Ghostbusters: The Video Game(s).

The next game on my list to complete is ostensibly "Ghostbusters: The Video Game" (you can probably guess at the length of my gaming backlog, considering this game came out almost six months ago). I say "ostensibly" because the game exists on multiple platforms and is, in fact, two completely different games, depending on what platforms you play them on. At first glance, the two versions appear to be purely cosmetic.. we have a cartoony, brightly-colored version on the Wii and the PS2 and PSP, and a darker, more film-realistic version on the PS3, X360, and the PC. They are, in fact, two completely different games with different play mechanics and even storylines that make both worthy playing separately, especially if you're a big Ghostbusters fan like me.

The two version do share a lot in common, though.. each feature fantastic writing and dialogue written by the original writers themselves, Dan Akroyd and Harold Ramis, who also reprise their roles along with Bill Murray and Ernie Hudson in providing the voicework for the game. The performances are mostly great, and hit all the right vibes that they had in the movies. It's great fun to hear them banter on during the gameplay, and it lightens the experience enough to push this from a semi-serious encounter into a more comedic romp, just like the movies. Both also reuse incidental music and cues lifted right from the first movie, and use them to such perfect effect that you swear the music was written for the game specifically. It's details like this, along with the exquisite modeling of the characters and proton packs and Ecto-1 (at least in the PC/X360/PS3 version) that makes the game feel like the real thing, and not a cheap knock-off game like has been done so often in the past.

In both versions you play a new recruit to the team, and you get to live one of my favorite childhood fantasies (and probably one shared by many a Ghostbusters fan), being able to run along with the four Ghostbusters on ghostbusting missions, laying waste to everything in your path with the ridiculously overpowered and unpredictable Ghostbusting equipment like the Proton Pack, boson darts, slime thrower, etc. The feeling of comeraderie between you and your four employers and the hilarious unpredictability and chaotically dangerous nature of your equipment makes this a real "blast" to experience, as you destroy whole rooms in an effort to catch one ghost. As you grab one in your capture stream and slam it all around the room to weaken them down so they can be trapped, the lightshow that entails is over the top, at times incoherent, and violent. You definitely get the "mad scientist" vibe from this experience, that doesn't quite feel like science but more like art. Of course, you get Egon and Stantz constantly spouting off technical jargon and explanations for what's happening and it all sounds very impressive but sufficiently bewildering too. So you and your in-game protagonist are simultaneously mesmerized simply by working with this crew and this equipment.

Whereas both versions hit all the right notes with the texture/characters/props/music/setting/writing, both have wildly different gameplay mechanics and even story differences that accentuate the two different platforms. The Wii version's controls are vastly simplified, and consist mostly of you waving the wiimote at the screen in various motions to mime the motions of blasting and wrangling the ghosts. There are also times where you'll need to use the capture stream on the proton pack to pick up objects and move them around to solve some simple puzzles and item fetching sequences. The story also takes you down a path that involves more lightweight action like this, less intense ghost encounters, and more enclosed interior environments that take better advantage of the Wii's lesser graphics capability.

The PC version, on the other hand, has much more technical controls, including a feature to manually vent the heat from your proton pack, switching between different beam modes, alternating between a blast stream and capture stream, using the infrared goggles in conjunction with the PKE meter to scan ghosts and artifacts, and a more abstract "slamming" command than actually waving the controller in the right directions. The ghost also come more rapidly and in greater numbers, pushing this version into more of a shooter than a puzzle solver. You also have to keep track of your teammates and revive them if they get knocked down and incapacitated by the ghosts too many times, otherwise the game ends and you have to restart from the last checkpoint. So on the PC version there's more emphasis on reflexes and skill and managing your team than the Wii version, which is definitely a lighter weight, less technical, more accessible gameplay, which I think goes nicely hand-in-hand with the more cartooney graphical style.

These are my impressions at maybe a quarter to a third of the way through the game. I'm sure there's more in store before I reach the end, but so far I'm very satisfied and sucked into this game, because it just feels so right, and it's everything that I thought a Ghostbusters game should be, from the writing to the musical cues to the visuals to the chaotic fun of trapping a ghost and holding it indefinitely. It really feels like you're busting some heads, in a spiritual sense of course.