the cutting room mirror

The Real Ghostbusters (Arcade)

The Real Ghostbusters is an arcade game based upon the classic 1980s cartoon based upon the classic 1980s movie. ("Real", as opposed to those two guys with the ape, who are the real Ghostbusters as in "they came first" but not the ones everybody knows.)

Unused Graphics#

Pictures of Peter, Egon, and Ray, whose likenesses strangely don't appear anywhere in the game itself (the player characters are all generic palette swaps). Their suits have been recolored to match the in-game players. These portraits are even contained in the Meikyuu Hunter G variants of the game, serving as evidence to the fact that this game was always intended to have the Real Ghostbusters IP.

Regional Differences#

To do:
We're just getting started here. There's also a bunch of revisional differences as well.

This game's got a rather odd release history. According to a developer of the game, it was always intended to be a Ghostbusters game. Data East were unable to acquire the Ghostbusters license in Japan, however, so it ended up releasing there as Meikyuu Hunter G, with no connections to the franchise (though the G in the title is a slight nod to the original property), before later releasing in the west with the license. The Real Ghostbusters has other differences from Meikyuu Hunter G, including level design and gameplay mechanics, so much so that you could basically consider it a second (and frankly much better) revision of it.

Title Screen#

Japan

International

Pretty self explanatory. The Real Ghostbusters uses unique graphics for its elaborate copyright message, while Meikyuu Hunter G simply writes its out in the game's regular font.

References#


  1. Domestic and Overseas Arcade Game List 1971-2005↩︎
  2. ACE Magazine No.4↩︎