Remembering Ico and Shadow of the Colossus
by Gideon, HSM team writer
It has been years since I picked up a PS2 controller and delved into its vast and robust catalogue of games. The games on the PS2, as I remember them, were some of the best games I ever played. Sitting together at the pinnacle of that mountain of videogaming excellence are Ico and Shadow of the Colossus.
It has been over five years since I have played either game, so when the announcement of their re-release surfaced there was no question that I would elect to get them again. If for no other reason than to speak with my buying dollar and let the people of the videogames industry know that these two titles are of the quality that is desperately needed in the industry today.
In our world of cookie cutter first-person shooters, rehashed third-person action games, stale and non-existent role playing games the re-release of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus gives gamers something in a re-release that is sorely lacking in most modern gaming experiences – heart.
This isn’t to say that all of today’s games are cold and devoid of personality, but there is something Team Ico was able to capture with their PS2 offerings that I have taken with me. It has shaped me as a person, and as a gamer. Just as a good book or a powerful movie can touch you and leave a lasting impression, these videogames have so effected me. I feel as if I was enriched by having experienced the epics which lie within each game, and I can’t wait to go through them again.
ICO
The NA cover was nothing like this. Shame.
My first impression of the game came in 2001 shortly after I had acquired my PlayStation 2. I was flipping through my Official PlayStation Magazine, as I did each time it was delivered every month, to see if anything caught my eye before I read it cover to cover. I came across the Japanese cover art for Ico and it stopped my thumb from flipping the next page.
Two figures, hand in hand, walked across a platform, seemingly leaving a large fortress toward the vast expanse of the world beyond. Attached the fortress by a high-rising walkway was a windmill. The vents on the windmill hinted at the mechanisms within.
The figures weren’t running, but they were walking with a steady purpose. Between them and the open world was a structure that looked, to me, like an aqueduct support. A ladder clung invitingly to one of the archways legs. Long shadows chronicled the long journey the characters had taken, or perhaps, foretold of the journey ahead.
The surrealist style of the cover art set a melancholy mood of hopefulness and dread. The washed out colors presented a world which was once vibrant and lively but, for some reason, had long been dried out and now sat lifeless. The blue-grey sky hinted at a looming storm, one which threatened the success of the journey of the two intrepid figures.
So much was being conveyed with such a simple cover. A journey of hope, full of mystery. A journey of discovery, full of puzzles. When I was finally able to obtain Ico from my local videogame shop, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that within Ico I found all that I was hoping and more.
Meet Ico. Yes. Those are Horns.
Despite one of the main characters, Yorda, speaking in a language the player cannot understand, there is a bond that is formed from early on within the game. Through minimal dialogue usage, which is subtitled either in English for the titular Ico, or in the symbol based language of Yorda, the player gets a solid sense of the disposition of the two main characters.
Ico immediately takes responsibility for Yorda and, with a reckless abandon that could only belong to a child, decides it is upon him to save her. Ico’s hopefulness and Yorda’s hopelessness come across clearly as Ico pulls Yorda through the world by the hand, at times yanking her somewhat roughly as she somewhat resists to being lead around. This connection is conveyed and felt by the player. A certain fondness for the characters develops and their survival and success seems important enough to fight for.
The controls are clumsy but, in their own way, add to the charm of the game. In the spirit of an adventure, the player is given no tutorial and must, through experimentation, discover the controls for themselves. This leads to some unique experiences, such as the first time Ico takes Yordas hand, giving the player a genuine gentle moment – something which is rare in videogames.
Ico is seen from the viewpoint of fixed cameras which can be panned at anytime by the player. This sometimes creates awkward control responses from Ico, which will likely result in frustrating deaths and re-tries, since much of Ico’s game play relies on platforming puzzles. Attempting to leap from one ledge to another or to a dangling chain will, many times, cause Ico to veer off into thin air grabbing at nothing.
Yorda will need a lot of help to get around.
Fighting the ominous shadow enemies extends the control experience by adopting both the style and downfalls of the control scheme. Once equipped, the player is able to bat at the shadow creatures which seem to find no threat in Ico and appear to only be concerned with pulling Yorda into their shadowy portals. When this happened for the first time, I remember frantically pressing the buttons of the controller to try to help Yorda as she was slowly consumed by darkness. The player is never instructed on how to help Yorda, or if it was even possible at that point. The actual battling feels hindered by the game’s limited weapons, and by limited I mean a plank of wood. Aiming at the enemies is a trial and error process and fighting – while functional – is tiresome at best.
The gangly controls and imprecise movements of Ico result in Ico moving around much like a child of his age would. He runs with wild abandon. He lunges at the shadow creatures with his plank in hand and he tugs at Yorda with a certain sense of misunderstanding that she is weaker than he is. Ico’s not a veteran soldier or an accomplished free-runner, he is simply a child trying to find a way out of an impossible situation and hoping to help a new friend along the way.
Go over and lean and let your chain swing. lol!
The labyrinth world is, in part, a character in and of itself. The large expansive rooms and ancient structures offer, at times, a confusing journey; but never did I feel as if I had no idea what to do. The player can always see the next place they must get to and I was usually able to get Ico there with relative ease. The challenge lies in figuring out how to get Yorda, whose meek stature prevents her from jumping or climbing very much on her own, to join Ico on the far ledge or high walkway as they press forward toward what is presumed to be freedom.
While Ico’s controls are cumbersome at times and the lack of instructions might irritate some gamers, this remains one of the most fondly remembered gaming experiences I have ever had. Whatever technical faults Ico has are heavily outweighed by its charm and character.
Shadow of the Colossus
Team Ico's next game took the action into the wide open.
After experiencing Ico, I knew I had to keep an eye on the team which created it, the aptly named Team Ico. It didn’t seem to take long for those artisans to follow up the moderate success of their first game with another offering, one which seemed dramatically different than their first. Whatever they had planned, I was on board.
All I had known of Shadow of the Colossus before seeing actual game play footage was that each level consisted of a gigantic beast called a colossus. My first glimpse of the game was footage of the first Colossus that The Wanderer – the main protagonist – encounters. The hulking beast moved slowly and heavily. The ground shook and rumbled with each step that it took. Debris and dust billowed up as the massive hoof dug into the earth. I watched in awe as the Wanderer clamored up the goliath, gripping its coarse coat and taking refuge on platforms affixed to its back. The Colossus itself seemed to be an embodiment of some ancient monolith – not quite completely animal.
When I finally got my hands on the game I was pleasantly pleased with the evolution in visuals and game play. Even though the game looked and controlled similarly to Ico, it was quickly clear that the two games were independent experiences.
Is saving one girl worth killing eight ancient demi-gods?
Considering the controls, the Wanderer handles a bit more like someone who had some experience and was capable of holding their own in a fight, which was exactly what one would expect of someone who has the gumption to climb a hulking living statue. The camera switches between a third person trailing camera during exploratory segments of the game to a quazi-fixed third person perspective for Colossus scaling. During the scaling, the player is required to keep an eye on the Wanderer’s fatigue and must use multiple buttons to grip and climb the creature. It is not uncommon for a ten minute session of scaling to be ruined by the shaking limb of a bothered Colossus, sending the Wanderer sailing toward the ground to start the ascent all over again.
To aid the Wanderer in his journey he is equipped with a meager assortment of tools. His sword is able to refract sunlight to guide him across an expansive valley to each Colossus and is used in bringing each beast to its knees. He also wields a bow, which he seemingly uses to annoy the Colossus into paying attention to him. The arrows fly through the air, sticking in some parts of the Colossus and bouncing off other more stone-like parts of the brute’s hide.
THIS is one of the smaller Colossi.
To travel between the Colossi, the Wanderer climbs aboard his horse, Argo, and crosses a vast -and lifeless – landscape. This is one of the most intriguing aspects of Shadow of the Colossus. The world in which the game takes place is expansive to say the least. One could spend hours simply exploring the countryside on horseback. The thrumming of Argos hooves against the grassy earth delivers a believable experience and establishes the Wanderer as an established horseman.
Aside from Argo, the Wanderer, the Colossi and a few birds circling above the towering beasts, the world of Shadow of the Colossus is devoid of life. I remember I spent quite a long time searching for a rabbit or a deer. After I felt I had exhausted my willingness to hunt down non-existent woodland creatures, I concluded that all the animals must have been scared off or eaten by the Colossi. This lack of ambient life is one of the ways Shadow of the Colossus is much like Ico and serves to link the two games in theme and personality.
Not all video game relationships are about sex. Some are about carrots.
Another aspect Shadow of the Colossus that seems to be staples of games developed by Team Ico are the relationships which are established within the games. In Shadow of the Colossus, the Wanderer is on a mission to save a young girl and must defeat the Colossi to save her life. This girl, however, is not who the player becomes connected to throughout the game, it is Argo.
Team Ico took great care to insure Argo displayed a good deal of sentience. He seems like a horse and he reacts to the Wanderer in ways one might expect a horse to. There are portions of the game that requires Argo to run alongside the lumbering Colossi with the Wanderer on his back. With the cadence of his steps and the looming beast taking chase, the adventure can seem as if it belongs as much to Argo as it does to the Wanderer.
Although the scale of the game is not by any means the most grandiose that was attempted on the PS2 or has been offered on the PS3, it still stands out to me with a certain sense of awed trepidation. I have yet to experience another game that has delivered the same amazement that I felt as I ran toward one of the Colossi with the task of climbing to its top to deliver a deadly blow.
The increased competence of the character of the Wanderer is a pleasant change from the weedy flailing of Ico. The gameplay experience, just as Ico, remains in its own class to this day. There has yet to be a game to capture its scale and sense of devotion to a singular duty. Shadow of the Colossus is similar enough to Ico to please fans of Team Ico’s first game, but is different enough to offer a new experience; one which shouldn’t be missed by any PlayStation gamer.
Team Ico Collection
With the PS3 release of these games, each game will benefit from optimization and additional features. Each game will have graphical retexturing and will obviously be presented in widescreen format, which is not available on the PS2 version of Ico. Shadow of the Colossus did have the option to be displayed in progressive scan and 16:9 format, but was limited to standard definition, leaving the game grainy and jagged on modern televisions. I only hope I will feel the same sense of awe and wonder I felt the first time I ventured into these worlds when I revisit them in their full high-definition glory.
There will be a small assortment of bonus features on the disk for fans of the series. A behind-the-scenes feature, concept art and a glimpse of Team Ico’s next game, The Last Guardian, have all been added to the collection. The most exciting feature for fans of the series is the inclusion of the alternate ending of Ico and the possible inclusion of the unlockable two-player mode for Ico, where a second player is given control over Yorda.
Both newcomers to Team Ico games and long time fans should give the re-release of these games some serious consideration. There are no games on the PlayStation 3 that are quite like these. Not only do their re-release speak of their quality and importance to the PlayStation brand, but it gives a whole new generation of gamers a chance to experience what is considered a pair of the best games of the PlayStation 2. Come September 27th set your status to busy and spend some time saving a luminescent girl or bringing down an ancient entity.
September 7th, 2011 by Gideon | 7 comments
Gideon is a team writer for HomeStation Magazine and likes cheese in all its forms. Whether it be block, slice, cream, wheel, log, string or aerosol, Gideon cant resist the pungent bitter taste of good cheese. Heck, he'll even take mediocre cheese, as long as its slapped between two pieces of whole wheat bread with a little bit of mustard.
Your article gives desire for discovering these games.^^
I’ve played ICO, but never Shadow of Colossus. ICO had left me an excellent memory. It’s a good idea to see them land on PS3.
When booting up these two games on my oh-so-finicky 60 gig PS3 It took everything I had to NOT keep playing them! It’s not often that I get so engrossed in a game from this generation. Since you never played Shadow of the Colossus I totally recommend getting the collection.
You paint an interesting picture of these two games Gideon, well done.
That cover art for Ico is something I would hang up in my home. I don’t blame you for stopping at it. I’ve been to a lot of art galleries in my time, and I know I would have done the same thing.
As an aside, who else inwardly cringed at the Chain Swing reference in the last picture for Ico?
I did lol!I was talking to some people the other day about the new hub, and some of them actually want Chain Swing to survive the change. They feel it helped to build the community. Oh well to each their own, I certainly don’t care if it stays or goes, but if it does stay here is hoping that there are all new songs to dance to besides that.
Oh man did I love these games, and I know exactly what you mean by them shaping you as a gamer. If I’d never picked up Ico or SoTC I’d probably never have been curious about games like flOw or Flower either. There’s something fundametally different in the relation you have with the “heros” of both games, they have understandable plight and despite being so unique in their setting, I found myself connecting with them on a level I never knew possible.
When I read that SoTC would be nothing more than a string of boss battles I was seriously worried, but then after killing the first Collosi (collousus?) I was struck with both a feeling of acheivement and a strange twang of regret, regret that is only obvious to those who have already played it -- I won’t spoil it for anyone who’s never had the pleasure of SoTC.
I didn’t know about the extras you speak of on this re-itteration, they sound great. I wasn’t going to re-buy these games as my originals are sitting in perfect condition in my house, but given this new info I might just take a second look. THANK YOU for bringing this to my attention. It’s always great to see another Ico fan too, nice read.