MadCap's Game Reviews - "Grabbed By The Ghoulies"

Yes, Virginia, there was a time where Rare was not doomed to making shitty Kinect games and...that one game that we shall never speak of again...when they were first acquired by Microsoft.  There was a time when the bright colors, cheerful music, and kooky characters were allowed to make hay, indeed even during the time of the Company that dare not speak its name...and for once, I'm not talking about EA. No, Microsoft, the company that took one of the greatest game development companies of all time and put them to use making things far, far below what their talents were worthy of.  Just before that, however, we have Grabbed by the Ghoulies, the last hurrah of the by-gone age of Rare games that people actually wanted to play.

Is it good? Well, I never played it when it was new, so this was my opportunity to get in and see what was what. Is Grabbed a glorious final battle cry before the world was crushed by the invading armies of darkness, or a last pathetic whimper from Rare as Microsoft dragged it mewling, mutilated corpse away? Let's take a look!

The plot begins with protagonist Cooper and his girlfriend Amber backpacking through the countryside when a storm picks up and they seek shelter at a mansion despite Cooper's insistence that they should press on to the next town.  However, a vampire named Baron von Ghoul overhears Cooper talking smack about his home, calling it "creepy", and decides to teach him a lesson, sending his ghouls to grab Amber. And so it's up to Cooper to brave Ghouly Manor and save his girlfriend.

Immediately a problem for me is the camera angles. This is a 3-D platformer. We need control of the camera in order to function properly, and in a far more fluid manner as well. Giving me the ability to pan around with the left and right triggers helps, but in a combat situation things will be hairy and mistake will be made far, far too easily. Would it not have been better to map the controls for the camera to the right stick of the Xbox control? Like someone who would design a game intuitively for a console might think to do?

And before someone gets in touch to tell me that is totally intuitive game design: No, it isn't!

What's worse is, because of these controls, Cooper is always looking off to the left or the right toward an enemy - even when the enemy has been defeated until they poof away - or object instead of straight ahead where the camera is pointed. This isn't so much an issue since he still controls well enough, but it's an irritation that I just can't look past. No other Rare game I've ever played had this problem.

The right stick does attacking of any sort, though without a weapon Cooper throws some really lame kicks and punches. Of course, the first room was a Billiard Room, so I had Cooper pick himself up a pool cue to whack some skeletons with, and I was having a good time, having a good time. I didn't want to stop at all...until I found that you apparently can't take some items out of rooms, particularly weapons.

That is, of course, besides sections where the oddly very helpful servants in Ghouly Manor give you a weapon of some kind to fight off the various baddies that go bump in the night. These include a flaming torch or a Super Soaker filled with holy water that give a projectile weapon that still has to be aimed using the right stick (and often you'll have to re-aim a few times just to make sure that you're staying on target.

Another big emphasis of the game is a bunch of Jump Scare moments followed by a quick time event. While I appreciate the effort in creating an atmosphere, Jump Scares are incredibly stupid, and so are quick time events. Rare, you didn't have to pull this in your other games to create an atmosphere.  Mad Monster Mansion in Banjo-Kazooie and the on-the-nose named Creepy Castle in Donkey Kong 64 managed to do that pretty well without having to resort to this sort of nonsense.

It's all because of the mechanic where Cooper takes more damage when he's had a fright, but it's really unnecessary, especially when you have so little health to begin with and if the Baron's feeling like a dick (which is often), he'll reduce your health to a certain amount and leave you to squirm. Not that this makes combat difficult, by any stretch, seeing that the camera is the only enemy you will ever actually have a challenge with. And not only that, but if Cooper loses his hearts, it's okay, because he'll just 'port back to the beginning of whatever stage he fell at with virtually no penalty. So basically the only real challenge is in fighting off swarms of enemies. Which isn't actually challenging, it's padding. And cheap.

In a very totally-not-Luigi's Mansion-esque thing, Cooper's hits on foes take away hit points as indicated by a heart hovering over each enemy's head. Once it drops to zero, they get destroyed in a needless dramatic fashion and poof into the dust of nonexistence. Of course, certain enemies can't be taken out in such a manner and have to be dispatched with various implements such as the holy Super Soaker or the torch.

And of course, because it's Rare, we have the kooky and colorful characters. Here, it's most of the serving staff who are definitely in the "quirky" category. Oddly, not so much Cooper. Far from the comedic duo of Banjo and Kazooie, Cooper is a guy trying to be too cool for school...and he's not really doing it well. Still, he's a bad enough dude to rescue his girlfriend from a vampire's lair, so he's at least got roughly the same personality as Charlie Brewster. At the very least he's counterbalanced somewhat by Amber, who has no patience for his nonsense and seeks to keep him in check at virtually every opportunity.

And, of course, because it's Rare, there are the little nods and cameos to other Rare games - such as Banjo-Kazooie and Konker's Bad Fur Day - but unlike in other games (including - admittedly - those in that one that I will never speak of again), all they do is remind me of far better games that I could be playing.  While the aesthetic is admittedly exactly what I expect from Rare, even for a horror game, the only things about this that are the ridiculous and unintuitive camera controls, padding of enemy assaults out to next week, and the rather poorly thought out and implemented Fear mechanic that could have worked, but ultimately doesn't because quick time events are awful and hilariously out of place in  a platformer.

Of course, a great deal of this can be attributed to Rare being purchased by Microsoft, forcing them to adapt the game from what had been a Nintendo Gamecube game into an Xbox game. Sadly yet another thing that Microsoft has done to wreck the good name of Rare, resulting in what is sadly a rather mediocre game. So, no, I won't blame Rare for this one. I'll blame Microsoft.

Up yours, Microsoft!

Grabbed By The Ghoulies is now available from Rare and Microsoft Game Studios for Xbox.

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