So, I picked up the Wii version of Ghostbusters a few days ago, with the intent to reward myself with it when I finished the Redeemers pages. Well, today I finished the pages, and fired up the Wii.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Obviously, the biggest difference from the 360/PS3 edition is the graphics. The caricatures of the Ghostbusters are well done, although Ray Stantz is a little plain-looking compared to the detail put into Egon, Peter, and Winston. Honestly, I like the cartoony look of the game, the one thing that bugs me in the presentation is the voice over Bill Murray provides for Venkman- He's basically playing Garfield. Venkman is supposed to be fast-talking, womanizing, and funny. Well, they got about one and half out of three. Bill Murray's performance here is definitely womanizing and has a few gems of comedy, but his delivery is WAY too slow for him to be playing Venkman!
Dan Akroyd however, is definitely in character as Ray Stantz, rarely missing a beat in his delivery. Harold Ramis as Egon Spengler falls somewhere in between the two. It's difficult to call, as Egon is written with all the dry humor in the first place. His delivery is good, but so far, not too many great jokes from him. Ernie Hudson returns as Winston Zeddemore, showing up about halfway through level one's story. As such, I haven't seen enough of Winston to call the performance, but so far he seems to be pretty on. Annie Potts as Janine, the receptionist, and William Atherton as Walter Peck are here, too. Potts' voice and delivery for Janine is perfect, but so far not many jokes have been thrown her way in the script. Walter Peck, at least in the Wii version cut scenes, has so far been made out to be quite an over-the-top villain. I kid you not, they made him do the Mr. Burns pose:
Yeah. Just a LITTLE over-the-top.
Oh, and although the Wii version has the same story, they've definitely deleted some scenes. There's a clip shown in the GameTrailers.com review of the 360/PS3 versions, where your character, Ray, and Peter get stuck in the elevator at the Sedgewick Hotel (where Slimer is captured in Ghostbusters 1), and Peter has a short comedy bit that was actually pretty funny. Maybe you revisit the hotel later on in the game, but when I played the hotel level, that scene was nowhere to be found. One more minor gripe- maybe it's just my TV and the fact that I have to sit so close to be able to play, the way my room is set up, but I can't shake that the game feels a little bit claustrophobic. Maybe I'll try hooking up the Wii to the big screen TV in the living room and see how that feels.
As for the actual gameplay, aiming the neutrona wand is reminiscient of Metroid Prime 3, but I think it's actually a little bit BETTER. Possibly because you're playing from a third-person perspective and not a first-person, but whatevs. The Wiimote gives great control over your proton stream, and I giddily trashed the hallways of the Sedgewick Hotel as soon as I was turned loose. The control you have over the proton pack is so good, you can write your name on the wall easily. Also, before starting a mission, you can choose to let a friend join in as another Ghostbuster- many a game of proton pack tic tack toe are certain to be played. Capturing ghosts is a lot of fun, although I can see it growing tedious as other reviews have suggested, because every capture requires a short quick-time event mapped to Wiimote waggle. The nunchuck gesture for throwing the trap isn't explained all that well, but once you figure it out, it's pretty cool to pull off. Maybe Red Fly realized that it was a pain to figure out, because another Ghostbuster accompanies you about 90% of the time in the first level and they throw out traps as well, but leave the actual capturing to you. The movement controls for your actual character feel a little bit sticky, but not enough to be an issue. Although it was a little irritating that I couldn't move at the same pace as Ray and Egon while they calmly walked to the elevator, bantering along the way- to stay with them and listen to the dialogue, I was forced to RUN, then stand. Then RUN, then stand. And so on.
So yeah, so far, it's a solid game! It's fun to play and pretty darn funny! It has it's problems, but what licensed game doesn't? Once I get my 360, I think I'll probably rent that version just to see how it stacks up, though.
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