XBOX-HQ.COM - PREVIEW: Ghostbusters

Alleged ghost sightings and related supernatural occurrences have been reported across all formats.

Well, it didn’t look like the third movie was happening anytime soon. Under cross-platform development from Terminal Reality and Red Fly Studio, Ghostbusters is a return for the original cast and writers after more than two decades, and a new canonical entry in one of the finest supernatural comedies ever made.

The game sees you cast as a new recruit to the classic Ghostbusters team, who are capitalizing on their knack of saving the world in the nick of time by expanding the business. From here, the game seems to go back over significant old ground as well some new backstories and scenarios.

Several monsters are associated with Gozer, the first film’s head ghost, and have a design inspired by that particular cod-Aztec symbolism, and of course the ghosts will be the real stars of the show. As well as the aforementioned, familiar faces like the Librarian, Slimer and Stay Puft return, and new nasties include ghosts forming themselves out of books, neon blue tubes of teeth roaming the streets, sinister gargoyles, and dog-like apparitions.

In place to bust them is the original (and best) equipment – the ‘unlicensed nuclear accelerator’, or proton pack; the ghost trap for weakened ghosts; the PKE meter which in the game gives information on the targets, and even Ecto 1. Sadly, preliminary reports suggest you don’t get to take it for a spin, but perhaps such single-minded focus will prove the right decision.

Locations range from the obvious to the inspired, and include a graveyard full of fog and encrusted headstones, the library from the first film recreated in painstaking architectural detail (though sadly there’s no variety in the books), and best of all the hotel banquet room where the team first encountered Slimer, complete with fully destructible table layouts and wallpaper. As well as this, you’ll try to stop Stay Puft’s ascent up a skyscraper while suspended above him on a cord, admire the view of a castle crammed full of ghosts, and explore sewers that seem to be crammed full of effluent monsters.

It should be emphasized that Red Fly Studio’s Wii version will be significantly different from the detailed glory of Terminal Reality’s game, with more stylized characters and the proton beam mapped to the Wii Remote (and, brilliantly, the ghost trap activated by pushing the Nunchuk forwards). Nothing above the singleplayer has been confirmed for 360, PC and PS3, but the Wii version will feature multiplayer modes including ‘Ghosts vs Busters’ in which players can play as either in a face-off (the ghosts have the ability to move through walls and slime the Ghostbusters) or in a competitive ghost-catching mode.

The only aspect of the game yet to be shown off is perhaps the most important: the script and its humor. But with the original cast back on board, and the obvious appeal of being a Ghostbuster, this could be one of 2008’s more worthwhile rides.

News-Source: Next-Gen