The Real Ghostbusters (Game Boy)

The Real Ghostbusters is the only game where Peter Venkman or Garfield or Mickey Mouse use an unlicensed nuclear accelerator or a pneumatic hammer to destroy floor blocks to find stars to get a key to exit the level. We ain't afraid of no blocks!

The premise was directly lifted from P.P. Hammer and his Pneumatic Weapon, released for the Commodore 64 and Amiga, featuring simplified sprites and near-identical level design. According to Gunner Lieder (the developer of P.P. Hammer), the port was entirely unauthorized.

To do: More regional differences, get images and audio for all of these differences, move stuff to the proper sections, add sections as necessary.

Unused Graphics#

The Real Ghostbusters replaces most of the ending sequence from Mickey Mouse IV and Garfield Labyrinth with a brand new one. However, graphics from most of the original ending still remain at 0xE570 and 0x10A92, and reveal a rather surprising secret; they've been reskinned to feature unofficial Kemco mascot Kid Klown, specifically his design from Kid Klown in Night Mayor World. Given that Night Mayor World was originally Mickey Mouse III, it'd only make sense for Kemco to retain him for the American reskin of Mickey Mouse IV, but plans likely changed when Activision stepped in as the publisher with the Ghostbusters license.

This ending would've featured a new character, Honey, who did not appear in Night Mayor World. Kid Klown in Crazy Chase would later feature a character named Honey, although she looks completely different than this.

Regional Differences#

Japan	Europe	US

The title screen was appropriately changed for each region.

Japan	Europe	US

The introduction sequence originally featured Mickey taking a walk with Minnie before falling into a pit. They were appropriately replaced with Garfield and Odie in Garfield Labyrinth, and with Peter Venkman and... nobody in The Real Ghostbusters. In addition, Mickey and Garfield find a pneumatic hammer at the bottom of the pit, but Peter does not, since his proton pack is apparently able to serve the same purpose.

Passwords#

Japan	US/Europe

The password screen had all of its vowels removed to account for Nintendo's password censorship. The passwords in Mickey Mouse IV are all mostly real 4-letter words, which were all scrambled for Garfield Labyrinth and The Real Ghostbusters (ironically, the scrambling method used changes "DISK" into "DCSK", which quite a few people would probably interpret as a rather naughty term). Despite both international versions adding numbers to the password screen, none of the new passwords make use of them.

Stages#

Both Mickey Mouse IV and Garfield Labyrinth feature 41 stages, with the last stage being a boss fight. The Real Ghostbusters adds a whopping 10 new stages after the 40th, with the boss fight now taking place on stage 51 (still using the same "FNDG" password as in Garfield Labyrinth). All of these new stages appear to be completely original, with none of them resembling any of the stages from P.P. Hammer and his Pneumatic Weapon that Kemco didn't already "borrow" for the original game.

Music#

This page or section needs more audio. There's a whole lotta words here, but not enough audio. Please fix this.

The Real Ghostbusters replaces the music for the title screen, password, opening cutscene, and the western castle-themed levels with an arrangement of the Ghostbusters theme, with the latter's original theme being moved to the crystal-themed levels. The theme for the opening cutscene is still used in the game's ending, but the rest of the replaced tracks end up going completely unused. All of the music features slightly different instrumentation as well, likely as a side effect of the Ghostbusters theme being inserted into the game.

Sprite Changes#

Player#

Japan	Europe	US

Mhm.

Japan	Europe	US

The stage clear screen was appropriately changed...

Japan	Europe	US

... as was the Game Over screen. Bizarrely, while the screens in Mickey Mouse IV and The Real Ghostbusters feature their respective protagonists looking distraught, Garfield Labyrinth instead features a diapered Garfield teasing the player(!). The heart cursor was also changed to a regular arrow in both international versions.

Items#

Japan	Europe	US

The extra life icon is different between games: Mickey eats cheese, Garfield drinks coffee, and Venkman just picks up an icon of his face.

Japan	US/Europe

Garfield and Venkman can lay bombs that will blow up any enemy that walks into them. Maybe that was too violent for Disney, so Mickey lays down wands that make the enemy magically disappear in a puff of smoke. Same effect.

Enemies#

The Real Ghostbusters swaps out a number of the original game's more goofy enemies.

Japan/Europe	US

The mushroom and weird dinosaur penguin thing were replaced with duplicates of the magic hat and witch enemy, respectively.

Japan/Europe	US

The knight, ghost, mummy and polar bear were replaced by one of two new goblin-looking enemies.

Ending#

This page or section needs more images. There's a whole lotta words here, but not enough pictures. Please fix this.

The ending of Mickey Mouse IV shows Mickey and Minnie finally being reunited, lovingly holding hands as a big heart appears behind them before a hot-air balloon swoops down and takes them to a lush flower field, where both of them dance together. Garfield Labyrinth opts to keep the ending intact aside from the character replacements... which doesn't really make a lot of sense. It would definitely make even less sense with the Ghostbusters theme (Janine Melnitz is Egon Spengler's love interest after all, not Peter's), so The Real Ghostbusters opts to make an entirely new ending; it starts out similar to the original, but with no broken bridge or other character to be found. Once he arrives at the place where Minnie/Odie originally were, it switches to a new scene showing a variety of ghosts (including a rather off-model Slimer) seemingly popping out of his body, only for him to suck them right back into his proton pack (not exactly how their equipment works, but okay), followed by a cut to the end credits. The new ending results in the theme used in the second part of the original ending going completely unused in The Real Ghostbusters.