Ghost 1.0 Reviews

Game loves to waste my fucking time, slime bubble boss is the worst design in a video game ever, fucking sucks. Stay away if you love your sanity

Metroidvanias are my favourite genre. And if it has a great story, the better. This game surprised me with a really nice story and likeable characters.

Enjoyed it quite a bit, but probably a somewhat niche title. Definitely more of a sale candidate if you are not in dire need of a half-serious cyberpunk metroidvania. [i]Ghost 1.0[/i] straddles a strange line, it wants to be something of a twinstick shooter, a metroidvania, a serious cyberpunk story, a tongue-in-check cyberpunk story and nostalgic all at the same time while also attempting to innovate here and there. Does not quite work out, honestly. The gameplay is solid, but also janky at times. When I recently got back into it and tried my hand at some of the extra challenges, I noticed this somewhat severely, as the regular storymode is comparatively forgiving there with all the upgrades to make your life easier. But then again, getting those can be an outright chore, as every room has a “hidden” loot that can be unlocked in the wildest ways. Shooting a specific spot, floating somewhere in ghost form, use a lift 3 times, kill enemies in less than 5 seconds, kill all enemies EXCEPT one specific type, kill ONLY a specific type… the list goes on. It often feels random and very much “just use a guide”. What I mean to say is, the gameplay is mostly solid, very much what you would expect, but it is also trying very hard to make you find secrets in very unintuitive ways that often feel like this has to be in it because of the genre and to keep you busy, rather than engaging you with intricately interconnected map design, secret passages and such. This is fine, considering that the setting is a space station which only allows so much variety, of which there is ultimately quite a lot. Bottom line is, I did not find this groundbreakingly awesome, but sufficiently enjoyable most of the time. What I will say is that I rather like the idea of the “ghost” that can possess most of the robots that populate the space station. In this sense we can get lots of variety, for instance by playing as the combat droid for a spell. But let us proceed to what actually drew me in. In a trailer, we see an early section wherein Ghost explodes a robot, is called out for what the hell this was supposed to be and gleefully goes “Stealth!”. That kind of blatant, unapologetic cringey humor felt just lighthearted enough for me to interest me. And oh boy, did the game deliver on this front. It is rather interesting, for as the plot progresses, we see lots of tongue-in-cheek humor and eye rolling, only missing a laugh track. We get traditional tropes… but we also get very different tones when it comes to them. The trio is developed somewhat thoroughly and actually interesting and relevant questions of the cyberpunk genre ala [i]Ghost in the Shell[/i] come up, alongside the tropey mentioning of “[i]Blade Runner[/i] rules” or whatever. We are told stories by and of other characters only for another to interject and correct that no, this was not an epic adventure, it was just D&D night. This game is [i]nerdy as hell[/i] and just runs with it. And I gotta say, I rather enjoy it for what it is here. It does not take itself too seriously, since it is after all a kind of silly shootey game, complete with the somewhat deliberately cringe voice acting and an episodic format where you are told “Last time on [i]Ghost 1.0[/i] . . . and now the conclusion!” whenever you reload, as if watching an endlessly ongoing TV show. Yet the writers showed themselves adept enough to keep from falling into the super ironic self-awareness trap and make it into one big laughing track. Again, while not groundbreaking or genre defining, I rather enjoyed it for what it is and how deliberately it celebrates a lot of 80s and 90s geek culture whenever it is not asking somewhat profound questions. Definitely a solid, fun cyberpunk experience for me. If a bit janky, but maybe that is just part of the deal.