Ghostbusters: The Video Game Review - Xbox Gaming in South Africa

It's been a long development road for Ghostbusters: The Video Game, with the title left without a publisher, and possible cancellation, after the Activision Blizzard merger. Thankfully, Atari came to the rescue - so after two decades since the last films release, fans of the franchise can finally look forward to a licensed Ghostbusters video game.

Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, who wrote the script for the films, helped developer, Terminal Reality, write the plot for the game as well as lending their voices and likenesses to their characters. Joining them are Bill Murray, Ernie Hudson, William Atherton, Brian Doyle-Murray, and Annie Potts who all made appearances in the films. So if you're a Ghostbusters fan you'll find yourself in a state of nirvana as you walk through the Ghostbusters HQ and see props from the films, as well as meet fan favourite, Slimer. You play as the Rookie who joins the Ghostbusters as their experimental equipment technician and fight alongside the rest of the cast during the course of the game. You'll get to hear Bill Murray cracking jokes while Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis spout parapsychological mumbo jumbo about the ghostly apparitions you fight. This carries through to the CGI cut-scenes used in-game that look almost as if they were taken straight from an unreleased third film.

The game sees you joining the group just as there's an outbreak of ghostly activity which just so happens to accompany an exhibit of Gozer artifacts. Naturally, things go wrong and you're pulled into alternate dimensions - with Times Square and the Natural History Museum featuring as some of the locations. Gameplay involves fighting ghosts using your Proton pack in third person or searching for clues using the PKE meter in a first person perspective. Capturing ghosts usually involves you shooting them with a proton beam to wear them down, at which point you can use a capture stream to manoeuvre the dazed ghost into a trap. Your proton pack, if used too long without venting it, can overheat causing you to be without any weapons for a short time until it's cooled down. If you take too much damage you can become immobilised and will need to wait for one of the other Ghostbusters to revive you. The same counts for them though and you'll find yourself rushing around during the middle of fights reviving fallen Ghostbusters.

The core gameplay mechanic of capturing ghosts changes very little throughout the course of the game and if it were not for the fact that I enjoyed playing with the original cast of the movies, I would surely have found it repetitive after just an hour or two. Other than a few boss fights that require you to use specific tactics to weaken your target, every other ghost you fight will be captured in the same way and so it becomes a game of repeating the same gameplay mechanics for the next six hours or so. It says a lot for the quality of the voice work and the strength of the Ghostbusters franchise though that the game doesn't manage to feel too stale for those of us who enjoy the films.

On the multiplayer side, Terminal Reality missed an opportunity when they left out online campaign co-op, which would see you and 3 other friends taking the roles of the original Ghostbusters and playing your way through the story. As a consolation, they did include separate online modes that allow play through of select standalone levels, but it doesn't do much to add extra depth to the title.

Ghostbusters is quite a looker, with character models that make Bill Murray and company look as young as they were in the original films. Although your character doesn't have any voice of his own as such, his facial animations are most amusing, and you'll find yourself laughing every once in a while to his reaction to situations. The levels you'll be ghostbusting through are also well done, with the Times Square level being one particular stand out as you battle your way through abandoned cars and then up a hotel, all the while fighting the giant Stay Puft monster.

Ghostbusters: The Video Game is a game for fans. Those of us that watched and fell in love with the film as kids will get a kick out of running around with the original Ghostbusters cast. The rest, however, will find their interest levels waning long before the final credits roll.

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