Ghouls 'n Ghosts (Virtual Console) Review

Ghouls 'n Ghosts

Brave Sir Arthur the Knight is back, once again searching for his girlfriend who has been kidnapped by Lucifer!

The mission of mercy is set over five scrolling levels, starting in the graveyard, then moving to hell desert, up a castle's battlements, down through icy underground caverns and finally inside a castle dungeon.

Our hero can run and jump and is initially armed with a lance that can be thrown left, right, up or down - but it's best to throw it in the direction of the nearest baddie. These horrors come in a multitude of shapes and sizes: vultures and skeletons are among the first to be encountered, and later worms and even Cerberus (the mythical three-headed dog) bar your progress.

Being hit results in you losing your armour, meaning that you must go on in your undies - another hit means death. Some thingies, like the Venus flytraps, kill you automatically, but either way death comes quickly and frequently.The end of level guardians are huge and deadly and must be shot repeatedly to finish them off. Needless to say, they don't just stand there while you attack, but unleash various forms of attacks to be avoided! It's a tough game. But did anyone say it would be easy?

By Damo

When you look at this game today, it's hard to believe that it was one of the very first Megadrive releases. Sega did an amazing job of reprogramming the Capcom arcade original for their 16-bit console - the port isn't quite arcade perfect but you have to look closely to spot the (minor) differences. Graphically it's brilliant, with nice bright colours and some lovely bold sprites. The only seriously negative point is the sprite flicker, which gets quite bad on some of the larger bosses, but this was a common problem in many early Megadrive games so it's forgiveable.

The music is simple, but effective - the main theme is a real classic and will stick in your head for weeks. Sounds effects are also nicely handled.

Set over a series of horizontally (and sometimes vertically) scrolling levels, G'n'G puts you in the armour of Arthur - a bold knight trying to rescue his accident-prone better half. Thankfully there's a wide range of weapons available to assist Art in his quest - lances, knives and throwing stars, to name just three. You can also pick up a suit of gold armour which boosts the attack power of Arthur's projectiles and allows him to release a 'super move' by charging up his power meter. Contact with a baddie results in our plucky hero losing his armour, continuing the fight in nothing but his underpants!

The game certainly packs a stern challenge - once you've completed it you have to go through the levels all over again - a fact that some people may find annoying, but others will love. The G'n'G series is infamous for its difficulty and this conversion is 100% faithful in that respect!

Only bettered by the excellent Super Ghouls 'n' Ghosts on the SNES, the game remains one of the best MD platformers and is worth checking out even if you've already downloaded the aforementioned Nintendo classic.

5/5

Average reader rating: 4.52 (25 ratings)

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