't just phone it in with any old ghost story. Same goes for everyone involved, really. Unfortunately, I didn't see me getting thanked in the credits so it gets a minus point for that.  

I did plenty of jumping and bashing into things so I can see why you would play around with the tether. Mostly, I defaulted back to the standard beam to feel more like a Ghostbuster and just torched a lot of stuff.  Especially Central Park. Being in the Ghostbusters company is such a big part of it that you feel it when you're separated in the sewers with not even one of them on the comms. Down there I played with the tether at the part you hit a door with no team members to tip you off on what to do to drain the slime. The PKE Meter basically said "get creative". I was stringing up wooden and metal barrels off the columns down there like something Spider-Man would do and catapulting them at that sliding door. It was a fun timewaster but obviously not the solution! Actually, by the time I opened the door, I'd unknowingly scuppered myself because there was still a barrel there so it didn't fully open to trigger the next bit.  But the tether's a cool inclusion because the others were maybe a bit too much like guns for the bustin I was after. Saying that, in one level I went on a freezing streak which was pretty satisfying.

I figured Spirits Unleashed must be pretty solid to be keeping you off Fortnite recently. Good to read your impressions on it. The cartoon style looks well done! Nice that they seem to have put some care and effort into it.