Introduction:

Back in 1986 Capcom brought upon the world one of the hardest and most brutal video game of all time. I’d certainly rank it up there with the hardest games ever. Maybe even the hardest. No, I’m not talking about Mega Man, Castlevania, Gargoyle’s Quest, or even Pit Fighter: I’m talking about Ghosts ‘n Goblins.

Even Gametrailers claims that Ghosts ‘n Goblins is one of the hardest games to ever exist. It’s inside their top ten. Actually it’s inside their top five. It’s number two. Ironically, that difficulty reminds me of my first impressions of the game while dying constantly on the first level as a younger gamer.

For the sake of contrast, Contra was number 10 on Gametrailers’ list, and Battletoads was Number 1. Contra was both harder and better than  Ghosts ‘n Goblins in my opinion, but not by much. They are both good. Anyway, on with some Ghosts ‘n Goblins.

Story:

You start in a graveyard where it appears that Satan wants to steal Sir Arthur’s wife. I’m guessing and grasping at straws here.  At least I know he’s named Sir Arthur. Not that it’s relevant, but I’m guessing he’s a king since she is called Princess Prin Prin or something and she consistently gets kidnapped in every single game in the series. Stay creative Capcom. It looks like they got married which begs the question, “why are they in a graveyard?” Were the party members dead or something?

Anyway, you have to go through levels of ghosts and goblins (no wonder why it’s called that) in a quest to save your girlfriend/wife. She was taken by Satan himself who appears to have passed her on to the Devil. Yeah. I’m confused by that too.

Sir Albert took off his clothes… (Just cast your own thoughts)

Gameplay:

Typical side-scrolling action, done at it’s best for the time. The controls are extremely fluid and movement feels free flowing and epic. There are six levels in total, but beware! You have to beat the game twice to receive both endings. You need the shield at the end of level 5 or it really does send you back to the beginning of the level. And take my word for it, because I forgot I needed the shield and got sent back.

Throughout the game you fight against snakes, ghouls (probably zombies if you are part of the new generation), dragons, Unicorns (not the cute kind) and, as I may have mentioned earlier, Satan and the Devil. Oh…almost forgot you also fight against giant kebabs that make squealing noises.

The snakes have blue balls.  But that’s okay.  With the amount of crap Sir Arthur has to go through he’ll probably have them for eternity.

Sound:

The sound effects are well crafted.  It’s been a long time since I played the NES version, but if it sounds like the Virtual console port then sounds can be a bit off at times.  They seem to be out of sync with what’s happening. Especially the flying kebabs or whatever they are. I’m led to believe by people that the actual NES version had better sound quality, and that it’s just not a perfect port to Virtual Console.

Graphics:

Considering it’s an NES game, the backgrounds are done pretty well. The forestry setting looks like a forest. The clouds, however, don’t look like anything. That’s assuming they are actually even clouds and not just floating bubbles. I wont hold it against the game though. Some of the level layouts are a bit confusing but it’s because of game design choice and not actually graphical issues. I will point out one issue that’s both on the NES and on Virtual Console: Enemies tend to flash off the screen for no reason, same with other objects. Again, this is common on NES as well. Thankfully I actually do remember something!

Final Verdict:

I’m going to give a little personal story here:

Ghosts ‘n Goblins is a very hard and relentless game which gave me many sleepless nights. I simply could not understand why the game was so unrelenting. It’s awesome and fun, but also extremely hard. I remember using the first default weapon on the end boss and screaming, “That was enough to down a grizzly bear, what the…” It really set the tone for how I felt about the game until I learned how to play it a little better.

I’d highly recommend it to those seeking a challenge. You can kind of cheat the challenge though with the virtual console. I did and I wouldn’t blame you if you did. The fact that I had to get footage for the review isn’t an excuse to have done it. I would have done it anyway. The game is too hard for me. Yep. The master of Double Dragon was defeated by this game.

It’s still awesome even though it’s immensely frustrating. It’s a classic, and a classic challenge. I’d recommend everyone try it anyway just so you can’t ever complain about a hard game again. This game is as hard as Sylvester Stallone and Jean Claude Van Damme put together. Maybe you’d even have to throw in Bruce Willis to actually come up with a fair representation of the difficulty of this game. It’s hard to call it a game. In a game you win or lose, in this game you constantly lose. But… Losing has never been so much fun.