Ghost Squad Review - 9/10
Sega have finally released one of their all popular genres of games on the Wii, the Arcade Shooter. The first game, Ghost Squad, takes us back to the days where we use to run to the arcades to play Virtual Cop and Time Crisis.
The Arcade Version
Timezone - Gold Coast- Taken by Phatbass82
Gameplay
The gameplay is what you would expect from a Sega arcade shooter, FUN! You're greeted with 3 different options, "Party" (For upto 4 players), "Arcade" (Just like playing the Arcade version), and "Training".
Arcade mode has a similar setup to the old Virtual Cop games, where you are able to choose from 3 missions to do, which eventually you will have to complete. You are also given options to change what weapons you use and what costume you will wear to do battle. There are so many weapons and costumes to choose from, but 1st time through you can only select one weapon and one costume. As you play the arcade more, you will unlock new weapons, costumes and new alternative routes to the end of the mission.
Gameplay is fairly standard for an arcade shooter. Although it's not just shooting bad guys. You are given some objectives from rescuing hostages (handcuffing them, for some odd reason) to disarming land mines. There are also some sniper elements where you have to take down enemies from a distance. There's also hand to hand combat, where it involves you aiming the Wiimote and certain points of an enemy and hitting the action button to deflect hits from them.
2 player in arcade mode is also really good. There are some hints of slow downs here and there. Nothing too obvious, and it doesn't last long. The Wii Zapper is not even required to play this game. Just using the Wiimote by itself is all you need to play.
The training section has 3 mini games which aim at trying to teach you how to play the game. Well, it's really just a gimmick, where you would just go in for something different if you don't feel like completing the missions.
Party Mode allows for up to 4 players to play at the same time. I only had a chance to try out two players by myself, with one Wiimote in each hand. There's also extra options to change to Ninja mode, where you just have Ninja stars you through at the enemies, who are also Ninja's. There's also another mode which I haven't unlocked yet, which I think is some sort of bikini mode, where the enemies are women in bikini's (yes, very odd).
There's also a Wifi mode, which is basically just uploading your top scores and comparing your scores with the best in the world.
Graphics
Graphics are good on the Wii. Arcade version VS the Wii version, the Wii version actually wins, in my opinion. I noticed constant framerate issues with the arcade version. The Wii version is very smooth, with the occasional drop in frame rate in two player mode. As for the textures and character design, the Wii version is identical to the arcade version. It's not next gen, but the graphics still look good.
Sound
Sounds are quite good. Machine guns, enemies moaning after being killed and voice overs are quite clear. Downside, it sounds as though the game doesn't make full use of the Dolby Pro Logic II capabilities (Emulate 2 channel sound to 5.1 channel) of the Wii. Still, it sounds good.
Controls
There are quite a few different options for different controller configuration. You can use the Wiimote by itself, the Wiimote with Nunchuck (which you can also use with the Wiizapper). The other options are basically where you want the Shoot button and action button. Response is good in the game. Free movement with the Wiimote makes the game fairly easy to play. Reloading is a simple matter of just moving the aiming cursor to the edge of the screen.
Final Word
I was very happy and excited about this game. Great game which is a perfect conversion from the arcade version. It was quite funny to see the difference between the Wii version and arcade version. Especially when I thought the Wii version actually played better than the arcade version. I really hope that game developers will bring out more arcade shooters like this game. So perfectly suited to the Wiimote.
The game will hit Australian shelves on 24/01/2008.
Videos
Official Trailer
Gameplay
Submitted by phatbass82
06/01/2008
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