Ghostbusters: The Video Game

I ain't afraid of no licensed games! But should we be? Ghosties FINALLY hits the shelves.

	Version PS3, (360)	Developer Terminal Reality	Publisher Atari/Sony	Genre Action

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Good bit: Despite criticisms levelled at the PS3 version, it still looks nice. Some textures aren't great but the characters look lifelike and levels are suitably imaginative.

Bad bit: But, to be fair, the PS3 version shouldn't be inferior to any. You've had years with the technology of the machine now: sort it out. Plus: stop re-using levels. That's not imaginative.

Good bit: There are numerous little touches harking back to the films, from the toaster on the pool table and the fire poles to the painting of Vigo, all of which can be interacted with.

Bad bit: There are only a few things that can be (pointlessly) interacted with, making the rest of the fire station and the levels seem dull and lifeless by comparison.

Good bit: Some stories behind the artefacts and ghosts encountered are pretty dark and interesting. For example, the Stone Angel Head.

The destruction is satisfying, with many items breaking apart in suitably nice fashions - and you're rewarded for it.

[this is getting dull. Let's kick it up a notch... deep breath...]

Bad bit: You can't drive Ecto-1 and you get mocked for it.

The game is unrelentingly cheap in the way you are attacked and grounded, with many knockback assaults making you unable to do anything as well as cornered or otherwise trapped, leaving you at the mercy of an enemy you cannot hope to avoid. Throw in the difficulty spike of the final level and this leads away from inconvenience and into annoyance as you keep on dying.

NPCs managed to get stuck on scenery and walls when they were trying to get somewhere they needed to be, and as the game operates on an archaic trigger system which does not seem able to adapt to failure, this meant the game - on no less than five separate occasions - had to be restarted from the last checkpoint. Shonky.

It sometimes feels as if developers Terminal Reality haven't played any games from the last few years, with dozens of little irritating points most games these days at least try to address. Ridiculous invisible walls (see: the Central Park level, where the player is forced on a route halfway around the world to get around a fence located at the starting point, only for Venkman to jump the fence once the player's task is complete), the inability to jump properly, inconsistencies with whether you can open doors/blow them up or not and many other little annoyances.

The last level replaces any semblance of skill with frantic, panicky luck and is cheap, cheap, cheap in the way sneak attacks pepper your character from all sides.

Good bit: Who cares about any of the above points, good or bad, though? It's essentially Ghostbusters 3 and you get to be a Ghostbuster. You get to fight alongside Bill Murray, you get to ride around in Ecto-1, you get to slime your co-workers and struggle to trap ghosts. You get to come, see and kick it's ass.

This is a very rare occasion where the licence really does override any sense of rational thought as to what makes a good game. Ghostbusters scores as high as it does purely because it is Ghostbusters. Without this facet, it is an uninspired trudge. With it, it is exciting, fulfilling and thrilling - so much so you can even ignore some hideous faults.

I wanted to dislike it on account of the "it's good, but only because it's Ghostbusters" spiel the game has been on the receiving end of from the press, but they're right. It's a licence that hasn't been endlessly whored out, that hasn't outstayed its welcome and started to smell like a musty, wet tramp who you kind of want to ask to leave but can't really pluck up the courage to (as it's rumoured he once bit a chunk out of a dog's face). It's not a licence with big, burly space marines or a ridiculous level of gore solely to shock, and it's genuinely funny in parts.

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