Dan Geeks Out: Video Game Review #364: Ghostbusters

Ghostbusters

Sega Genesis

Nostalgia Factor:

This is a game that I have wanted to play for a LONG time. As a Genesis owner growing up, I always had my eyes peeled for this game. None of the stores had it. None of the rental places. None of my friends had it. No one. It was like the game didn’t exist. All I had as evidence that this game was real were old video games magazines that talked about it from time to time.

The only Ghostbusters video game I owned was the god awful Atari 2600 version, and that just wasn’t cutting it. The Genesis version looked so cool to me! Unfortunately, I’d never get my hands on it. Until now, when I fired it up on my RetroPie. Would it be worth the 32 year wait? Guess you’re going to have to read the rest of this review and find out!

Story:

I’m not sure when this game is supposed to take place. Winston is conspicuously absent (hmm…) and the Ghostbuster team consists only of Ray, Peter, and Egon. The goal of the game is to go around from haunted site to haunted site, clearing each location of ghosts while collecting mysterious stone tablets that the defeated ghosts leave behind. When you have collected all the tablets, a portal to the spirit realm is opened where our heroes must defeat Janna, the evil goddess of death and destruction. Defeat her, and the portal is sealed and her threat to the universe ends once and for all.

Gameplay:

At first glance, this is a typical of the era side-scrolling shooter. You start by picking which Ghostbuster you’d like to play as. They each have their own strengths and weaknesses, so pick wisely. I went with Peter, of course.

The goal is to fight your way through each stage, defeating all of the stage’s ghostly mini-bosses (there can be anywhere from one to four in any given stage). Once you have defeated all the mini-bosses in a particular stage, the area to the actual boss character opens up. Fight and defeat the boss character, and you complete the level. What’s different about this game is that you can pick the order in which you play through the levels, almost like a Mega Man game.

When you complete a level, you are brought back to the Ghostbusters headquarters, where you can spend the money that you earned to upgrade your equipment and buy items. You can earn extra money by capturing the spirit of each mini-boss you defeat in one of those foot-activated trap thingies that you see in the movies. If the spirit gets away, you earn less money than you would if you had captured it. Be diligent trying to catch these ghosts, as upgrading your equipment is absolutely essential if you want to beat this game. Why? Because this game is freaking hard and you need all the help you can get.

It’s a little difficult for me to compare this game to anything else. It’s not like other shooters of its time, like Contra or anything like that. It is slower paced and requires you to be cautious and preserve your health and your special items. I almost want to compare this with a Shinobi title. I’m sure that’s the first time in history anyone has ever compared Ghostbusters for the Sega Genesis to Shinobi – but hey I am a trendsetter.

What I found most difficult about this game are the boss battles. The hit boxes for these things are incredibly small and hard to hit. The bosses are constantly moving and constantly firing off attacks that are very difficult to dodge. They all have specific patterns they follow, so trial and error is key here. Expect to die, and expect to die a lot. Just keep in mind that this is normal and if you want to beat this game, you HAVE to figure out the bosses attack patterns. Look at each death as a learning experience.

The stages themselves are hard, too. Lots of enemies to fight and tough jumps to make. Expect to take a lot of cheap shots, which is annoying because I always wanted to go into each boss fight with as much health on my meter as humanly possible. The game is somewhat generous with health items. Just keep your eyes open for Slimer and the second you see him, blast away at him like there is no tomorrow.

Each stage is also fairly large. You don’t just move from left to right like most games. These stages are like mazes. You can go up, down, left, right. Luckily, there is a map handy to help you navigate. As I said before, your main goal in each stage is to eradicate the mini-bosses before you take on the main boss. Once the mini-bosses are gone, the location of the main boss will appear on your map – making it fairly easy to find. The first few stages I played I didn’t realize there was a map function. Once I discovered this, it made the game slightly easier. It’s still tough as balls though.

Graphics:

I like this game’s graphics. The big-headed characters immediately caught my attention as a kid and are one of the main reasons I always wanted to play this game. They actually look like their movie counterparts, which is nice to see. In many of these old movie to game adaptions the characters don’t resemble their counterparts at all.

The stages are nothing too remarkable, but there is a nice variety visually among the boss characters. I always looked forward to seeing what the game was going to throw at me next.

Sound:

It wouldn’t be a Ghostbusters title without a video game rendition of the movie theme song, and this game definitely delivers. Not that this rendition is particularly good. I’ve read reviews saying that this is the worst version of the Ghostbusters theme to date. I wouldn’t go that far, but it certainly is not very memorable at all. Nor is any of this game’s music, actually. It’s one of those games where you don’t remember anything about its music or sound effects as soon as you are done playing it.

Overall:

I wanted to like this game. I really did. It has a nice concept. I like how you have to fight and capture ghosts. I like how you get paid for your efforts. I like how you can use the money you earned to upgrade your equipment and buy new things. This game has good graphics, and is fairly appealing visually. It’s just not any fun to play.

This entire game was a frustrating experience for me. It’s not even that the game was too hard (which it kind of was). I can handle a good challenge, for the most part. But make it a fun challenge. Make it a fair challenge. This game is filled with cheap deaths and moments where you just want to chuck your controller through the wall. Some of these stages are overly long, and making your way through each of these giant mazes begins to feel like a major chore.

There’s no joy in this game. There’s no fun. Come on, this is the Ghostbusters! Where is the sense of humor? Where are the lighthearted moments? This game should not feel like homework. I should WANT to play this game. I’ll admit, about halfway through this game I debated whether I even wanted to continue playing or not.

*sigh*

Sometimes games are better left unplayed. I always had this game built up in my mind as this super fun and exciting Ghostbusters title that would put the Atari 2600 version to shame. It does put that game to shame (which isn’t hard to do), but falls flat in virtually every other category. Now my dreams are ruined. This isn’t a fun game, and I can’t even pretend that it is.

I don’t see any scenario where I come back to play this again in the future.

THE GRADE:

D+

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