Geist

"Disappointing, but still fun and original."

I remembered when Geist first appeared at E3. The whole concept of possessing someone then jumping into another sounded awesome. Unfortunately, a couple years later it went in a different direction. Instead of body jumping, we were introduced to something way more fixed. You can only posses certain people and you have to scare them first. It may still sound cool but it makes the game kind of repetitive and disappointing

Graphics: 9
The graphics were well done. The environments are highly detailed and the character models are done well. When you are a ghost, the graphics are blurry (in a good way.) Some of the enemies are blocky, but you will mow them down too fast to care .

Sound: 9
The gun shots sound dull but the voice acting is done well when there is any. The sound when your a ghost is creepy and silent. Explosions sound cool and entering a new body is shocking and just plain awesome!

Music: 2
The music is some of the worst I have ever herd in my life. The music is just annoying techno. I couldn't stand it. There were a couple tracks that were that were okay, but overall the music sucks.

Story: 9
Your body gets separated from your soul and you have to get it back. There are plenty of plot twists and the story is original for the most part.

Gameplay: 9
This game is overall pretty original (sort of.) Lets start out with the ghost parts. You can posses people by scaring them. Usually you have to do a lot of things before being able to posses someone. It gets repetitive after awhile though but is still fun. Your health decreases as a ghost but I didn't think much of it because it decreases very slowly.

The shooting parts are not anything special but are still fun. You have unlimited ammo which makes the game way to easy. The hit detection sucks and so does the lame enemy AI. Some of the fights are intense though and the boss battles rule.

The puzzles can be pretty easy but some are difficult. There are tons of them too. Sometimes though, the puzzles are way too difficult while some are so easy that you won't even realize that you completed one.

Replay: 6
Multiplayer is pretty good but there isn't much more than that.

Buy or Rent: Either one
Rent if it is more than $40 but buy if less than $40. It is a pretty good game that should be given a chance.

Overall score: 7.3/10 (rounded to 7)

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 02/06/06, Updated 07/09/08

Game Release: Geist (US, 08/15/05)