0 Comments | Add a Comment

Send to a Friend Print

Ghost Master

By: Ure "Vader" Paul
Date: Thursday, September 04, 2003

Growing up in an age when Ghostbusters reigned cinemas worldwide, it was only a matter of time until kids got hooked on the idea of whipping out specters and sending them back to a parallel universe. But to this day, I never imagined what it would be like to control one of those nasty spooks and how much fun it would be to scare the hell out of people. After playing Ghost Master, I have to admit that the idea of haunting houses and spreading terror through the neighborhood is quite riveting. Now you're probably thinking: who in their right minds would come up with such a wacky idea for a video game? The answer is the development team at Sick Puppies. Experienced gamers will be glad to know that the Studio Manager/Creative Director of Sick Puppies is none other than, Gregg Barnett, former head of Perfect Entertainment - the developer responsible for Discworld II and Discworld Noir. Perfect Entertainment also did the first Discworld game, although at that time the company was divided into Prefect 10 and Teeny Weeny Games. (Ed. - Here Luggage!) Anyhow, it's nice to know that such a creative mind is behind this project. Discworld was one of the most enjoyable adventures of its time. (Ed. - It is in fact the case, that all roads lead AWAY from Ankh Morpork.)

"Ugly little spud, isn't he?"

Play it again, Sam.

Gregg and his team of artists and designers crafted a unique simulation that allows players to command a pack of ghosts, ghouls, elementals, specters, and such. You are a Ghost Master and your simple duty is to haunt houses and spook the living daylights out of the citizens of Gravenville. Your missions include solving ancient mysteries and puzzles of various ghostly locals. During these endeavors, you will be able to unlock additional characters - these characters usually come in the form of banished souls who have come back from the dead, seeking vengeance for their untimely passing.

It's a bit hard to define the genre of Ghost Master. The game has many unique qualities that set it apart from conventional video games. Will Wright's renowned title The Sims is perhaps the only parallel that comes to mind. Otherwise, the game was described by its makers as a combination of strategy, adventure, and resource management. And, believe it or not, all these elements are present in the game. There are even some traces of role-playing to boot! Ghost Master turned out to be a successful mixture of various genres, which establishes excellent gameplay mechanics and presents an extremely challenging experience.

At the start of the game, players get to flex their ghostly skills by haunting a few households. Ghost Master features an excellent tutorial that will help ease you into the game and prepare you for the challenges to come. If you think being a ghost is easy, try scaring the crap out of 30 people, all of which have individual beliefs. Each dweller must feel what it's like to be scared to death by a mysterious and eerie sprit. If you wish to frighten all the dwellers off, you must take several important factors into account. For starters, a Ghost Master needs to keep an eye on the level of Ghost Plasm and Gold Plasm. Ghost Plasm is something like mana. It gives you the energy to spawn ghosts and use their abilities throughout the game. This is one aspect where gamers must be very cautious and thrifty, since Ghost Plasm supplies are scarce at the start of each scenario. Successfully casting spells, which results in people panicking and screaming, increases the level of Ghost Plasm and allows you to send more specters into action. Of course, casting spells also drains your Ghost Plasm, so you are obliged to think your actions through. Gold Plasm is awarded to the Ghost Master with each completed scenario, letting you increase the skills of all of your faithful ghostly minions, consequently making them more efficient haunters; hence the RPG elements we talked about earlier.

Positioning is another important aspect of haunting. Placing your haunters throughout the level calls for a bit of brainstorming and good tactics. Houses are divided into sections and each section can be occupied by a certain vapour, specter, or spirit. For example, it would be reasonable to select a skilled ghost and bind it to the most crowded spot in the house. Thus you can be sure that once you unleash its powers it will influence a great number of unfortunate dwellers. The cool thing is that some ghosts have the ability to act through particular objects, like the TV or piano. This can be achieved by summoning poltergeists (such as Whirlweird) or specters (such as Ghastly). Understandably, your success as a Ghost Master also depends on how well you combine all the available skills and abilities of your ghosts. Cowardly people usually become weak from the haunting very quickly and can rush out of the house in no time. But, there are many skeptics out there that are not so easily swayed. Your job is to make sure their belief and terror scales are raised as much as possible. Of course, for that task you're gonna need to summon more potent spirits. Also, some specters and spooks can manipulate objects within the physical world, which drastically influences the behavior and belief of humans. This action, however, may also require a lot of Ghost Plasm, so you'll have to work your way up by using weaker ghosts before you can summon the stronger. To help you with troublesome "subjects," some missions include residential spirits that have been imprisoned for a long time - liberating them can help you achieve your goal and, shall we say, "persuade" skeptical mortals to acknowledge paranormal activities that take place within their humble abode.

Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time!

Hm, whose dwelling shall we haunt next?

Locations, where your ghosts "operate," are usually huge estates, sororities and frat houses (there are 15 unique locations altogether). At a certain point in the game you even get to haunt a lunatic asylum, a military base, and the local police station. Every location has different inhabitants, so it's gonna be a whole new challenge every time.

The AI stands as another challenging aspect of the game. Each character - both ghost and prey - has a complex and diverse set of reactions to whatever happens in the environment (there are 30 CPU-controlled characters within each location, all with their specific AI routines). In order to complete your objectives and outsmart your prey, your attention is required at all times.

Graphically, the game looks wonderful. You'll see an extensive range of vividly animated character models, as well as a pretty decent assortment of imaginatively portrayed Spirits, Disturbances, Vapours, Elementals, Frighteners, and Horrors - all of which, by the way, have their own appearance and unique-looking spells. The spells (ghostly skills, or whatever you wanna call 'em) are colorful and a joy to behold. In other words, a great hand should go out to the team of artists, designers, and 3D animators that made all this possible. And it also might interest you that the entire game is in full 3D, offering you a chance to view all the locations from practically any angle. The camera also has a zooming scope, which can be very helpful in specific haunting situations, a cheerleader taking a shower, for instance! (Ed. - Down boy!) Surprisingly the frame rate throughout the entire game was pretty solid, even in high-res - you can beef the game up to 1600*1200. One of the coolest visual aspects is the ability to view the surroundings from both the eyes of the humans and ghosts alike. Viewing different situations from the ghost's perspective really increases the tension and creates a creepy atmosphere. Once in this viewing mode the surroundings look different (everything is purplish) and you can hear the heavy breathing of the spook you entered.

The sound is another shining aspect of the game. Deceptively cheerful tunes with hints of spookiness hum in the background and create a surreal atmosphere as you listen to the screams of your petrified human victims. There's also an array of reactions and funny catchphrases, often yelled out by the terrified dwellers.

Once again, the commendable mix of genres can keep you busy for quite some time. Also, things have run smoothly and without any problems all through the game. The interface is intuitive and players are sure to get used to giving out orders to the sprits, assigning them to various tasks. Of course, the game is not perfect. There are a few drawbacks here and there. To begin with, the learning curve can be slightly steep for casual gamers that hate bothering with tutorials. One other possible downside to Ghost Master is the lack of multiplayer mode. Eventually, you will want more from this game, and God knows playing in multiplayer could've done wonders for the game's replay value.

In all honesty, however, it was very hard to find any serious drawbacks to the game. I guess you could say that haunting is somewhat of a specific pastime that might not appeal to every player out there. But, even if paranormal goings-on and various ghostly activities don't tickle your fancy, you should at least have some fun with the all of the aforementioned aspects of gameplay.