Ghostbusters - Hands On Preview

13 Mar 2009 at 18:01:58 by Tim McDonald

I'm not going to beat around the bush. Ghostbusters: The Video Game, on 360 and PS3, looks rather good.

Maybe this shouldn't be a surprise. The game is being touted as the official third part of the Ghostbusters series, with a story written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, and with the return of the original cast. The game acts as a sequel to the movies, picking up a few years after the end of Ghostbusters 2, with the player taking the role of a new recruit to the team who's been hired to test out the experimental new equipment to see if it's safe for the old guard.

In our playthrough, Stay Puft is back for some reason (the plot is being kept tightly under wraps) and after something in a skyscraper. Wandering through the dark rooms in search of his target, I'm quickly set upon by marshmallow hellhounds.

The combat itself is a fairly standard third-person shooter affair, with the usual analogue-stick movement and aiming, and the right trigger firing off your proton pack. The controls are quick and responsive, and while the proton pack doesn't need reloading per se, it does overheat, requiring you to tap a button to vent the pack. The alternate fire lets loose a boson dart, which does a fair bit of damage and works like an explosion – extremely useful against the masses of quick-moving marshmallow beasties, but immediately overheating the pack.

Ray, who's with me, has managed to get himself “killed” by the beasts by this time, and is shouting for assistance. In a brief pause in the action, I run over, and tap a button to haul him back up to his feet, in a fashion very reminiscent of Gears of War. It looks like the other Ghostbusters will be able to revive you, too, which is rather nice, as it's one feature that's frequently lacking in games that let you “revive” your squad.

The beasts are weak, and before long we've cleared out the room. This is the first point at which I really notice the amount of damage we've done. Tables have been broken in two, lamps lie shattered on the ground, and the wall is covered with scorch marks left by the proton beams. I feel like a real Ghostbuster, and not least because I'm covered in marshmallow goo.

Destroying these things doesn't seem to have much of a gameplay impact as – while the game tallies the cost of your destruction – we suspect the city will pick up the tab. It does, however, remind you of the films, and the team’s blatant disregard for health and safety procedure. As the developers put it, the ability to “raze a room to the ground” is an important part of Ghostbusters.

Moving on up the tower, we meet up with Venkman – voiced expertly by Bill Murray, and with his trademark one-liners – and I take a moment to check out just how everyone looks. The answer? Spot on. There's some mild exaggeration to the characters, but they look an awful lot like their film counterparts, and everything looks like it should, from the clothing, to the proton packs and PKE meters.

We head on up to the roof, and here we bump into some rather meaner spooks. These ghouls are dressed in builders' outfits, complete with yellow hard hats, and have a nasty habit of possessing the various vents and ducts on the roof and then sending them hurtling towards us. The answer? Destroy everything. With less to throw at me, they're easier to take down

These ghosts actually require trapping, which is a great joy. Blasting them with the proton pack isn't quite enough, but after a bit of sustained fire, they're trapped in the beam – at which point, you pull the left trigger to smash them into the wall, floor, or ceiling, to weaken them further. Eventually they become docile, and with a quick tap of the X button, I hurl a trap out. Manoeuvring the ghost over the trap wakes it up, and as the beam encompasses it and starts to drag it down, the thing tries to escape. Deft use of the analogue sticks holds it in place, until finally the trap closes over it with a satisfying hiss.

Continuing on along the rooftop, there's an ominous, screen-shaking thump. Then another. Then another. Suddenly, Stay Puft's hands and head appear as he begins hauling himself up, over the side of the building.

Fade to black.

There's a lot that was shown off in the event that wasn't covered in our hands-on, but I can happily report that the basics are all there. The voice acting is solid, everything looks right, the scripting is fairly tight, and the game looks to have decent progression, with a system of upgrades and a variety of weapons (the experimental stuff you're using.) More importantly, the wrangling of the ghosts is a huge amount of fun.

From the release, though, we can expect a bit more. There's a hefty emphasis on ghost battles that require a bit of thinking – one was shown off that takes place in a hall of mirrors, with a ghost that travels from mirror to mirror, using them as transportation. The answer? Smash 'em all. “Golem-tech” was also touted, allowing some ghosts to pull objects towards them to form a protective body, and the objects used depends on what's still intact in the environment with different objects giving the body different properties.

And the best part? They all tie into the Ghostbusters mythos, with Aykroyd and Ramis writing the backstory and making sure the new ghosts and weapons sit comfortably in the Ghostbusters canon. A lot of the new content will be based on ideas the writers originally wanted to include in the films   but didn't have the budget or technology for at the time. So, fear not. This looks to be a real Ghostbusters experience, and not a Real Ghostbusters experience.

Watch our video interview with the development team.
Read our impressions of the Wii version here.

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