Here’s another game that passed from hand to hand. So much that there are parts of the copy I own that I have never seen, lost somewhere in the recesses of Lincolnshire, never to be seen.
This for my money is the best RPG based on a licensed property. Yes, better than West End Games other, more popular game that was based on that other more popular film series. It’s written by the people responsible for Chaosium’s Call of Cthulhu. This is the key to it’s greatness. As good a representation of the mood and ideas of the first Ghostbusters film in game form, it is also a wonderful parody of the Call of Cthulhu game. That second part wasn’t obvious to me straight away as it was probably another 3-4 years before I played CofC.
The rules are nice and simple, and if you want to play the characters from the film you can be playing it pretty much straight out the box. It had a bunch of adventures with it, plus ideas for a whole lot more and a handy bunch of off the peg NPCs for all occasions.
There’s an adventure you could buy for the game that I played as a player that I enjoyed greatly – “Ghost Toasties” – mainly for the fact it involves fighting the spirits of cereal packet mascots.
There was a second edition to tie into Ghostbusters 2, but much like that film it looked like it sucked a lot of the fun that made the first so great. Ghostbusters 2 is awful, and it boggles the mind that people still clamour for a third. Did you people see Evolution? Have you heard the commentary on the first film where Ramis and Reitman discuss Aykroyd’s mind boggling insane/awful original concept for the film? I am certain a third film would be a bad idea.
Now, on the other hand, a proper release of the Lorenzo Music era Real Ghostbusters episodes (which can be tied to the RPG via way of Larry Ditillio and CofC) would be good idea.