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Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime

Into the Sanctum of Slime

We shot a couple of questions to Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime producer Jonathan Moses, to find out more about the most important Ghostbusters-related question - what happens when you cross the beams?

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The Ghostbusters are taking in new recruits next week, as Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime launches as download on PC, PSN and XBLA. We shot a couple of questions to producer Jonathan Moses, to find out more about the most important Ghostbusters-related question - what happens when you cross the beams?

Where do you draw most inspiration, have you looked at both movies, cartoons, comics?

We got a lot from the movies, past games, and the comics. We're familiar with the cartoons, but we didn't spend time reviewing the old series.

The Ghostbusters-game for PS3/Xbox 360 got a lot of praise for the way it approached the classic Ghostbusters-characters, with its voice acting and well-written script. How are you approaching the source material?

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When we started, we were worried about having a good "voice" for the characters that would fit with the world of Ghostbusters. We were very fortunate to find Tom Waltz as a writer. He has not only written for other games in the past, but he has worked on Ghostbusters comics for IDW and was extremely skilled at bringing that universe to life. It was a natural fit.

What do you feel is key to a successful co-operative game experience?

The most important thing with co-op is to ensure each player feels like they have an important role to play. For example, in Ghostbusters there are three weapons that are each good against specific enemy types (distinguishable by color). However, each weapon also has some advantage against other enemies... and players will often face off against groups of enemies that require strategic choices of which weapon to use as waves will come with mixes of enemy types.

The Proton Stream is good against red enemies. However, it does continual damage against all enemies, and it slows them down when the creature is tagged by more than one. The Fermion Shock gun can hit multiple enemies at once, and does a lot of damage the closer you are to the target, especially yellow enemies.

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So - with multiple players, teams can slow and hurt an enemy with proton streams, allowing another player to get close with the Fermion Shock to finish the job against the bigger creatures. Or, players can each focus on specific colors of the smaller waves.

What's your approach to replayability of levels, will there be any random elements or such?

In Ghostbusters, you're going to want to replay levels to get the best scores, and try beating them with friends and family.

Destructible environments and objects flying around was a big part of the recent Ghostbusters retail title, is that something we will see in Sanctum of Slime as well?

Destruction of your environment is key in Ghostbusters, and in Sanctum of Slime - there is a lot of stuff to blow up. You'll find relics, power-up, and score points for breaking things.

What happens when you cross beams in your game?

After the intensive training process all rookies go through before their first mission, they all know to instinctively avoid crossing the streams... and the streams really don't touch (just over/under). From the gameplay side, we iterated on a few different consequences, but in the end felt it disrupted the pace of the action too much. What we've ended with is a game that is both true to the brand - but more importantly, a blast to play.

Wanako has specialised in downloadable games - any particular reason and how do you feel the services (PSN/XBLA) have evolved over the years?

Better games, and more choices for players certainly shows what this market can deliver to consumers. We're all helping build a community of gamers with broad tastes and a willingness to buy more games.

We had a great relationship working with Behaviour Santiago (formerly Wanako). This is a genre that they're very familiar with. The team is extremely talented and fun to work with.

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Ghostbusters: Sanctum of SlimeScore

Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime

REVIEW. Written by Bengt Lemne

"At 800 points I didn't expect a very long or extremely deep experience, but it just feels a bit too simple, barren and repetitive..."



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