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Grabbed by the Ghoulies on XBL

Rare's first Xbox game joins Xbox Originals
The next release in the Xbox Originals download line has arrived this morning in the form of Grabbed by the Ghoulies, the first Xbox game developed by Rare which even it admits sold bugger all.

Game director and Banjo man Gregg Mayles explains: "For all those discerning games connoisseurs who somehow managed to miss out on playing Ghoulies the first time (and I'm sure there must be a few million of you somewhere), I highly recommend you spend a few lazy evenings (or a lot if you're rubbish at games) inside the Baron's delightful Ghoulhaven Hall.

"Imagine a game you really like and then visualise Ghoulies as a stylish haunted house version of that. So, if you like Halo, pretend that the main character is Master Chief and the hilarious DJ Mummy is a terrifying Covenant alien. It works for me."

We bought it, at least. If you fancy saving Rare' blushes spend 1200 Microsoft points (£10.20) on it now.

computerandvideogames.com
// Interactive
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Posted by fanboy
I remember this - it was a quality game.

Ive always been appalled that no one bought Crimson Skies, so hopefully people may take the plunge with this.

The truth is though, because MS wont include achievements with these games, their sales potential is reduced dramatically.

And anyway, it couldnt have come out at a worse time, what with L & D out tomorrow. Is anyone gonna review that for us?
Posted by _Marty_
I'd heard it was poor. Is it worth bothering with?

I'd like to try The Thing, if the powers that be fancy bring that to Xbox Originals... :)
Posted by monkey_puncher
I played the demo and thought it was awful, I might be tempted to check this out again sometime though.
Posted by Tonyb
Yep, I was one of the few that purchased this first time around and really enjoyed it, so will defo be picking it up again.
Posted by MoodMan2009
I absolutely loved Ghoulies ( :D ) as did my wife, so this may be my first Originals purchase, since I sold my original copy for about £0.50 at Gamestation.

If anyone isn't sure about this game, just think back to the old Ultimate games on the Spectrum and you will get a similar feeling playing this.

Now if Microsoft would convince Rare to make all the Ultimate games into up-to-date versions I would be an extremely happy man.

And while they are at it, they could release an emulator and allow us to purchase every Spectrum game to play in Hi-Def...
Posted by casperthedog
Still wish they give demo trails for these Xbox Originals, as many are said to be good games overlooked at the time, and i want to have a go, but dont want to pay 1200 points to see.



I have heard that MS will be putting achievements on Xbox games, with Halo and Fable being first and others after (likely that the Downloadable Xbox games will be first with Achievements)
Posted by mfnick
Afraid thats not going to happen. Achievements are built into the game code during the development. To include them in Xbox Originals will require doing all the coding again & would take a hell of a lot of work & money. Whereas just putting it on there is basicaly emulation.

It was explained on one of those 'sentuamessage' things.
Posted by casperthedog
Well i heard it on a podcast (GameWeasel with Matt Cuttle) and it was a news thing he said, theres no offical annoncement i have seen so i dont know where he got that info from, it may happen i dont know.
Posted by fanboy
I struggle to believe its THAT complicated.

If trophies can be patched into old PS3 games, then i cant see why they cant do the same thing with achievements.

@Marty - Its a decent game, but not fantastic. Its just a good laugh, but was only ever worth a rental to be honest.
Posted by crimbo
pahhh MS LOL what a joke what sad retarded monkey would actually pay money for this.



ohhh wait marty would.
Posted by fanboy
You've gotta love him havent you? :lol:
Posted by mfnick
Becasue trophies were added at a later date. Achievements have been built into the 360 console & its games since the beginning. It wasnt an afterthought or a patched feature.
Posted by fanboy
But doesnt that just prove that it can be done then?

If sony managed to do it without it being built into the hardware or past games, then surely thats proof enough.

Forgive me if Im being stupid, but I just dont understand why Sony could do it, but MS couldnt.
Posted by _Marty_
I love him like I love going to work.

Tolerate because I have to is probably closer the mark...
Posted by Kubik
Depends on whether you like this type of game or not marty. It was made by the same team that did Banjo so if you like that style of game and their sense of humour then it should be right up your street. I thought is was a great game but wasn't aware it sold so poorly originally.
Posted by crimbo
or maybe you should try and get some work done this week you lazy *******
Posted by _Marty_
»
Unless you are my manager or in any way affiliated with my employer (you aren't), you let me worry about my job and the quantity of work (or lack thereof) I produce. Ta.
Posted by crimbo
»»

no marty i am the founder of mcdonalds and when i tell you to get back to work you do it
Posted by _Marty_
»»»
I see - so you are Ray Kroc, 106 years old.
And dead?

Interesting...
Posted by crimbo
»»»»

manager
Posted by condemmedman
The only retarded monkey I see is you crimbo and thats being harsh on real retarded monkeys lol

This game was pretty good for a quick blast not sure I'd pay 12000 point tho
Posted by CatGoneCrazy
While it's lovely to listen to Marty and Crimbo try to out-wit one another, I would just like to say Grabbed By The Ghoulies is a superb game and it's probably only the name that put people off buying it. OK, guys, you can carry on now.
Posted by The_Johnson
It was good fun this - i picked it up for about £30 at the time, and though repetitive, a decent challenge and I liked the twin stick fighting technique!
Posted by _Marty_
Sadly, having a battle of wits with crimbo isn't really fair as he comes unarmed...

Good to hear more positive things about this game. I used to love Ultimate as a company, and early Rare were grand. This was Rares first Microsoft game, right?

If that's the case, the bad press might be due to the Xbox crowd not being used to that sort of game - it being more at home on a Nintendo platform.
Posted by ledickolas
Another underwhelming original release I see.

And still no Beyond Good or Evil and Strangers Wrath?

The Originals just reek of a poorly put together service that's just there to rinse you of money. There's no added value in buying them and they just chuck a game up every now and then.

I also fail to see why they can't put achievements in and have the games fully compatible with all the 360 functions. Sure it's time and money, but it's also my time and my money that they want for these purchases. For 1200 pts I expect more actual work on their part. All the games so far can be bought elsewhere in their original format for a hell of a lot less.
Posted by fanboy
Yeah 12,000 is a lot! :lol:

To be hoenst though I do agree, it is overpirced. It should be 1000 max.

And why do Xbox originals never go down in price like Arcade games.
Posted by fanboy
I do agree with you in that they are way overpriced, but this wasnt a bad game.

It annoys me that there are people that think strangers wrath and beyond good and evil were the only two games that were any good on the xbox.

Grabbed by the ghoulies was a decent game. Crimson Skies is on there and thats excellent, and Psyconauts is on there too and thats an absolute classic. Remember that Metal Arms: Glitch in the system is up there too - what a game that was. Massively underated.

Jade empire is up there, that was brilliant too. Fable is there. Splinter Cell chaos theory is there. GTA San Andreas is there! Farenheit is there!

I agree that they should update the games to include the new features, but I totally disagree that the games they have released are poor. The list I have made above has some absolute classics on it.
Posted by mfnick
Obviously im not a game producer or really know how these things work, but im sure if it was that easy they would do it. You know how much MS like money & they know how much extra it would make if they did include achievements. So if they could im sure they would.

It must be down to how achievements are programmed into games & how it connects with the 360 architecture. Think about it, when you put a 360 game in it has pics on the dash, it gets it own page in your library thing bit & you can access the dash at any point.

Xbox originals cant do any of this. Not even the quide. So access to this must be programmed into the game itself. The PS3 versions however were added afterwards & must not have much relation to the game code itself but can be added in a similar way to DLC.

Like I say this is all just educated guesswork but its the only thing I can come up with. Unless MS are just that lazy. But with the extra revenue they'd undoubtabley make from doing this I doubt its that. MS wouldnt pass up a chance to make a quick buck.
Posted by fanboy
Yeah thats a good point, cos they would undoubtedly sell a lot more if they did include them.

Im still not sure that its impossible, but maybe they just think the loss in sales is less than the cost of development time. The originals are literally just straight ports arent they? Ive seen a few with discalimers on them about glitches and bugs and things, so I guess they just dont wanna spend the money on polishing them, but want to charge top dollar for them. Thats business i guess.
Posted by Black Mantis
Panzer Dragoon Orta, JSRF, KOTOR, Otogi, PGR 2. It had a great lineup IMO.
Posted by fanboy
Oh yeah KOTOR was quality.

Black is on their too.

Put it this way, its a lot better than the PS1 games service on the PS store.
Posted by timmytom1
Seeing as though a re-release of goldeneye is being made impossible by nintendo being a bunch of dicks (or at least according to that feature that XBW did about a year ago,i`s like to see the original perfect dark put up ,oh and drop killer instinct ,it was shit then,and it will be worse now
Posted by fanboy
From what I've read (From impartial sources) Nintendo actually tried to come to an agreement by having goldeneye on both Virtual Console and XBLA.

MS said they would do a suped up HD version with online multiplayer and Nintendo said 'no'.

Apparently thats were it ended.

I dunno, its all rumours isnt it? Timesplitters would be good on the originals.
Posted by ledickolas
Sorry I meant underwhelming as in quantity, not quality. I'm sure Grabbed By the Ghoulies is worth a shot, just not at that price.

Otogi 2 was great, never found the original so that should go up as well. Panzer Dragoon Orta was cool too, but they should have done a sequel to the RPG. Psychonauts was awesome.

Yes there were loads of good games for the xbox, and that's why they should be on the service, instead of trickling up there every now and again.

Okay and if it's too difficult to put achievements and the ilk in, thus ensuring no extra work on Microsoft's part then charge a reasonable price for these games. 800 pts should be the absolute max. I bought Beyond Good and Evil for £6 online for a pristine boxed copy, I really can't believe the originals are a tenner still.
Posted by milky_joe
»»»»


After reading this comment, the tea that was in my mouth is now all over my keyboard and screen.

Kudos.
Posted by blagger
Underated Rare game imo.

I won't be buying it cos i still have the original.
It has a retro feel to it, almost like it was coded by a bunch of ex spectrum 'ultimate play the game' programmers.
There's posters galore in the game of atic atac, underwurlde, knight lore etc.
Definitely has a retro feel to it, a bit repetitive but great fun.

Superb music as well.
Posted by Picnic12
Blagger sums it up.

Grabbed by the ghoulies is the closest thing that you'll get to Luigi's Mansion on the Xbox in terms of setting. The whole 'fight/evade ghoulies until a door opens' may remind you a bit of Ultimate- Play the game's Attic Attack and the setting a bit of Mad Monster Mansion from Grabbed by the ghoulies, with direct references to such games in the game.

It is a linear (too linear arguably- no secret passages in a haunted mansion Rare?) beat em up in which you will be give one of a small handful of different challenges in each room. If you attack the wrong kinds of ghoulies at the wrong times the drama comes from trying to avoid the Grim Reaper.

Rare's irreverence towards their own game, by saying that practically nobody bought it (I did, for one) is characteristically charming as they aren't afraid to take the mickey out of themselves.
It is repetitive and could have had some more leaps of imagination but it's not a bad night's play for a retro feeling game with nicer graphics.
Posted by petrolhead
If Microsoft reduced the price of the larger hard drives and the very old games they are releasing then I might consider buying over live for my 360.

As it is, I purchase games on PSN and store them on my 60gbPS3 with upgraded 250gb hdd that cost £35.
Oh, and I can play online games for free.
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