Refined? No. Awesome? Y-E-S.
I need to get the bad stuff out of the way so when I go off about the awesome bits I can do it knowing the other stuff's out of the way. Probably the most annoying thing are the inconsistencies: this game is a prime perpetrator in the "contrived video game limitations" category. It's got it all: Trees that sometimes burn and sometimes don't, spaces you can sometimes run through and other times can't, places where the option to interact with a door or object you CLEARLY need to utilize don't activate until your teammates have finished their conversation, etc etc. I was so unused to this kind of shoddy design that the first few times it happened I wandered away from where I was supposed to be trying to figure out where I needed to go that it took me a good long while before I figured out I'd already BEEN there. Also, in spite of being real smart guys, they've got incredibly stupid AI. There are multiple boss fights where you may wind up doing nothing but playing medic; you only lose the game if all the Ghostbusters present are killed, and during the big fights there are sometimes nigh-unavoidable hits that you'll need one of your buddies to get you off the floor from. These poorly-designed attacks, when combined, were the most frustrating hang-ups for me. There was also one instance of me being down and Ray being so eager to help he charged right through the boss and got himself killed before he picked me up.
Each of your proton pack's weapons has two upgrades, which are either game-changingly great, incredibly minute conveniences, or out-and-out worthless. The slime tether, for example, has an upgrade that makes it last longer, but since its sole use is puzzle solving and people without the upgrade still need to solve the puzzles, it's utterly pointless. Its other upgrade is equally dumb; as far as I could tell from the description it was to use less ammo, but the stupid thing doesn't use any to begin with! Regardless, you'll end up with these and other useless upgrades because they're the only thing to spend your money on, and I finished the game with a surplus of over a hundred thousand dollars. I appreciate that they tried not to have all the upgrades be damage bumps or things like that, but to make multiple "upgrades" with zero function? Poor design.
Also of poor-to-unremarkable design were the levels. As Ryan noted, oftentimes the levels are completely linear, and while there are little side areas to nab little collectables, they often wind up turning you around and unable to find your way back due to all the halls in a given stage looking exactly alike.
The sound quality also leaves something to be desired. While it doesn't quite have the "recorded through a tin can" bitrate of some Wii games, it's still of unnecessarily poor quality. They also rely almost completely on recycled song clips from the movies. While it was immersive and cool the first couple hours, it gets tired after awhile.
Graphically the game is a mixed bag; gorgeous sometimes, bland others, but overall the least that can be said is it's unremarkable, but at its best it can be stunning. Specifically the art direction on some of the cutscenes and stages is too cool for words.
On that note, I think it's high time I give the game its deserved praise. The writing was, I thought, hilarious. I haven't laughed at a game this often since Psychonauts. Although sometimes Harold Ramis and Dan Akroyd sometimes forget references do not equal jokes, these moments are often punctuated with something so witty you can't help but laugh. Almost everyone sounds a little uncomfortable either with the idea of voice acting or just getting back into these characters, but there is definitely a point where everyone hits their stride. Akroyd had it completely nailed down from the get-go and was definitely my favorite part of the voice cast. Ernie Hudson and Harold Ramis also pick up the pace pretty early on, but it definitely seems like Bill Murray lags behind substantially more. That almost makes it all the better when, maybe three or four hours in, something finally clicks and he just nails almost all his lines from then on. During the cutscenes everyone is animated super well too, especially facially. The lip syncing isn't always perfect, but the fact that the characters are actually expressive makes up for a lot.
The game's main selling point, though, is the immersion quality. Let me tell you it really feels like you're in the universe, fulfilling the role of this new ghostbuster. It's so saftisfying being praised by the members of the team and feeling like you're accomplishing things for the good of New York, that it defies writing here. It's one of those "You just have to play it" kind of things. It was a huge throwback to childhood for me, reminding of the little plastic proton back my friends and I would run around the back yard with pretending to capture the neighborhood ghosts.
TL;DR, if you're a fan of the films, this is an incredibly worthwhile purchase that you didn't know you needed.
