Grabbed By The Ghoulies

It's Rare's first Xbox game, and we've got a close-to-finished copy.

As with so many games, people and situations, Grabbed By The Ghoulies reminds us of an episode of The Simpsons. It's the one that starts off at "Bi-Mon Sci-Fi Con", with Mark Hammill knocking cardboard cutouts over with a plastic lightsabre and a Star Wars take on Guys and Dolls ("Luke be a Jedi toniiiiight!"). Anyway, the specific bit we're on about is when the camera pans to a totally abandoned booth with two guys sat behind a table waiting to sign autographs. These men are Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong. But nobody cares, much to the exasperation of a suited PR man who exclaims, "Folks! Folks! These men have actually been in outer space!", his voice rising an octave with each syllable, at which point a nearby huddle glances in his direction and makes a collective "meh" noise.

Yep, that's how people seem to react to Grabbed By The Ghoulies. "Who cares if it's from Rare?" they foolishly announce. "I'm more interested in Perfect Dark Zero, Kameo and Conker's Live and Uncut!" And they're not the only ones. Had it been possible to choose, we're pretty sure Microsoft would've picked a different game for Rare's Xbox debut. Although Grabbed By The Ghoulies is cute, different and obviously inspired by Luigi's Mansion and Eastern game design, you just can't see yourself banging on about it down the pub next week, let alone in three or four years time.

Balls

Effectively, all it is is this: Teenage sweethearts Cooper and Amber get lost wandering through the forest and happen upon a big old mansion called Ghoulhaven Hall, where they decide to spend the night. However before they can get inside and cuddle up on a Chesterfield next to the fire, Amber is grabbed by the resident ghosts (or "Ghoulies" as they're surprisingly known) and stolen away into the depths of the house. Once inside, Cooper sets out to rescue her with the help of a stout, endearingly cheesy English butler who points him in the right direction.

However to move between rooms, Cooper first has to conquer each room's challenge, as dreamt up by his otherworldly adversary the Baron, who sets goals like defeating all of a certain type of enemy, defeating a certain number of enemies, surviving for 60 seconds, or something like that, often stripping you of much of your vitality to toughen things up. Sometimes he even demands that you avoid killing a certain type or enemy or kill different types alternately.

Failure to live up to each room's specific ruleset will summon the Grim Reaper, who follows you around to the sound of a clanging bell and knocks you down dead with one brush of his bony finger, before playing air guitar on his scythe (which leaves him vulnerable, if you can figure out how to exploit that). But at least for the first couple of hours you won't have to worry too much about being knocked back to the start of a room, because it's more or less plain sailing - the only real challenge being to find a big blue hardback book with a Rare logo on it in every room. For every five of these "Rare tomes", you unlock one of 20 mini-games accessed via the main menu.

Dead Good

Fair enough then. It's a sort of 3D beat 'em up with a kleptomaniacal slant and a dusty, thoroughly interactive haunted house ala Luigi's Mansion. The surprising thing though is just how accessible and endearing it is. The story of Cooper and Amber might seem like something best kept for after-school cartoons, but there's something about the way it's told in storybook fashion via brief cut-scenes, animated cartoon strips and dialogue screens borrowed from silent movies, with quirky umms, aahs and grunts instead of spoken words slung over the top. It's at once adorably cute and chuckle-worthy - so much so that it feels like, gasp, a Nintendo game.

Then there's the way you play it, which is so simple even a six-year-old child could operate it ("Quick! Someone fetch me a six-year-old child!" [That'll show up in some interesting Google searches -Ed]). All you have to do is keep your thumbs on the sticks and your fingers on the triggers. Left analogue is movement, right analogue is combat (point and you'll poke, elbow, boot, wire fu or roundhouse), and the shoulder triggers rotate the camera. There's no 3D up or down element, which we got used to after a while (side note: is it just us, or do people tend to face the camera slightly downward in third person games?), and the only other regularly-used buttons are A, for picking up and B, for dropping weapons like broomsticks, chairs, picture frames, mirrors, books, bottles, bricks and other bits and pieces, which can be used Final Fight-style for several blows before they splinter and tumble to the ground.

Things To Do In Twycross When You're Dead

Furthermore, we owe our devotion to the task (we clocked up several hours in one sitting when all we were doing was "trying it out") in no small part to the game's glorious visuals. Rare has used a borderless style of cel-shading similar to Zelda's for the characters and enemies and mixed it with a more intricate, Luigi's Mansion-esque approach to the environment. Each room is hugely detailed, layered to the ceiling with shelves and furniture stuffed with pots, pans, dusty books, old Ultimate Play The Game posters [go on Rare, please do an Atic Atac sequel, go on - watery eyed Ed], Xbox game boxes, kids toys, musical instruments, dirty plates - whatever the setting, it's smothered in fine detail, and almost every chunk of it is good for one destructive smack, often revealing power-ups (for health, Doom-style Berserk mode, avoiding shocks and things like that), or hiding Ghoulies.

The lighting too is simply superb. As if the soundtrack (inspired by Luigi, obviously, but we also caught touches of Silence of the Lambs and things like that) wasn't already pumping atmosphere into the room like an AC unit, the flickering fires illuminate the workshop and Cooper's mummy-sizzling torch throbs in the darkness of the basement beautifully. There are real-time shadows everywhere of course, but then that's what happens when you shift development focus to hardware that isn't going deaf, dumb and blind in its old age.

And it's worth giving the Ghoulies themselves a bit of space, too. They may be dead, but every one of them is alive with personality, from the quirky skeletons who put up their dukes and dance towards you like a boxer to the kung fu imps who prance around in little red karate outfits to the sound of clinky Hong Kong action movie music, leaping Trinity-like into the air to launch their flying kick attacks.

Our favourites though are the one-legged, hooked pirates and their thick, piratey "Yeargh!" accents. The combat is such that after a few repeated blows, enemies will become dizzy and even get knocked down, from whence Cooper can boot them around a bit to whittle down their hit points, and the pirates just make the best "ouch" noise of any of them. We would have picked the Grim Reaper as our favourite for his jangly guitar impression and imposing presence, but he's such a pain in the arse (moving ever so slightly faster than you and negating virtually any chance you had of continuing a task to unlock the next door) that we'd rather just insult him. He's a cock.

Grave Concerns

So, then, the bottom line is that you should be more excited about Grabbed By The Ghoulies than you actually are. It's silly, slapstick fun aimed at everyone from your little kids to your parents, and it has that inherent Japanese-ness borne out of a long subservient relationship with one of that country's best games developers. Right?

But... gah. It also has that same "almost-ness" about it as Star Fox Adventures and other latter day Rare productions. Although it mimics the style and setting of Luigi's Mansion rather well, Nintendo's pint-sized adventure was great because every new room was a diverse new puzzle, stretching the boundaries of Luigi's abilities in the context of the game but never quite abandoning them. In GBTG, every new room is a heavily contrived challenge, based around seemingly random parameters over which the player has no control. Difficulty is increased by cutting down your health, throwing in more monsters and negative power-ups (which sap health, slow you down and so on), and making it harder to avoid a visit from the Reaper, whereas Luigi upped the ante by forcing you to think laterally. The closest GBTG has come to that so far is a hunchback enemy who only takes damage when smacked in the face, and yet spins round defensively whenever you go near him, or the mummys who only die when set on fire.

The best example of this complaint is surely the henhouse, where vampire chickens lurk en masse. Creeping in to steal a giant egg, you have to traipse through a maze of haystacks and farming implements, and, with no jump function to help you, it isn't long after all hell breaks loose and the vamps come flying that you're dead, because you were too busy navigating the knee-high maze to concentrate on where your enemies were coming from. To add insult to injury, you're then forced to spend a few minutes racing back through the maze to try again.

A Rare Talent

That's not to say there haven't been standout moments. Few games could match the undead disco in the ballroom, where at least 20 skeletons and zombies are dancing away. You can take them all on (and die trying) of course, but you can also slip through without laying a finger on them. Then there are the occasional projectile weapons, like fire extinguishers, fizzy drink launchers and even more obscure alternatives (better leave something to mention in the review, right?). And we love the "fright" bits where Cooper is caught unawares by a leering spectre and the player has to hit a button sequence quickly to calm him down - particularly the early one where the player is taken on-rails through a trophy room stuffed with ghastly faces...

It's just that for all the positive things about it so far, and reasons we'd be keen to recommend it when it's finished and on store shelves, GBTG is at this point, for want of a less clichéd expression, "a mixed bag". And although the difficulty ramps up after a couple of hours (to stop you zipping through the remaining three chapters quite as quickly as the first two), there are 20 mini-games to unlock and play, and there seem to be plenty of damsels tied up around the mansion to rescue somewhere down the line (perhaps on a second play through with the Baron's master key at hand), we're not sure how long we'll last with the finished game. And the one we're playing now has a few camera and slowdown issues to boot.

Then again, the point of the piece has been to try and build up some interest in Ghoulies, and going out on a sad note would be extremely stupid. With that in mind, we'd like to make it clear that we're leaving you now to go and play it. Because even with a pile of Christmas-rush titles sat on our mantelpieces, including games we're more than likely to offer a hallowed 9/10, Rare's occasionally spellbinding, mostly imaginative take on the haunted house idea is by far the most attractive option we can think of right now. Even if we'd rather pay £40 for it than $375 million.

Comments (34) Latest comment 9 years ago

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  • Slacker #1 9 years ago

    Our favourites though are the one-legged, hooked pirates and their thick, piratey "Yeargh!" accents

    Garrrrr.... There be pirates everywhere.... Ye scurvy dogs...
  • Tiger_Walts #2 9 years ago

    There be some devilry here!
  • CyberClaw #3 9 years ago

    "Even if we'd rather pay £40 for it than $375 million."
    Clever reference to MS buying Rare (rumored $375 mil)... for those of you who didn't catch it ^^;
    Edited by 1 at 19/09/03 @ 14:18
  • Blerk #4 9 years ago

    ice and snow, fifty below, makes a happy eskimo!

    Why do you always do that? Am I missing the joke?

    Anyway, GBTG.... meh. Rare ain't what they used to be. Next!
  • templar-wizard #5 9 years ago

    as it seems to 'Zombies Ate My Neighbours' Redux,
    does it have same screen multiplayer as the aformentioned classic?
  • prettyboytim #6 9 years ago

    Then there's the way you play it, which is so simple even a six-year-old child could operate it. All you have to do is keep your thumbs on the sticks and your fingers on the triggers.

    Ahh - see, that's where you're wrong. I happen to have a six-year-old child, and the problem with the Xbox controller (even the Type S controller) is that she has considerable difficulty reaching the triggers while her thumbs are on the sticks.

    It's a damn shame, because otherwise she would be accompanying me through Legendary on Halo by now...


    Erm.
    Arrrr..... er.. Me Hearties. Or something.
  • TipTop #7 9 years ago

    Sounds interesting. There is an article on the BBC's site today about how Microsoft are trying to woo the younger gamer. Titles such as this may just open up the platform to a wider audience.

    htt p://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3120794.stm

    This may be a case of deciding the stratgy based on their release list rather than the other way around, but Im certainly going to keep an eye on this a little better, given I liked Luigi's Mansion amongst others ..
    Edited by 1 at 19/09/03 @ 14:47
  • ST.. #8 9 years ago

    "Even if we'd rather pay £40 for it than $375 million."
    Clever reference to MS buying Rare (rumored $375 mil)... for those of you who didn't catch it ^^;

    You don't say!
  • Nemesis #9 9 years ago

  • Sko #10 9 years ago

    Soooooo... Mario 64, Banjo-Kazooie? Mario Karts, Diddy Kong Racing? And now Luigi's Mansion, Grabbed By The Ghoulies.

    Pah. Wannabes ;)
  • Johnson #11 9 years ago

    Subservient? Why not just call Rare Nintendo's old bitch and be done with it?
  • Dizzy #12 9 years ago

    I always considered this a kind of remake of Attic Attack. I loved that game! Looks like I will also love this... maybe it is also a good game to play with the "m8s" around :) drinking beer? If anybody can easily play it I am sure it will be a hit.
    Just a quick question, is the route through the house always the same or randomised?
  • TipTop #13 9 years ago

    Atic Atac. Cool. Heard they we were remaking Sabre Wolf! Now a vertex shaded, bump mapped, Dolby 5.1, 3D Jet Pac would be great!.

    :)
    Edited by 1 at 19/09/03 @ 16:09
  • Blerk #14 9 years ago

    Grrr. Bloody amateurs! *puts on Ultimate Spelling Hat*

    Atic Atac.
    Sabre Wulf.
    Jet Pac.

    Got it? ;-)
  • mOth #15 9 years ago

    I spent, what now seems like, an entire summer playing Sabre Wulf.

    I remember the sense of anti-climax when I finished it and all that happened was a message came up saying "The end. 97% complete".

    oh and there was probably some sort of crappy tune composed using beep() commands taunting me through the tinny speaker of my bbc b.

    I'm still very bitter about the whole affair and it probably explains why I've never have been able to complete many games since...
    Edited by 1 at 19/09/03 @ 16:10
  • TipTop #16 9 years ago

    Pffft BBC. BBC = Elite and Castle Adventure, Speccy for anything Ultimate!
  • Tricky #17 9 years ago

    Heh - for some reason one of my abiding memories of playing Atic Atac is that kind of "squish" noise that you get whenever you move from room to room, interspersed with the tip-tap-tip-tap of your footsteps.

    /me goes misty eyed.
  • Nemesis #18 9 years ago

    Elite. Yarr!

    Thar be pirates!

    Yarr!
  • Blerk #19 9 years ago

    Yikes! Where'd that space come from? :-o
  • TipTop #20 9 years ago

    Even better would be an Alien8 remake? I am very excited about this game now it's been pitched as an Atic Atac update. You should be in marketing Dizzy.

    'Grabbed by the Ghoulies - Atic Atac for the Noughties'
  • TipTop #21 9 years ago

    One 'ickle rant and your tarnished forever :)

    That said it would be the killer app it needs!
  • Zero Beat #22 9 years ago

    Every time I see a video of GbtG I fall in love with the presentation. Watching Gamespot's new videos, the physics are very impressive, whack an Imp into the wall above a book case and it'll slide down the wall crashing through all the shelves below kicking up a lot of dusty books. Best cloth physics 'evar' too, curtains flick round without keeping their original too tightly like they do in Hitman, Splinter Cell etc.

    Those Imps are just too cute. I'll thoroughly enjoy elbow dropping them until big bro Ninja Imp comes along and I have to kick him up the arse.
  • Xensor #23 9 years ago

    Avast ye land-lubbers! Gib the mainsail ye scurvy dogs afore i flair ye hide from ye bones... aaarrrrgghhh!!!
  • Tiitiz #24 9 years ago

    Same here ZeroBeat

    After seeing the clips it does look rather interesting. If it's anything like Luigi's Mansion then you can stick it though.
  • Oceadge #25 9 years ago

    Sko - Soooooo... Mario 64, Banjo-Kazooie? Mario Karts, Diddy Kong Racing? And now Luigi's Mansion, Grabbed By The Ghoulies.

    Annnnd... Banjo-Kazooie was better than Mario 64*, Diddy Kong Racing was better than Mario Kart 64*, will Grabbed By The Ghoulies be better than Luigi's Mansion?!


    * IMHO of course
  • Bill Gates is Evil #26 9 years ago

    Personally....

    I LOVE cartoonish haunted house games. This game kinda reminds me of some Tim Burton movie. I love the style of graphics.

    I'm being honest too. Before I decided to make this post, I thought "are you sure you aren't just being biased because it left Nintendo's AntiChristCube and is now on your favorite console"?

    Any who played the AMAZING Banjo-Kazooie (the first one) knows how great that game was. Ocea, in my opinion that game is better than any Mario game, ever. It is so memorable. My favorite level? The haunted house. I've got a videogame fetish for haunted houses, and this game is my most anticipated game for the holiday season. Honestly. I admit I'm a bit of a freak in this regard, but i'm putting this over PGR 2, Mario Kart DD, Prince of Persia, and every other big game coming out this holiday.

    Then again, the point of the piece has been to try and build up some interest in Ghoulies, and going out on a sad note would be extremely stupid. With that in mind, we'd like to make it clear that we're leaving you now to go and play it. Because even with a pile of Christmas-rush titles sat on our mantelpieces, including games we're more than likely to offer a hallowed 9/10, Rare's occasionally spellbinding, mostly imaginative take on the haunted house idea is by far the most attractive option we can think of right now.

    My thoughts as well. I really owe it to Nintendo for this game, since they're probably the ones who told Rare to make this.
  • beep #27 9 years ago

    Rare needs to find someone who can design characters which are a bit more likeable. The lead characters from this game look like pratts, which is maintaining Rare's tradition of uncharismatic, hateful designs.

    But that's just me...

    And I'll still probably buy this one...

    But maybe not for full retail, seeing as the last Rare game I bought (Starfox Adventures) I still haven't spent more than half an hour with.
  • dynarama #28 9 years ago

    prettyboytim - get an adapter from special reserve so you can use a ps2 controller on the Xbox. It's only a tenner and it makes Xbox games playable without certain injury.
  • savant #29 9 years ago

    Is it Rare-bashing season or something? This looks like a charming game, and I've been enthused about it since seeing the first videos from E3. Rare's last titles on Nintendo hardware have been disappointing, but that doesn't mean that this one is going to be a dud at all. Let's have a bit more optimism around here, eh?

    Ar. Hoist the mainsails! Swab the decks you landlubber! etc. etc.
  • Bill Gates is Evil #30 9 years ago

    Well, Rare's late games on N64 had the severe problem of having to be rushed (for a Rare game) in order to try and help N64 survive. That's why the major problems with Banjo-Tooie and Perfect Dark were technical--framerates. Perfect Dark had horrible, horrible framerates and would have kicked serious ass if it were actual smooth.

    And Star Fox Adventures had the unfortunate case of beings a N64 to GameCube port, because SFA DIDN'T meet the N64-dead line.
  • Sonic Revenge #31 9 years ago

    Love Rare, have done so for years...But come on, this reminds me of those shody British and American PSone Platformers that used to spring up every week or two and slip away just as quickly. I dont really have too much faith in Perfect Dark Zero either, Nintendo wouldn't have let and asset like that get away without it having serious technical\design imperfections...Just a view though ;)
  • Khab #32 9 years ago

  • Tiger_Walts #33 9 years ago

    Sounds a bit too close to Gauntlet: Dark Alliance, hopefully the combat is varied enough to escape this.
  • CyberClaw #34 9 years ago

    The only thing I have to say about Rare, is that they have the only 007 game that is good (actually very damn fucking prety good, not just decent like every EA 007 game). Golden Eye. Quite in fact it was the top of the cream in the N64, specially the MP frantic action :) Sure, we have Time Splitters 2 (Rare ex-employees), but it isn't as revolutionary or ground breaking as Golden Eye was back then. I'm expecting something from Perfect Dark Zero. There was something about Golden Eye.... Ah, nostalgia :)