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Dec 4, 2007



Thanksgiving, 1991. The events of the Ghostbusters II movie - oil-painted villain Vigo the Carpathian vanquished by Dr. Peter Venkman and team - took place two years ago. But the city of New York has embraced the law of original Ghostbusters baddie Gozer, and a museum dedicated to his (her?) architecture and art is about to open. So it looks like the perfect time for our spook-smashing heroes to set up an offshoot franchise team - with you as the newest recruit. Yada, yada, yada. All that really matters is this: you get to wield a Wii Remote like a Slimer-sucking, scenery-smashing Proton Pack.

The beauty of Ghostbusters The Video Game is that, in essence, it's the third movie. Original stars Dan Ackroyd and Harold Ramis are on board, "very excited" according to the developers, and playing a big role in writing, tweaking and tuning the script ("It's real feedback - our stuff isn't just being sent into a void," say the devs). So you get the real Ghostbusters - and you get the real ghosts, with the team determined to deliver pretty much every spook from both films, from Slimer to that scary woman in the library.

We've gone hands-on with the Wii Remote as a Proton Pack: move with the analogue stick, aim with the Wii pointer, then press fire and - ZAP! - 500,000Mhz of particle accelerator beam arcs across the room, frazzling ghosts and furniture. When the beam turns blue, you can slam a trapped Slimer against the walls. Push the Nunchuk forward to slide a Ghost Trap under a spook before guiding him in with the Remote, 'tugging' him toward you like a stubborn fish. Your Proton Pack boasts eight different types of poltergeist-pulverising weapons in all: you'll upgrade it over the course of the game. Examples include Proton Pulse, the ability to short circuit your Pack to serve as a temporary shield; Tether Gun, which lets you tether ghosts to the environment with sticky goo; and Shock Blast, good for swarms of insects in the library and an explosive treat.

We played The Graveyard level - a murky, spooky stalk up a rocky path. It starts with nightmare-inducing glow babies emerging from the dirt - these Wisp-Class ghosts can be dispensed with one burst of the Proton Beam. But by the end, you're up against a colossal ghost boss with a gravestone on his head. This fella needs coordination: you've got your little team of Wii-controlled Ghostbusters (proper, talking ones from the movie), intelligently searching for Proton Beam and Ghost Trap points. You all need to train your beams on the boss's head when he jack-in-the-boxes up from underground. Eventually, he'll make a run for it, prompting a hectic chase back down the hill.

Other levels are epic in scale. One's set during the Macy's Day parade in Manhattan, where you're battling your way onto a float. Another is a battle through a labyrinthine library basement, all flying books and shield-wielding ghost Knights - and, yep, the return of that scary woman in the library. And if you were hoping for a Stay Puft appearance, how about a chase through New York's city streets, culminating in an eye-shattering boss fight where you're blasting at the Marshmallow Man from the side of a skyscraper while he claws his way up, his horrible distorted bug-eyed baby face grinning right at you; his fat, delicious arms throwing stone pillars at your face?

As for vehicles, details are still partially shrouded in ghostly developer-fog. One we do know about is set en route to Times Square: you 'escort' the Ectomobile as it wades through a barrage of ghosts, sucking the spooks into a big Ghost Trap on the back. Sounds like an on-rails Proton-aiming bit? Yep. No proper driving bits at all, sadly.

The Wii version is its own beast compared to PS3 and 360 - lovingly stylized and designed with the system's multiplayer strengths in mind. Not only will it have all 10 or so single-player levels, from the streets of New York to the mysterious 'Lost Island,' but also a bulging grab bag of multiplayer modes and minigames. There's no Wi-Fi planned - but the devs promise Ghostbusters is "always fun" with you and three friends.

Red Fly aims to bust 'screen-watchers' with the 4 player 'Busters vs. Ghosts' mode. This is a 2-on-2 multiplayer game that comes in two flavors. The first is a simple "team that catches the most ghosts wins" game. Then you've got a mode with no ghosts at all - where you simply need to damage as much furniture as possible. To make things even more interesting, players controlling a ghost have their environments rendered entirely differently (in the supernatural) to the Ghostbusters. So even if you peek at their screen, it's tough to tell where they are. Red Fly also promises "so many maps it'll almost feel like it's randomized."

The 4 player co-op is a full split-screen team of you and your mates, ghost-bustin' through the solo missions. There's also a competitive version which is still the solo missions, but turned into a beam-crisscrossing battle to be first to the ghosts. Then there's Domination mode, which sounds a bit like king of the hill (the game - not the TV show): ancient artifacts are scattered around the map, and whoever 'controls' the most wins. Tack onto that a slew of minigames - like a 30-second battle to bag 100 ghosts, a shuffleboard-like Ghost Trap sliding test, a battle against overheating Proton Packs - and we're likely looking at some of Wii's most hectic, back-and-forth multiplayer.

We're a long way off from playing the finished version of Ghostbusters The Video Game; the team's aiming for a 2008 holiday release. That leaves old fans plenty of time to fire up their DVD players and dust off their lunchboxes from the Ghostbusters days of yore.


Source: Gamesradar- hands Ghostbusters Wii