Grabbed by the Ghoulies review-why this game is a Rare disapointment

Grabbed by the ghoulies and rare replay© Microsoft Corporation. this review was created under Microsoft's "Game Content Usage Rules" using assets from Rare Replay, and it is not endorsed by or affiliated with Microsoft.

Well I am going through some games on the Rare Replay and looking for games to play through and review here on hub pages and on my YouTube channel (tommy thekeyblademaster if you’re looking for my channel) and I saw Grabbed by the Ghoulies. So I decided to play it and see if it’s has bad has everybody said it was. After playing it I can say this I wish I could say this game was so bad that I would rather be grabbed by my Ghoulies then play this game again, it would mean I was playing a more interesting game then I just experienced. Grabbed by the Ghoulies falls into a category that is hard to review, a game that is not broken on any technical level, but is unfortunately broken in the most important area and that is a game has to be entertaining. Grabbed by the Ghoulies is unfortunately boring.

The story in Grabbed by the Ghoulies is a cookie cutter story that seems more inclined to be an 8-bit NES game. Basically you play a young boy named Cooper who is out with his girlfriend, get lost in the woods, find an old mansion, Cooper accidentally insults the mansions owner Baron Von Ghoul and he decides to kidnap his girlfriend. Cooper now has too explore the barons creepy mansion and try to get his girlfriend back. Yeah it’s a pretty basic plot, and in the mansion you will find help among some of the eccentric staff that keep the mansion help that side with you against their employer the Baron for some reason. The story itself is told in comic style cut scenes with no voice acting.

Well I will say one thing for the time the graphics in this game are quite beautiful. There well cell shaded, the monsters have their own eccentric looks, and the environments although typical haunted house do have enough of their own style to look unique. I have problems with the rest of the game being boring but it has nothing to do with this games look, in fact it’s the graphics are the only thing that make an impression at all in this game.

Typical haunted house type music and some basic sound effects. The monsters have some decent sounding groans but nothing here will leave an impression on you.

The gameplay in grab by the ghoulies can be described with the words tedious, boring, dull, and just plain forgettable. The idea in the game is to explore this huge haunted house and get your girlfriend back. But if you’re thinking this is anyway open ended and you’re going to be doing exploring think again. The game holds your hand, only the appropriate doors are ever open to you, and it’s linear has heck. The game even goes so far has to randomly generate your health for each room so forget actually exploring for power ups, or feeling any sense of progression through the game.

Now each room has a challenge, things you need to do in order to complete the room and unlock the door. Usually defeat so many Ghoulies, but occasionally you do have to find or key or solve a puzzle. Some rooms have challenges where you can’t do something like pick up a weapon, or break something, or kill a certain enemy. Do and you will summon the reaper into the room and if he touches you it’s instant death. There are only so many challenge type and after a while the game just gets tedious from doing it. Rather than these challenges seem fun they seem predictable and just keeping you from doing what you need to do. Later levels have bigger challenges but that doesn’t necessarily mean more fun, it’s just means more tediousness.

If you’re wondering what the controls are like well you move around with the left stick, but rather than using the face button the game lets you hit using the right analog stick. Yeah the game suffers from mild camera problems from this, but it’s far from being a deal killer. But there are no defense moves no way to get cooper to block or dodge like in a proper action game, it’s way to simple again no way to feel like you’re actually progressing what you get is a game that is ultimately boring.

Yeah this game is on the Rare Replay, is it the worst game on the disc oh heck no when you get into games like gunfright and saber wolf that are just broken then no. However it is a really, really dull game that’s just not fun to play. It leaves no lasting impression on you. This was the mighty Rares first game for Microsoft and it showed Nintendo might have screwed Microsoft in that trade.