Ghosts'n Goblins

Ghosts'n Goblins

Game No.	64
Voting	7.88 points, 72 votes
Developer	Design: Tokuro Fujiwara Coding: Chris Butler Graphics: Chris Butler Graphics (title screen): Ste Pickford Production: Troy A. Lyndon
Company	Elite Systems
Publisher	Elite Systems, Encore, Radio Elettronica & Computer
HVSC-File	/MUSICIANS/C/Cooksey_Mark/Ghosts_n_Goblins.sid
Release	1986
Platform	Amiga, Amstrad/Schneider CPC, Arcade, Atari ST, BBC/Electron, Bandai Wonderswan, C16, Plus/4, C64, MS-DOS, NES, GameBoy, ZX Spectrum, mobile phone
Genre	Arcade, Platformer (Scrolling Screen)
Gamemode	Single player
Operation
Media
Language
Information	also: Spettri Successor: Ghouls 'n Ghosts; Redesign (original arcade version) in 2015: Ghosts'n Goblins Arcade

Description[edit | edit source]

The game[edit | edit source]

Epoch of the drama: Dark Ages
Places of the story: cemetery, forest, vaults, ghost town, caves, fire bridge, ice palace, demon castle
The plot itself: a knight fights against evil

Sounds scary, doesn't it? That's what it is. A demon has kidnapped the knight's, that is your, girl. So he gets started to free her. The demon doesn't look at it deedlessly, but he sends all kinds of gloomy creatures towards him: zombies, ghosts, demons and even shooting carnivores.
You need to fight yourself through four rather different levels, which are each devided into two parts. The passage from one part to the next is guarded by a weaker demon (death bird), which needs to be defeated with three hits. To get to a higher level, you need to defeat a strong demon (Ork or dragon), which guards the key to the door. At the end awaits you as a guard of the girl a big Chinese dragon.
Further game elements are new weapons, that you find in your search, as well as the time limit (2:59 minutes) which needs to be kept in every level. If the knight is hit by an enemy, he will lose its armour. Now he is invulnerable for a few seconds, but then the next hit will kill him fully and the current part must be started again.

Background[edit | edit source]

In 1986 the popular game "Ghosts'N Goblins" appeared in the amusement arcades. In this game you guided Sir Arthur the knight through seven sideways-scrolling levels by jumping and throwing weapons.

The seven levels have the following themes:

Level 1 : Graveyard / forest (woods)
Level 2 : Ice palace (ice towers) / ghost town
Level 3 : Underground labyrinth (cave)
Level 4 : Cave and ocean of clouds / fire bridge
Level 5 - 6 : The castle of Lucifer
Level 7 : Throne room (final level)

In the same year of its arcade release, the game was ported to the C64 by the company Elite; Chris Butler was responsible for the conversion. Of the original's seven levels, the C64 features only four; this is because Elite - which had contracted the conversion to Chris Butler - insisted that the game should be run completely from memory without having to reload from media.

So the first four levels of the arcade model were converted into the C64 version. The order of the third and fourth levels were changed because the cave was more appropriate as a final level than the fire bridge (number four in the original).

Chris Butler was an expert C64 game programmer, which has been proven by his later work. The graphics are nice to look at and there are no weak spots to be found in the gameplay. The music was composed by Mark Cooksey, who wrote some of the most popular pieces of music for the C64.

Not for nothing is Ghosts'n Goblins one of the most popular C64 games, even to the present day.

Three years later the successor "Ghouls 'n Ghosts" was converted for the C64; unfortunately, it did not compare to its great forerunner, although it was more extensive than the original.

Design[edit | edit source]

The game "Ghosts'n Goblins" has a 2-D screen with fluent scrolling through the whole level. Very good animated sprites and music, which fits very well to the game, also elaborate graphics.
Four rather different levels, which are each divided into two parts:

Cemetery and forest (woods)
Ice palace and ghost town
Clouds (or sky) and fire bridge
Underground labyrinth and demon castle.

Each of the eight parts is several screens long, and some even a few screens high.

Animation from level 1.

Images from different levels.

Hints[edit | edit source]

Controls[edit | edit source]

In the game

/ Joystick left/right = walk left/right
/ Joystick leftupwards/rightupwards = jump up and left/right
Joystick upwards = jump straight upwards / climb ladders
Joystick down = knee
Fire button = shoot

In the highscore list

Joystick all directions = choose letter
Joystick fire = confirm
Choose ED sign = finish

Weapons[edit | edit source]

Following weapons are appeared (in the right senquence): Lance, fire torch, sword, axe and shield.

Start Conditions[edit | edit source]

5 lives, weapon lance and for each level a time of 2:59 minutes.

Points[edit | edit source]

This points you can get:

Knight's armor: 0; more portection
Weapon: 0; better, powerful weapon
Zombie, birds, bats, ice crystals, fire sparks: each 100
Flying knights, flying pigs, vampires (Level 2), shoooting stone column: each 200
Bonus like melons, moneybay, king statue: each 200
Shooting carnivorous plant: each300
Middle enemies like red eagle or small giant (Level 2): each 400
Final boss giant: 500
Final boss dragon (10 parts): 2300 (all; 9 parts: each 200; Kopf: 500)
Key: 0; open the door to the next level, protection for the way into the next level

Game Over[edit | edit source]

The game is only over by losing all lifes. If you end successfull the level 4 with lifes, you restart the nightmare with level 1 again.

Solution[edit | edit source]

Tips

In the clay jugs, that are carried by the zombies and other enemies, you can find extras such as bonus points in shape of moneybags or weapons.
The zombies, the carnivores, vampires, flying ice crystals, knights or pigs, as well as bats can be destroyed with each one shot, the death bird, giants or shooting pillar with at least three shots and the guard of the gate with at least five shots. Often, more shots are needed for the enemies with higher strength!
Watch out for the windows in the ghost town!
The weapons, that fly straight are the better ones, i.e. lance, knife and shield. The shield is the best weapon!

The safe position by fighting against the final boss Giant in Level 1.

14 enemies in a level part (last part of Level 1).

The final boss chinese Dragon in the last Level (Level 4).

A screenshot of the final animation ... after that the nightmare begins again!

Cheats[edit | edit source]

Bugs

Ghosts'n Goblins Maps (Level 1-4).

When facing the last enemy, the collision query of your own character is defect, if you place yourself directly to the right of the gate. This results in your character not being able to get hit by hostile shots.

Cheats from 64'er

POKE 7086,07 -- Zombies dissolve.
POKE 7086,06 -- Zombies disappear into the ground.
POKE 7086,03 -- Zombies turn into birds after a few seconds.
POKE 7086,01 -- Zombies turn into plants.
POKE 7086,19 -- Zombies turn into Superman.

Voting[edit | edit source]

Voting of the C64-Wiki users (10=the best vote):
7.88 points at 72 votes (rank 131). You need to be logged in to cast a vote.
C64Games	9	5th April 2010 - "top" 20767 downs
Lemon64	8	5th April 2010 - 228 votes
Gamebase64	10	A Classics!
Happy Computer	86%	Games special edition 2/86
Kultboy.com	7,64	5th April 2010 - 30 votes
ZZap64	97%	Edition 9/86

Reviews[edit | edit source]

Sledgie: "The games is very quick and requires skill and a great deal of patience from the player."

Denni: "I found it very hard. But it was quite fun anyway."

Jodigi: It is really a difficult, exciting game, where I needed a lot of practice. In spite of that, the C64 version is not very good, especially as the machine version contains many more levels, therefore a small devaluation.

Guybrush: "It was damn tricky, but maybe exactly because of this massive difficulty it was so popular. 8 points from me."

MontyMole: "In contrast to most of the arcade conversions it has aged very well. The C64 version is self-contained enough to be fun still today, despite the now available arcade version."

o.b./TRSi: "This game was one of the few exceptions of arcade conversions: it was at least as good as the machine version."

MrBug: "Diese schräge Orgelmusik, die werde ich wohl nie vergessen. Und die Umsetzung der Arcadeversion für den C64 war gut. Nie unfair aber doch sehr schwierig. War ein wirklich gutes Game"

Blubarju: "Graphics and sound are great. The controls are also ok, but why do such games always have to be so hard (at least for me)? Anyway, 8 points from me."