Grabbed by the Ghoulies Excerpts (2008)
The following excerpts detailing the development of Grabbed by the Ghoulies was originally published on Rare’s Scribes letter page in 2008. We’ve scoured each edition for that year in order to provide you with every mention of the title to be found in Rare’s posted answers in chronological order below.
We’ve also included a link above each heading which will re-direct to the original letters page that the question was featured in should you wish to view it in the original context – otherwise you’ll find that the entries below only focus on answers related to Grabbed by the Ghoulies for a comprehensive listing for any fan wanting further information on pre-release content, hidden easter eggs, abandoned features and development secrets:
Dear Scribes,
OK, seeing as Banjo-Kazooie is the subject on the tips of everybody’s tongues today, I’ve decided to follow suit and write you guys yet another letter about the franchise. Yay.
What I really came to ask, is if you could please put a Ninja level into the new Banjo game. After looking back at your previous titles, I’ve decided that this would be a perfect fit. First of all, it’s something you haven’t done before. Secondly, it’s Ninjas. Thirdly, you haven’t done Ninjas before. Although I actually prefer Pirates over Ninjas, I believe your bias towards Pirates appearing in videogames is a glaring fault on your behalf. Ninja fans across the world are spitting on Banjo right now, because as it has shown in the past, it does not care for their kind.
In Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie, we had two pirate characters: Captain Blubber and Captain Blackeye. We also had Jolly Roger as a character, and Davy Jones’ Locker appeared at the bottom of the sea – two notable pirate references. There were pirate enemies in Jolly Roger’s Lagoon and there was buried treasure and giant treasure chest enemies in Treasure Trove Cove. Both levels contained shipwrecks. Yet not a single reference to Ninjas as far as I can see.
Furthermore, when I picked up Banjo Kazooie: Grunty’s Revenge, I was in shock. There were only five levels (not including Spiral Mountain), yet one of them was a beach level just like in Banjo-Kazooie. To top it all off – Pirates. Yet another sunken ship, a ghost ship with a shrieking skeleton as its Captain, and Pirate seals. Playing through the rest of the game, and I found no Samurai; no shuriken or any other sort of Ninja reference. Shame.
I could keep going on about your clear preference of Pirates over Ninjas within the DKC series and DK64 amoung other games, but I think I’ve already made my point. Banjo-Kazooie 3 needs a Ninja Level, or at least some Ninja references to balance things out. I doubt Ninja fans will take it too kindly if you subject them to this again.
Oh, and don’t even think about a cowboy level. The western section of Witchy World was enough – even Ninjas and Pirates can agree on this one – cowboys suck. They don’t deserve to be in games.
Faithful fan,
Kowbrainz
At least it’s a slightly different take on the “OMG TEL US ABOUT TEH NEW BANJO” demand. And an issue this pressing needs to be taken straight to the top of the Banjo team hierarchy.
“Although your support of ninjas is to be applauded, I think you’ll find that ninja fans are well catered for in many games, including the Ninja Imps in our very own neglected masterpiece Ghoulies. Pirates may have been enjoying a well-deserved resurgence of late in the mainstream media (thanks to Pirates of the Caribbean) but for years they were the downtrodden, forgotten heroes in video games. So all we were trying to do was champion the cause of under-represented pirates everywhere.
“Also, people can relate to pirates. While trying to be a ninja in real life requires years of training, dangerous swordplay and constant hiding in shadows, anyone can become a pirate by simply purchasing a cheap eye patch and then saying ‘a-harrrrr’, ‘matey’ and ‘me hearties’ repeatedly.”
Hola Senor Scribes,
Having recently purchased Grabbed By The Ghoulies with a button I found in the park I’d just like to let everyone in earshot know how bloody good it is. I was up ’til the small hours last night promising myself ‘just one more room’. Top-hole.
Give everyone involved a hearty slap on the back and buy them a Guinness. Put it on my tab.
GRL
Ah, there has to be at least one every time. If I didn’t personally compile the letters for Gregg to answer, I’d swear he was sneaking them in himself.
“See how the love for Ghoulies grows! Maybe in another 50 years we’ll have sold enough to warrant making a sequel. I’ll leave the last word in this matter to the Cursed Mummy, as seen in Ghoulies Basement: ‘Wuhhhhh… Ankhaaaaaaaarrrrrr!’”
And on that note, time to transition into the last phase of this Bumper Epic 10th Anniversary Celebration (Kind Of) Scribes as we bring you the inevitable crop of Bumper Epic 10th Anniversary Celebration (Kind Of) Snippets…
Dear Scribes,
I’m Luiz from Brazil and I am huge fan of you guys, I want to say I love what you guys are doing with Banjo and Viva Piñata and I will always support Rare, I’m sorry if my English is not very good, I hope you understand.
As everyone knows, Kameo had DLC on Xbox Live after launch, but that was a considerable time ago and they still have the same price tag. Maybe you guys don’t know, but it is really difficult to get Microsoft Points and the Live signature here, and when we manage to get, is not something we can spend mindlessly, so I would like to know if you guys could contact Microsoft and ask them to make Kameo DLC free, and don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that the content is not worth it, it’s just that even if it’s just $2,25 or so, for us it comes at a higher price, I hope you guys understand my point.
The other question is, do you guys plan to make past games like Grabbed by the Ghoulies – which I never had the opportunity to play – and Conker (same here) available anywhere else than the Xbox itself? (Xbox Originals for example.) Ebay sellers are most of the times hard to trust for me, and it is quite hard to make them send it to Brazil, plus, it comes with a high price because of elevated taxes. High price is not a big problem when talking about such good games, but it’s not always possible to see if the game comes complete or not, and it is the only source with these games available.
I’m not asking it just for myself, since even Americans have problems buying these games, you guys must know that you have a huge fanbase that likes to support the company and that would like to play most of Rare’s games, so, I hope you guys consider it, and even if you can’t make it, I would be glad that you guys tried to do something for the fans.
Thanks for reading and keep the good work,
Luiz
As far as I know we still haven’t heard anything about Conker or Ghoulies joining the unpredictable Xbox Originals line-up. Let’s check on other possibilities with Shaun from Banjo: “Don’t worry Luiz, your grasp of the English language is better than most of the guys I work with! Currently no plans are in place to bring back the games you mention. It’s perfectly feasible that classic Rare titles could appear in some guise or another at some point in the future, just no plans as yet.”
And on the way back we’ll swing past Chris from Kameo: “Sorry to hear about your DLC woes, but I’m afraid we haven’t got any news on a price drop as it’s something that requires action by a lot of different people, many of whom are now busy with other things. There are a few free DLC packs up for Kameo, including the Co-Op pack and the Design-A-Skin costumes, so hopefully they’ll tide you over. Blimey, that was a depressing answer. How come we get questions about international trading standards and Gregg gets to answer easy ones about the Kremlings house-sharing with Grimshaw in their University days?”
Two teams. Two designers. Two quotes. The lingering threat of actual information. STOP THIS MADNESS.