Mama Mia, It's a Luigi! (Luigi's Mansion (GC))

Member Name: HappyHour

Product:	Luigi's Mansion (GC)
Date:	12/07/02 (390 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: 1

Disadvantages: , 1

Dear Diary,

It?s Luigi here again. I have just received news of me winning a mansion! I got the letter in the post today! Unfortunately, I don?t remember entering the competition. Any way, who cares, it?s a mansion, it?s free and it is mine! All MINE! Mario is going over tonight to check it out?

Never learn those Mario brothers do they? After being kidnapped by Bowser God knows how many times and doing umpteen missions, they still do not think that getting a mansion in an unknown competition is not suspicious. That?s Italian Plumbers for you?

So, anyway, Mario went to check out the house and guess what happened? No, he wasn?t ambushed by Deano76, who had just gotten hyper from way too much Belgian Chocolate. He went into the mansion and instantly went missing. When Luigi went over, he was no where to be found, so he took the mission of getting him back in a mansion full of ghosts single handedly.

As he looked round, he found a key. He then used that to get into another room in which he came face to face with a ghost. Fortunately, Professor E. Gadd, armed with his trusty Poltergeist 3000 (a vacuum cleaner), got the ghosts away and got Luigi back to his laboratory.

After Being Trained, Luigi was unleashed on the mansion alone.

Basically the aim of the game is to go around this mansion, suck up as many ghosts as you can, collect as much money as you can and free Mario.

To catch the ghosts you have to scare them with your flashlight (sorry about the about the American Words but I am vulnerable?) and, if their ?heart? shows, you suck them up until the number just above it goes to zero.

You do so by a device (which is mentioned above) called the poltergeist 3000, a vacuum cleaner specially adapted for sucking up ghosts and various other things. The creator of the machine is the again

If only it were as simple as the concept makes it seem. You have to do so while the ghosts are droppi
ng all sorts of things at you and dragging you across the room. There may also be other ghosts attacking you at the same time, which is annoying.

Some ghosts stray from the normal pattern and have little extras. One may drop banana skins for you to slip on. Another could go up behind you and try to wrestle you.

There are also 3 element ghosts, which you can only catch if you have an element coin for each type. These come in Fire, Water and Ice. You get them from place like candles (Fire), taps (water) and fridges (ice).

You can use these to catch other special ghosts that have little things instead of their hearts. If it has fire, use water on it. If water, use ice. If ice, use some fire. Simple if you think about it.

They also react to the environment around them. You can freeze water, light candles and make flowers grow.

You can use these if you have an element coin as well as sucking up an element ghost. To expel some press the left shoulder button on the joy pad. To blast a ball of the element, sharply press it down. Depending on how much you want to expel press the shoulder button light or hard.

There are ghosts that are TOTALLY different. These are ?portrait ghosts? which are from some of professor E. Gadd?s painting gallery. You have to catch these using special means. For instance, one playing pool needs to be hit with pool balls. Two twins you need to find in hide and seek. It is all very complicated.

You can also use some ghosts for your own good. One tells you things about Mario by feeling things out of his items. The items like a glove or a hat can be found all around the mansion.

Once you clear a room from all ghosts, the lights in that room are turned on.

Last, but not least, are the Boo?s. These are the ones that created the mansion and are the ones that set the paintings free. These are all in hiding until you open up a secret chamber. There are 50 in total, and
the hide in furniture in lit rooms. These give themselves funny names like Boo telicious, which can be quite amusing. To catch these, all you have to do is follow them around the room. They can also pass through the walls into different rooms, in which you have to follow them to and try to catch them there.

There is also a little detector on your GameBoy Horror (explained more later), which tells you if any Boo?s are near.

There are also the boss ghosts, which are 3 in total. You have to use extra special tactics for these. Sometimes you just have to be patent. Others it takes you a couple of goes to get the idea of what you are doing.

There are 5 different levels to the mansion and the top floor is definitely the scariest. It is designed to look like it was from the 50?s and you can sense that ghosts are waiting to get you.

Now for the Gameboy horror. This is a portable device, which was designed and made by E. Gadd. It contains a searcher, something which tells you about the floors and also another thing about how much money and portrait ghosts you have found.

The searcher lets you see things through Luigi?s eyes and if you press the big green button, it tells you something about the item you are looking at. If you ask about a mirror, it sends you back to the start of the mansion.

The floor thingy shows you a plan of the rooms on each floor and if you have the keys for the doors, as well as if you have cleared that particular room.

The money/portrait ghosts thing shows you how much money you have found and also the portrait ghosts you have gotten.

Another thing that plays a big part in the game is money. There are many different types of it to find all around. There are coins, notes, slabs of gold as well as diamonds, pearls and other assorted goodies. If you find enough of these, you can build Luigi a brand new mansion (or a house in my case). The highest I could get was 49,500,000 G
(What ever that means).

Near the start of the game you find Toadstool, who has been sent to find Mario by that evil princess (why didn?t she do it herself, the stupid woman?). He is crying in a corner and, if you offer to find Mario for him, he will save the game for you. After that he will be found in various parts of the mansion. He will also give you little bits of information.

There are a lot of little puzzles in this game for you to figure out. You have to use the mirrors to full effect to solve them all. I was stuck for about 4 hours looking for an opening, while the answer was in front of me all the time. A button was on the opposite wall, and could be clearly seen through a mirror.

The graphics on this game are absolutely awesome. The look of horror on Luigi?s face when you open up a new room is unrivalled by any game I have ever been on. When he opens up a new room you can see his hand shaking nervously as he reaches for the knob.

The lighting is also very good as well. When lightening strikes, you can see the shadows jump across the room. One bad thing is that the whole lightening effect happens in rooms with no windows.

The mansion itself, from the outside, looks a little poor and rushed, but it is not all that bad.

The dust that is in the mansion is used o good effect by the developers. You can see a trail of dust behind him when Luigi is running up and down a corridor. And guess what. You can also suck up the dust with your P3000.

The sound is very good as well. The theme tune will soon be of legendary status. Is is very catchy and I actually have in my head right now. Luigi even hums along nervously!

The lightening is very well used by the sound as well. You feel like the bang is near you.

Overall, the Developers (especially the god of gaming, Shigeru Miamoto) have used the GameCube to its full potential in this opening game. Unfortunately, it is a bit short and
I finished it in one weekend.

For all of you who finished Mario 64, there is a shock in store for you?

Hope you enjoyed my opinion on Luigi?s Mansion and I hope my next opinion to be about Fifa World Cup (which I have got for my GameCube).

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