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hendcross's Luigi's Mansion (GC)

[February 28, 2013 03:40:50 AM]

Luigi’s Mansion: Saturday, February 23rd (Games One and Two)
Luigi’s Mansion is a single player, action, adventure, thriller type of game. It provides a sandbox, the mansion, to explore and interesting story to follow. The player controls Luigi and searches for his brother Mario who has gone missing inside of his (luigi’s) new mansion that he won in a contest. Upon entering the mansion it is revealed that it is quite haunted with plenty of ghosts to stop Luigi from finding his brother. The player is met in the mansion by an eccentric scientist named Professor Elvin Gadd (E. gadd) who has created a vacuum cleaner that can suck up ghosts called the Poltergust 3000. As expected this device is given to Luigi and the search becomes a mission to rescue Mario from the ghosts of the mansion.

The Player:
The player controls a very frightened Luigi and all devices he acquires from Prof. E. Gadd. Although you start the game with only the Poltergust and a flashlight which stuns ghosts for about a second, as the game progresses you are given more controls for the Poltergust including the ability to emit elements (fire, ice, and water). The poltergust can also suck up money, items, pull on things, etc. as it is essentially a vacuum cleaner. Luigi can also examine objects and call out to Mario using the A button. The player can roam about the mansion whenever and to wherever he/she likes to investigate the mansion and continue the story. When a ghost is found (or more likely finds you) you can try to capture it. This is done by shining the flashlight on them which stuns them for a second and makes their heart appear. Their heart has a number on it which is their health. When you see their heart you begin using the Poltergust to suck them up. The force of the poltergust will begin pulling them into it but the ghosts will be trying to fly away at the same time. During this tug of war the player can control the direction luigi is pulling the poltergust but not luigi. This is because the health of the ghost only drains when the poltergust is being pulled in the opposite direction that the ghost is flying. Luigi also has health which goes down when he is hurt by whatever odd means a ghost uses to hurt him.

The Mansion:
The mansion appears very creepy as any haunted house should. The music in the background is equally eerie and complements the mansion’s dark (literally lights are off), spooky atmosphere nicely. You roam the mansion alone save the ghosts that appear randomly and literally out of nowhere to attack you, making for a thrilling experience when exploring. Although you can go wherever you like in the mansion you are limited by the story level of progression. Depending on where you are in the story or what devices you have unlocked from E. Gadd you may or may not be able to access certain areas. Usually the door to a new area will be covered and made impassable by a ‘mysterious force’. The mansion is very large providing lots of places to explore and rooms to investigate. Each time you clear an area of all boss ghosts that area will regain power and the lights will come on which is nice because ghosts only attack in the dark(btw, the entire game takes place at night).

Enemies:
Ghosts come in many forms and they randomly spawn throughout the mansion. They can only be captured by shining the flashlight on them which stuns them for a second and makes their heart appear. Their heart has a number on it which is their health. When you see their heart you begin using the Poltergust to suck them up. Some ghosts are special though and have to be captured a certain way such as using an element on them beforehand. Other ghosts simply have lots of health like the bosses while others are almost immune to the force of the Poltergust like the Boos. By immune I mean that although their health goes down as the Poltergust is used on them, they can float away without being pulled back to Luigi. Bosses typically can be found going about their business and are uncapturable until certain conditions are met such as sucking away a book that the boss ghost was reading with the Poltergust. This would initiate the boss battle. Bosses are very strong and have special abilities to hurt luigi (such as levitating then throwing books which is the aforementioned boss’s attack). Even when being sucked up by the Poltergust they have very strong flying ability and often change direction while pulling luigi all across the room. Because of this they can pretty easily break out of the Poltergust’s pull (when a ghost’s direction of flight is far from the opposite direction in which the luigi is pulling the poltergust they can break away from its pull and escape.) after which they will continue attacking luigi. Such is how boss battles go.

Gameplay:
It was interesting to see such a different atmosphere from what Mario games usually provide but then again this is Luigi’s game, not Mario’s. The game is pretty creepy with eerie music and ghosts jumping out at you all time. Being able to explore the mansion at my leisure was really y fun as there are lots of cool rooms to investigate. Watching bosses go about their business and having to figure out how to start the boss battle was fun too; whether you had to steal his food, open her room window, etc. Lighting the butler ghost’s candle and watching him freak out over the fire was pretty funny. The ghosts in general are quite comical though as they prove to be dangerously playful at the same time. Lots of ‘Oh you silly ghosts, dropping deadly bombs from the ceiling, how quirky’ moments are had. This way the game keeps a lighthearted and creepy feel to it which separates from the typical Mario games as well as the typical silent hill/resident evil-esque games. Finally, capturing ghosts in general is just a blast. The game does a great job of making the capturing process intense regardless of whether it lasts a second capturing a small ghosts or minutes capturing a boss. Getting that perfect pull direction while a boss flies all across the room dragging luigi with him/her is awesome fun. The music changes, the boss panics, Luigi panics (he’s always panicking) etc.

Overall:
Luigi’s Mansion is a great change of pace from the rest of the Mario series and really puts a nice spotlight on the often forgotten brother Luigi. It’s eerie and exciting all at the same time with plenty on content to keep you exploring the mansion until you rescue Mario. I myself am pretty hyped for the sequel coming soon to 3ds.