Ghostbusters: The Video Game (Xbox 360) Review

Posted by Adam Larck on 06.26.2009

411’s Adam Larck hopes you ain’t afraid of no ghosts before reading this review. Check out his thoughts inside.



Title: Ghostbusters: The Video Game
Publisher: Atari, Inc.
Developer: Terminal Reality
Type: 3rd Person Action
Players: 1 (1-4 Online)
Rated: T for Teen

When I got this game sent to me, the timing could not have been better. Both Ghostbuster movies were on T.V. and I had finished watching both before jumping into the game. So I was ready for this game. I wanted to relive what I liked about the movies and team up with the original Ghostbusters.

And I did, but it felt very short lived. The time I spent in the game was fun, but could have been so much better. Let me tell you why below.

Gameplay

The game feels like it could easily be the third movie in the series, which it has been touted as. It starts out as a commercial, with the original team looking for a new member. Enter: you, the Rookie. Literally, that’s your name, Rookie. Your suit says it, everyone refers to you by it. Can’t change your name or your appearance, for that matter. It may be a small gripe from me at this point, but with so many games having create-a-character modes, why can’t you make yourself as a Ghostbuster. It would have been great to put yourself in with the team.

Anyways, after the introductions, you’ll run a quick tutorial level in the Firehouse where Slimer escapes. You’ll learn that the HUD (health and Proton Pack heat level) is actually located on the pack. While this is great in theory, when the action starts to get hectic you’ll have a hard time monitoring your health while fighting. The only good thing with the health is that even if you are knocked out, as long as teammates are with you during that time they can revive you. Which you may get knocked out a few times with the health being slow to recharge. With the pack overheating, I would just tap RB whenever I could to vent the pack so it would cool down.

After capturing a ghost in the training level, you go to famous locations from the movie, such as Hotel Sedgewick, Times Square, the Public Library and History Museum, among other locations. This is where a major complaint I have comes in, the game just feels short. It only has eight levels, one is a revisit and the other is the final boss battle. It would have been nice to have had more levels, or even longer levels than what is given. Also in the game are some classic enemies you may remember, like Slimer, the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and Gozer.

During the game, you can use the PKE meter to scan ghosts to find out their weaknesses and history behind them. The PKE meter can also be used to scan artifacts, which are haunted items with a history behind them. Once you scan these, they appear in various places in the Firehouse.

The pause menu has a multitude of things for you to do. You can look at Tobin’s Spirit Guide to see how many of each ghost you’ve beaten, buy new upgrades for your beams (you’ll get four different beams throughout the game), or see your stats for your campaign. It shows you how much money you’ve made, and how much you’ve destroyed in game.

Speaking of destruction and beams, I want to touch on the beam mechanic. It looks great, but actually controlling the stream seems like a pain sometimes. You can aim it, but the wild arcs it can have seems to cause a lot of destruction even when trying not to. To even capture a ghost, you have to weaken it first then throw a capture stream out and throw a trap, each different buttons all over the controller. Even after doing all of this, you have to slam the ghost around for a bit before it will go into the trap. Once again, this seemed random when it went into a trap. Something definite would have been nice when capturing, like being able to move a ghost closer or farther away to position over the trap.

Of course, what would a Ghostbuster game be without mentioning one important rule: Don’t Cross the Streams! In single player, it will knock you and your teammate on your butt. In multiplayer, it just killed us instantly when we tried it.

Speaking of multiplayer, I want to touch on a few things here. There are six different modes that vary from lasting as long as you can to destroying relics to dunking Slimers in traps. There are also 12 different areas that you can play the modes in. You can do either individual jobs or a campaign, which is a combination of three different jobs in three different areas. It would have been nice to have been able to do the actual campaign co-op. After all, there are normally four members in the game at the same time anyway.

In multiplayer you can be one of the original Ghostbuters, which is great to do. There are 20 ranks to go through, and you get ranks by earning money in Ranked matches. One problem I had here is after playing a match; you’re thrown back to the main menu. You can’t keep in a party even if it’s a custom match.

Besides just doing jobs, you can try to capture rare ghosts found only in multiplayer, and pick up various beams and shields during matches. The farther a round goes and the better you do, the more your equipment can get upgraded.

Graphics

The characters look great and mimic their real life counterparts pretty accurately. Locations also look great, from the recreation of Times Square to all the artifacts in the History Museum. As far as just the graphics in game goes, they look great …

When you can see them. Probably one of the biggest problems I had with this game was that it was too dark. Often times you were forced to use the PKE meter just to use the night vision to see. You have a flashlight, but can’t manually turn it on. It’s supposed to come on whenever it is dark, but even when it was pitch black the flashlight wouldn’t turn on sometimes. It would have been much better for the game to have been lighter overall so that players could see where they were going.

There were also a few other problems with glitches as well. A particular one was on the Times Square level. My partner got stuck behind a door that gets thrown open, and I couldn’t advance beyond the level. I had to actually restart from the previous checkpoint and hope they didn’t get stuck again, which they didn’t. Another case was that characters would just run into walls to get ghosts, while creatures, like gargoyles, would get stuck in walls to where you couldn’t kill them. It looked comedic while it was happening, but after I found out I couldn’t advance the comedy wore off quick.

Sound

The game really shines here. All four of the main Ghostbusters reprise their roles in the game. The original theme also gets played during the loading screens, which is a great touch. I wish that the theme would have been played during the main menu, though. Instead, you just get some light instrumental music. Just a touch that would have made the game a bit better.

In game, the Proton Pack sounds great, as do many of the sound effects going on. The ghosts noise sounds good, and quite creepy in some places (I’m sorry, but haunted children’s laughter is always a bit creepy). The sound is top quality here.

Lasting Appeal

The single player won’t really last long for you. I’ve seen many people beating this game in just a day or two, even while exploring for artifacts and ghosts to scan. So not much lasting appeal in this department, but what about multiplayer?

It’s fun to play the different modes, but only having six modes will get quick fast. That, added into getting kicked out after every match, will quickly get on your nerves. I hope for some downloadable modes or another mission to do in the future. But for now, after beating the game and playing around with multiplayer for a bit, this is a title that may soon be forgotten on your shelf.

Fun Factor

The game really has a nostalgia factor here for fans of the series. I was reminded of a lot of scenes from the movie as I went through the game. Also, the achievements use a lot of famous quotes from the movie, which is a great touch.

Unfortunately, the fun starts to wear out when some of the glitches come into play. I enjoyed myself throughout the game, don’t get me wrong, but I just got annoyed at some areas due to glitches or my teammates. I hope a patch comes out soon to fix these problems, as it would really help the games be even more enjoyable.

The 411

Fans of the movies will love the game, while newcomers may want to rent this to see what it’s about. It’s worth seeing what the game is about, and how it’s supposed to be like the third movie in the series. If you can put aside the lighting problems and glitches, there’s a good game at the core. It’s just weighed down by some slight problems.

Graphics	7.5	While the graphics of areas and the team looks good, the lighting problems and environmental glitches really brings this area down.
Gameplay	8.0	It’s a good game that has a lot of interesting things with the Proton Pack and old ghosts in the series, but the randomness of capturing ghosts and the ineptitude of your teammates really need to be fixed.
Sound	9.0	The sound is definitely the shining point in this game. The recasting of the original actors is great to hear and the in game sounds are top notch.
Lasting Appeal	7.0	The single player game really doesn’t last long. While the multiplayer is a great touch, the novelty of it dries up pretty quick once you start repeating the same things.
Fun Factor	7.5	It’s great to see what a third movie would have looked like. The commentary is funny at times, and the game is fun to play, but the problems in the game just weighs down the fun too much.
Overall	7.8   [ Good ]

Screenshots
All 6 Ghostbusters (Xbox 360) Screenshots