Ghostbusters: The Video Game Review for Nintendo DS

System: DS, X360, PS3, PC, Wii, PS2	Review Rating Legend
Dev: Red Fly Studios	1.0 - 1.9 = Avoid	4.0 - 4.4 = Great
Pub: Atari	2.0 - 2.4 = Poor	4.5 - 4.9 = Must Buy
Release: Jun. 16, 2009	2.5 - 2.9 = Average	5.0 = The Best
Players: 1	3.0 - 3.4 = Fair
ESRB Rating: Everyone	3.5 - 3.9 = Good

At Ghostbusters HQ you will get your orders. You don’t have to take every task that’s issued, but you’ll lose reputation points for the ones that you don’t. If you lose too many rep points, the game is over. Once you’ve accepted a task, you drive to the location in the Ecto-1, which is like controlling a sheet of plywood over a field of marbles.

Ghostbusters: The Video Game screenshot

It’s very cumbersome and unresponsive. When you run into an entity, you pinpoint it with the stylus and hold it on the creature to drain it of its energy. While you’re doing this, you will use the shoulder button to capture it in some kind of contraption. There are plenty of sci-fi weapons and gadgets at your disposal, although they basically do the same thing. These new devices keep the gameplay from getting stale too fast, but it does begin to decay quickly after the first half hour.

The money that you earn from successful endeavors can be used to research and develop new weapons and gadgets. Interestingly, you are never forced to use them, so you don’t really need them. At times you will have to switch to the other playable characters, and not necessarily because of their different skills but because of their courage-meter reading. The lower the meter level, the more apt they are to run away from the monsters. Control of team members is limited to a few simple commands such as “stop” and “go.” The A.I. isn’t very intelligent, and you’ll have to switch among them to ensure they aren’t getting killed. Switching requires using the stylus to select their portrait and pressing the B face button. When you’re busy in the middle of a fight, this is a very inconvenient method. Not to mention that some commands do not register at all, and other times the wrong commands are activated. What will happen is that you’ll go into a tapping frenzy in an effort to have the game issue the appropriate command, and this will only further complicate things. The icons are small and it’s very easy to hit the colored buttons that freeze characters in place instead of freeing them.

The cutscenes convey the Ghostbusters franchise as good as one could expect. They are filled with great graphics, great voiceovers, and movie-quality sound effects. The rest of the game has trouble living up to the cutscenes. In fact, the game has trouble living up to standards of a good DS game.

By Cole Smith
CCC Senior Writer

RATING OUT OF 5

RATING DESCRIPTION

2.3

Graphics
Cutscenes are great. The In-game graphics can’t compare.

2.1

Control
Some commands don’t register. Stylus use is overused and awkward to execute.

2.3

Music / Sound FX / Voice Acting
In-game sounds are repetitive. Again, the cutscenes are great.

2.4

Play Value
Repetitious gameplay disguised by new items and characters.

2.3

Overall Rating - Poor
Not an average. See Rating legend above for a final score breakdown.

Game Features:

Players will have the chance to chase, attack, and catch ghosts in a funny and frightening battle to save New York from its latest supernatural plague.

Authentic Ghostbusters Experience: The game features the voices and in-game likenesses of Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray and Ernie Hudson in an original story penned by the writers of the original films Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis.

Unique gameplay: Experience unique ghost hunting, wrangling and trapping with upgradeable weapons in widely destructible environments and large scale boss fights.

All New Storyline: Set two years after Ghostbusters II, the game will feature an all new storyline as the player battles and captures well-loved and brand new ghosts throughout New York.