Now that the Xbox is aggressively pursuing Sony's targeted mainstream demographic, Sony needs to dazzle gamers like me more than ever. One sure way to my heart is the classics, and few classics lie closer to my heart than Ghosts'n Goblins.

Army of darkness

GnG and its sequel, Ghouls'n Ghosts, gave even the venerable Metroid a run for its money when it came to unforgettable platformers. The gameplay was fresh, fun, and challenging as hell (literally - you fought the Devil and his hordes). I remember guiding Arthur on his quest for love and justice the way some people remember their first kiss or their first car: it was a rite of passage that changed how I looked at everything that went before. No more muttering curses under my breath so Mum couldn't hear. A typical GnG session found me screaming at the set, turning the NES off in anger, then coming back to the game, screaming some more, and finally collapsing to the floor in triumph. And that was just the first stage!

The game was about as tough as any major release, but it was irresistible. So much so, that when your hard-fought journey to the end was rewarded with the immortal, "This room is evil and is a trap devist by Satan. Go forth dauntlessly! Make rapid progres!" you didn't mind going at it one more time. Well, as long as you got in some room-trashing time first.

For me, and (judging by TNL's boards) many other dedicated gamers, that level of engagement has been sorely missing from games ever since 3D took over. Fast and furious gameplay, twitch shooting, and precise jumping are simply easier to pull off in two dimensions. But is all hope lost?

The Great Golden Hope

Maximo: Ghosts to Glory is not a continuation of the original series. The main character is different, and the weapons have changed. The challenge is toned down a notch - I didn't utter a single obscenity during the entire first level. What remains, however, is the spirit of the originals. Well, that and the heart-covered underwear that the protagonist wears under armor apparently held together by threads that split on impact.

The game begins where Maximo's life ends. Back from a crusade, he finds the evil wizard Achille risen to power. Achille has begun to drill into the ground in search of the power of Hell. The drilling has literally wakened the dead, and as the underworld spews its inhabitants out onto the surface, even the Grim Reaper himself is worried.

On a more personal level, our hero is outraged to find that the dark wizard, once his trusted advisor, has taken Maximo's place as king and taken Queen Sophia as his own. Maximo's allies, four sorceresses who overlook different parts of the kingdom, have been imprisoned. And to add injury to insult, Achille effortlessly strikes down the outraged hero in the first ten seconds of the game.

Fortunately, the Reaper has big plans for Maximo. Worried about the unemployment line, Death offers to give the knight his mortality in exchange for a little help. So off on your quest you go, burning for vengeance, backed by Hell.

The action is seen from a third-person perspective, which is great since the mere thought of trying to make some of the jumps with a first-person camera makes me queasy. Maximo is refreshingly sure-footed, so you don't have slippery controls to blame when you plummet into a lake of lava or leap into the waiting arms of a bloodthirsty zombie.

You can use either analog or digital directional control, with analog being useful in only a couple of instances where you have to maneuver on narrow planks or ledges. The X button is used for jumping and a double press results in a perfect, highly controllable double jump that is spot-on accurate. Square is used for a light sword slash and also for opening chests and doors. Triangle is used for heavier slashes. Pressing Circle throws Maximo's shield once he enables that ability by finding the relevant item early in the game. The front triggers control the view, L2 makes the knight crouch, and R2 raises his shield in defense.

Various button combinations result in special attacks. One you can do right from the start of the game is the powerful downward attack. A double jump and a heavy slash causes Maximo to thrust his sword downward with incredible power, wreaking havoc on any enemies or items beneath. As you find more items, you will gain the ability to shoot projectiles and cause massive energy shockwaves, among other attacks. In addition, there are various elemental augmentations for your sword and shield and some other interesting attacks that I shan't spoil for you. Overall, there are dozens of powerups, some permanent, some time-based, and some that wear out with use. You can switch the abilities into safe slots, so that you can keep them even after you lose a life. The number of safe slots increases as you progress in the game, and deciding which powers to keep locked and which to risk losing is entirely up to you.

Graphics'n Goodies

One of the game's strengths is its attention to detail. Coins roll downhill, swords get stuck in trees, and vertical slashes cause different death animations than horizontal slashes. You can look down at Maximo's belt to see how many keys you have left. When you stand still in a cold place, Maximo shivers. The characters, designed by famed artist Susumu Matsushita, are not terribly original, but the whole game world has a tongue-in-cheek quality that makes this a fun game to watch as well as play. The lighthearted design also serves to defuse your anger just a wee bit in those controller-tossing moments.

Like many good games, there are two ways to play: reckless and thorough. There are scores of hidden items to find in each stage, and the going is definitely easier later on if you take the time to kill all the enemies and find all the chests in the first few levels. Later, as your stock of coins is dwindling and the enemies begin to swarm our brave warrior's half-naked self, you might be better served making a mad dash from checkpoint to checkpoint. The game world is set up to facilitate revisiting levels, and for most of the game you are free to go where you wish. You mastery of each level and of the game as a whole is displayed as a percentage, a friendly reminder that there is probably a lot of room for improvement.

Hidden items are everywhere in Maximo. The most common way to find them is to jump in suspicious areas and hope for a chest to emerge from the ground, but subterranean caves and the tops of buildings are also good places to pick up that extra diamond or flaming sword.

The environment is brimming with activity and the levels are expansive and expertly laid out. Besides the hidden chests, look for giant upheavals in the topography, monsters climbing out of the earth, hands reaching up and grabbing at Maximo's ankles, and a falling tree or two. The scenery changes as you progress through the kingdom, and before long our valiant knight finds himself wading through murky water in a swamp and crunching snow underfoot in a magnificent mountaintop setting.

After completing the first level in a stage, you exit to a central area wherein you have access to every part of the stage. You can redo an easy section multiple times to build up your reserves, or you can knock the levels off one by one. Each hub area also contains a save point and a warp to all the areas you've already cleared. Once all the levels in the area are beaten, a path to the boss opens up.

There are six bosses in all, and they are all quite easy to beat if you manage to keep your cool. In fact, don't be surprised if you beat most of them on your first try, seeing as they don't do a lot of damage and their actions are governed by simple patterns. The battles are scaled-down versions of those in Zelda: Ocarina of Time, down to the boss name flashed on the screen at the beginning. Some might see the light boss encounters as a breather, but others will be disappointed in the tacked-on feel.

The musical score adds to the atmosphere immeasurably. In some stages, it merely fades into the background, but in many others it spurs the action on and echoes Maximo's heroics quite effectively. The music is a major component of the game's epic feel. It's like Lawrence of Arabia with skeleton pirates and hammer-wielding demons.

There are several animated cut scenes during the course of the adventure. Once viewed initially, each scene is added to a movie-viewing mode so that you can replay any parts you weren't entirely clear on.

High-stress Swordplay

While Maximo: Ghosts to Glory is a lot more forgiving than its GnG predecessors, it does have its nasty streaks. First off, realize the camera is not your friend. In some spots, you can't rely on the camera at all, namely when your back is to a wall or you are bouncing on a brain (er, you'll see). It is not so much an annoyance as part of the challenge, though. Mostly, you will tap L1 to bring the camera behind Maximo and not even worry about it, but you will run into situations where you swear the thing has it out for you, especially when you are prevented from switching into a first-person view or you are subjected to a weird overhead angle.

The difficulty level increases considerably between the second and third areas and again between the third and fourth, then it actually gets a bit easier. If leaps of faith are not your thing, you will hate the later levels at first, but the game controls precisely enough to make a believer out of even the most timid platformer. The worst part is jumping across a ridiculously wide chasm onto a hilariously small platform only to have an axe-throwing skeleton materialize on the next rock and get a cheap shot. But, the undead aren't expected to conform to the king's rules of fair play, now are they?

Finally, there is the matter of continuing. I could've sworn that at the beginning of the game the Grim Reaper showed Maximo a special coin and said that he'd be fine as long as he had one. Later on, though, Death jacks up the price of (im)mortality, requiring two coins, three coins, or more. The coins are easy enough to obtain, but they do take some effort to harvest. Breaking certain tombstones releases fairies; collect fifty fairies and you get a special red coin. Saves require one hundred run-of-the-mill gold pieces, and can only be made in the hub areas.

It takes about 12-15 hours to get through the game initially, depending on your playing style. Once you strike down the final boss, you will want to go through at least one more time, if not twice, to unlock some extras. Old-schoolers will get teary-eyed at the some of the feelings this title stirs in them, and will probably love every minute - the raging, exhilarating, maddening, delightful kind of love that Arthur's old-gen exploits used to provide. Maximo: GtG is a loving tribute to a classic era of games, and well worth a purchase.

· · · Nick