Golly! Ghost! (exclamation marks compulsory), is an electro-mechanical/videogame hybrid, that was released by Namco in 1990. It runs on the company's System 2 hardware, and uses a diorama which is controlled by the game's driver board (of two Motorola 68000s running at 12.288 MHz) to open and close mechanical doors which are connected to solenoids, much like the moveable items on a pinball table; the diorama has five 24v globe lights that come on only during gameplay to light up the rooms. They are all on when the game is being played during the shooting scenes, and off for the cutscenes, title screen and high scores - and they are not individually controlled, they are either all on or off. The driver board powers the diorama unit's solenoids and lights via some connectors on the driver board; the guns also plug into the driver board via another small connector (as the first Namco game to use them). Even if the game is emulated in MAME, only the video portion of it is emulated, which means that you will not see the players' (codenamed "ZIP" and "ZAP") scores, the timer, or that diorama on your computer's monitor if you decide to play it - and without those, the game is virtually unplayable. This was also the fourth game from Namco to allow scores not ending in "0" (after: Hopping Mappy, Bakutotsu Kijūtei and Metal Hawk); Phelios, which is the same age as the second and third of those games, also created the illusion of allowing them but the smallest point value it could award was 10. Like all four of those earlier games, this one used a Yamaha YM-2151 FM sound chip for its songs - but only like the third and fourth of them, it used a C140 custom sound chip for its sound effects and speech (the ghosts' laughter and their saying "HERE!" and "BYE!"), as opposed to a PSG and DAC.
A sequel, entitled Bubble Trouble: Golly! Ghost! 2 (often shortened to just Bubble Trouble), themed around sunken treasure, was released in 1992 but exclusively in Japan; it's also emulated in MAME, but as with its predecessor, only the video portion of it is emulated, so it is again virtually unplayable.
Images
-
Title screen.
-
Upright arcade cabinet.
-
First round of the game.
-
English flyer.
