Ghost Trick Remains One Of The Most Inventive Puzzle Game Ever
Have a good afterlife.
The Nintendo DS was a treasure trove of puzzle games, producing perhaps the greatest era the genre will ever see. The system’s touchscreen and dual-screen format allowed developers to get wildly inventive, and there are two dozen games I could name off the top of my head that are unlike anything else I’ve ever played. But the game that feels most emblematic of this special moment in gaming history is the little masterpiece called Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective. Overlooked at the time, Ghost Trick has aged into one of the best puzzle games ever made.
Arriving Stateside 15 years ago, Ghost Trick is a fascinating one-off from Capcom, a company that’s since proven to be wonderfully experimental in the face of a largely homogenous AAA industry. Ghost Trick is particularly interesting because it comes from the mind of Shu Takumi. Takumi is best known as the creator and longtime director of the Ace Attorney franchise, and you can see that same quirky, abrasive sense of humor in Ghost Trick.
Ghost Trick’s phenomenal art style makes great use of color.
You take on the role of a spirit named Sissel, who wakes up in a junkyard and sees a man’s corpse. Realizing the body is likely his, Sissel assumes he just died, and is greeted by another spirit named Ray that’s inhabiting a desk lamp nearby. Ray teaches Sissel how to possess inanimate objects just in time for him to save a young detective named Lynne from an assassination attempt. Sissel sets out to protect Lynne and solve the mystery of how he died, tasks that prove to be connected.
Ghost Trick has a great hook that gets you invested in Sissel’s plight, but the game’s true narrative strength, like Ace Attorney’s, lies in its fantastic characters. Writing is quick and snappy, and leans into the vibrant personalities of its eclectic cast, from your adorable Pomeranian sidekick to the flamboyant detective Cabanela, who’s renowned the world over for his magnificent dance moves. But Ghost Trick is also a layered game, weaving a tragic central narrative through a comedic framework that builds to a strong finale.
The writing in Ghost Trick is witty, but often touching too.
The story also sets up a robust array of gameplay options, as the game embraces the nature of playing as a ghost. You’ll puzzle your way through the narrative as you figure out which objects to possess and how to manipulate them to influence characters. For example, you might enter a suit of armor and move its arm to scare someone out of the room.
Ghost Trick puts a lot of fun twists on your experiments with items, like how possessing a phone line lets you trace a number. But things really, and ironically, come alive in its “4 Minutes Before Death” sequences, where you’ll discover a corpse and converse with its spirit. You’ll be put into their shoes four minutes before their death, allowing you to use your abilities to change their fate.
Ghost Trick is all about experimenting to wrap your brain around the game’s logic.
What makes Ghost Trick work so well is the same thing that makes Ace Attorney tick: a perfect fusion of narrative and gameplay. The puzzles feed directly into how the story plays out, and then the characters and plot work themselves back into the gameplay. It’s a game that feels experimental but expertly tuned, right down to a touching story about the importance of life. Fifteen years later, there’s still nothing like it.
