Ghostbusters PR

In this advanced gaming world, what can a developer do to grab peoples attention?  Screens are cool, but there’s nothing to show how the gameplay works, trailers can be misleading and Q&As never really tell us anything new.  So, Vivendi have taken a different route in their PR for their Ghostbusters game, and done this:

This is a fully restored Ectomobile, here making an appearance at Minnesota Best Buy to promote the new Ghostbusters game.  I’ve talked about the Ghostbusters game in an earlier post, and the fact I don’t really know much about it, so this car might not mean anything to me, but I’m sure fans of the films will recognise it.  For a games company to do something like this for promotion though is interesting, especially for a game that hasn’t really gotten the most press so far.

 

Wii Spend

I included Wii Fit in my list of games to look out for 2008 because of its innovative Wii Balance Board, on which you stand and move around to pass various minigames that are thrown your way.  It’s out April 25th in the UK, and the price still eludes me.  I’ve had a look around and I can’t find any pounds sterling price for this game/pack.  In the US it’s released on May 21st and will cost around $89.99.  Converting this to pounds gives us around £45, but I’m pretty sure it’ll be bumped up a bit to either £50 or more likely £60.  It’s quite a lot of money for a game, but hopefully it becomes an investment with more games coming out for it in the future.  I can see snowboarding and some sports games using it, and maybe in the future it will be used along with the Wii Remote while playing a game, maybe trying to balance on a beam or sprinting away from the police on GTA.  Lots of opportunities, but the Wii Fit game should at least provide a little entertainment (as should the video below) and give a different experience to many other videogames on the market.

Ghostbusters: The Videogame Early Preview

This is a strange one for me to write about, really.  I haven’t really seen any of the Ghostbusters films, but when I saw images and the trailer from this game, it sparked my interest.  And, I know there’s probably some dedicated Ghostbusters fans out there, so it makes sense for me to just put a little bit of information down here.

The game’s being released for pretty much every system available – PS3, Xbox 360, PC, PS2, Wii, DS.  No PSP version, though, and strangely two production companies are taking on the game.  Presumably they’ll both give the game the same story (which is being written by the original films writers), but the style in which they’ll do it will be different.  Terminal Reality is producing the PS3, 360 and PC versions, while Red Fly Studios are in charge of the PS3, Wii and DS versions.

This ‘Ghostbusters In Hell’ storyline associated with the third film (this game is really Ghostbusters 3) will not be used for the game, although Dan Aykroyd announced the possibility of a computer generated film based on that plotline.  The videogame will be released on September 26th 2008.

It’s also worth considering which platform you’ll buy it for, too, since there will be marked differences.  The PS3, 360 and PC versions will have better looking graphics and be more singleplayer based.  The Wii, PS2 and DS versions will have more cartoony graphics and be more centered around the multiplayer experience.  These versions will have the same story, but with multiplayer modes such as free-for-all added on.

So, there’s some scant information on Ghostbusters The Video Game.  Despite not being a big Ghostbusters fan myself, I’ll be following the progress of the videogame.  It seems like the films lend themselves to making a fun videogame.  But, we all know what the majority of film-to-game transfers are like.