Ghoul Boy Short Review
by Amr (@siegarettes)
- Ghoulboy
- Developer: Seran Bakar
- Publisher: eastasiasoft
- PS4, Vita, Switch
Ghoulboy doesn’t quite capture the retro feeling that it goes for. Ghoulboy fits comfortably along games like Poppyworks’ Super Skull Smash and Halloween Forever, which look the part in screenshots, but aren’t quite there when you get your hands on them. The movement is all slightly off, the feedback isn’t there, and some of the stage designs get finicky. Regardless, it ends up being decent fun in its own right, even if it mostly reminds me of games it can’t live up to.
Out the game it’s clear that Ghoulboy is attempting to emulate games like Rastan and Rygar. Platforming is basic, and while there’s a few puzzles they’re mostly there to set you off on a different route before looping to the main path. Stages in general follow a straightforward path. Any verticality in the stage is used mainly to hide secrets. The most interesting navigational tool is your spear, which not only works as the primary long range weapon, but can also attach to walls to create impromptu platforms. These are limited, so they aren’t relied on too much, factoring more often in puzzles which they conveniently precede.
You’ll complete a few stages, fight a lot of enemies, take on the boss and move on. It’s fun for as long as it lasts, until it gets too hard, of course. So far so standard. It doesn’t excel in any one place, but it never makes any missteps big enough to make it aggravating.