Written by Marcus Charleville and Richard Dagsköld and published by Firebird in 1984, Gogo the Ghost is a simple maze game in which you must guide a friendly spectre through many screens of enemies and traps in order to rescue his “dream princess”.

The game features 150 different screens to explore, although you don’t need to visit them all to complete the game. The maze sometimes has multiple routes to choose from, although some are blocked by doors that must first be opened with the right switch (switches are flashing items marked with a ‘c’).

Touching the cave walls, moving enemies, barriers, spikes, traps, or anything else in the room, will result in instant death and the loss of a… not a life, but a ghost, so moving around requires pixel perfect movement to avoid that happening.

Pressing the fire button on the joystick causes Gogo to use his special invisibility powers, which allows him to move through enemies, or anything flashing (that would otherwise kill him), although this effect only lasts for as long as his power meter has some juice in it.

Each room has a time limit (shown as a reducing bar underneath the power meter) which re-sets every time you enter a new room. If time runs out – you guessed it: you lose a ghost.

There are items that, when collected, will award Gogo with bonuses. The six items shown underneath the play area indicate what is awarded when they are lit up (from left to right: an extra life; extra power; extra time; 1,000 points; extra power, and 5,000 points). Gold dust can also be collected for extra points.

Gogo the Ghost is a playable, challenging and fun game, and is well-presented, but it is frustrating to play at times. Some rooms seem almost impossible to complete, until you remember that Gogo‘s invisibility powers help him avoid ‘death’ when used. Thankfully the game occasionally provides passwords that allow you to start from specific rooms, which is a useful feature.

Some of the sound effects in the game are very annoying, though. The constant ‘siren’ sound effect on some screens makes the game sound like it’s bugged, but I think it’s intentional. I couldn’t work out how to turn the sound off, and I don’t think it can be, so you have to put up with it (or simply mute it). I think this game would’ve benefitted from some jolly music, instead of the ear-splitting sound effects, but then Gogo the Ghost was just a budget release so I guess we shouldn’t expect too much from it.

More: Gogo the Ghost on Moby Games
More: Gogo the Ghost on CSDb