A new Ghostbusters game has been announced. Called Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed, it’s an asynchronous, 4v1 multiplayer shooter, where four Ghostbusters can take on one player controlling the ghosts.
The game’s official description reads:
As a Ghostbuster, join with other Ghostbusters to chase and trap ghosts in museums, prisons, hotels, and more, and capture the ghosts before they can fully haunt the areas. Or, as the Ghost, hide, sneak, surprise, scare, and of course, slime Ghostbusters and civilians until the everything has gone completely spooky. Use trickery, deception, and Ectoplasm to gain the upper hand and drive the Ghostbusters out.
Here’s the trailer, which at the very least features the voices of Ernie Hudson and Dan Aykroyd:
It looks...pretty basic, especially since this is its debut trailer. It’s being made by Illfonic, who specialise in mid-tier releases like Friday the 13th and Predator Hunting Grounds, so it’ll also probably be a cheaper game.
I have some concerns! For starters, Ghostbusters is a movie that was very much a product of its time (1984) and place (New York City), and pretty much every attempt to carry on with the franchise in other places and/or times since has been a disappointment, whether it’s movies or a succession of bad video games (the wonderful cartoon series being the lone exception).
Next: Illfonic’s track record. Hunting Grounds, Friday the 13th and Dead Alliance all sucked. Then there’s the fact asynchronous multiplayer games always sound better on paper than they do to people who only want to play as one of the sides (though this will support solo and offline play at least). Then there’s the fact that on PC, which will surely be its biggest platform, it’s going to launch as an Epic Store exclusive (it’s also coming to both PlayStations and both Xbox consoles).
This game is not making life easy for itself! I’m forever an optimist though, and forever someone dumb enough to keep giving Ghostbusters things a chance, so will still be interested in taking a look when it’s out in “Q4.”