Some games just have a deeper feeling to them. They penetrate the mind and dig deep, stimulating thoughts of curiosity, awe and wonder. Team Ico is one of the few that can pull off such feats in the creation of their games. They seem to know what they’re doing, even if it’s just re-releasing old titles in high definition. With the Ico/Shadow of the Colossus Collection re-release, the company has successfully inspired and re-inspired an old adventure that’s worth re-visiting.
Considering there are two games bundled into one, it’s only fair to give two separate mini reviews with an overall judgment at the end. First up to bat is Team Ico’s first release, conveniently titled Ico.
ICO – Ico is a double edged sword for me. It’s a moving and revolutionary game that has definitely altered how people will look at
puzzle/adventure games. On the other hand, it’s frustrating and border line obnoxious at times. The story begins with soldiers taking a boy with horns to a large prison fortress. Apparently deemed “a bad omen” because of the horns protruding from his skull, the boy is locked away and sealed into the fortress by magic. The soldiers leave, thinking the boy is sealed away for good, and his prison pod comes crashing to the ground after a tremor shakes the castle, releasing him.
The boy, named Ico, wanders the castle and eventually stumbles upon a caged girl named Yorda. After some navigation and platforming, you free Yorda from her prison and together you search for an escape.
After freeing Yorda, shadowy figures come from the floor and attempt to kidnap Yorda from you. Your task is to keep her safe from the creatures and lead her through the puzzles and rooms of the fortress.
The game has a healthy mix of puzzles and combat, although the combat is incredibly simple. As Ico, you’ll continually beat down the shadow creatures as they attempt to grab Yorda and pull her into the black abyss.
A lot of love is sent Ico’s way due to the pure simplicity of it all. It’s straight forward and lacks a lot of explanation, but that’s absolutely okay. It’s minimalistic on purpose, and it hits home. It’s a boy-and-a-girl story through the perils of a seemingly abandoned castle. And that’s all you need to know.
The game is designed beautifully, and with the HD makeover, it’s even more so. The textures of the tiles and bricks, the smudgy look of the shadow creatures, the light vs. dark complexion, it’s all stunning. The design, despite the emptiness of it all, is full of beauty and things to simply admire while navigating bridges and passageways.
It’s a unique game which Team Ico set the bar with for adventure games. Yes, it’s an escort mission through and through, but between its minimalistic approach and gorgeous layout, Ico has truly put a new spin on adventure games.
On the other hand, Team Ico could not have made Yorda more annoying. At times, she’ll follow you at a normal pace, but at other times, she’ll stop dead in her tracks. Yorda needs to be tugged around on occasion by grabbing her hand, she can’t climb things, and seems pretty inept in the ways of basic survival. It gets to a breaking point when all you want her to do is just stay away from the hordes of shadow creatures. But no, she’ll just stand there. Sometimes she’ll move around a bit, but she doesn’t put up a fight.
It’s hard to move past Yorda’s obvious lack of survival television shows in her life, but if you can, the game is fantastic. It’s beautiful and open, a type of game I had never played before.
But moving onto Ico’s sibling title…
SHADOW OF THE COLOSSUS – I’ll be completely honest with you right now, and let you know from the get-go that this has been and
continues to be in my Top 3 favorite games of all time. The re-release just continues to inspire all my love for it.
Shadow of the Colossus (or SOTC for short) holds true to be the epitome of adventure. It’s a game that demands bravery and intelligence, and defines ambition and imagination.
The game begins with the protagonist, Wander, riding his horse, Agro, with a seemingly lifeless girl riding on the back. He travels to a forbidden land with a stolen enchanted sword, hoping a higher power will breathe life back into his loved one. The story is sparse, but moving, told mostly through visuals and the straight forward quest handed down to you by the deity Dormin. You are told to defeat the 16 colossi roaming the forbidden land, and then the girl, Mono, will be resurrected.
Equipped with only your sword and a bow with arrows, you travel with Agro, your only companion throughout the game.
Like its predecessor Ico, SOTC centers itself with a minimalistic concept. Defeat the 16 colossi. The world you travel in is vast, visually stunning, and for the most part vacant. Occasionally, there is a hawk in the sky or a lizard scurrying on the ground, but, in the end, it’s just you, Agro and the colossi.
Although empty, the game’s setting has truly been mastered by Team Ico. The designers take into consideration the importance of light. In the sunlight, Wander has the ability to raise his sword to create a compass in order to locate each colossus. In the shadows, however, the sword struggles to gleam and will fail, leaving players to use their own intuition to find their way. When fighting colossi, players can also use the light to locate the “sweet” spots on each boss. Some are much harder to locate than others. But in the sunlight, a ray of light can uncover a symbol where Wander should plunge his sword into on each colossus.
Beyond the light, the sounds are extremely immersive. When galloping through the sand, crunches will be heard, the wind can be heard howling over thing bridges and rocks can be heard crumbling under Agro’s hooves.
And the soundtrack deserves its own paragraph. An orchestral soundtrack further promotes the intensity and epic feeling of each boss battle. Sprinkled throughout gameplay, each movement of the orchestra is just as beautiful as the visuals. Shadow can absolutely claim to be fully immersive to the senses (when it comes to gaming, so obviously disregard taste and smell), which only adds to its already high regards.
But the best part of SOTC would be the most obvious: The battles with each colossus.
The first time I happened upon a colossus, I was left staring at the television screen with a stupid look of amazement on my face. All I could do was gaze upon the marvel of the massive being in front of me and ask myself, “How the hell am I supposed to beat that?”
After 10 play-throughs of SOTC, gamers will still look forward to the challenge.
But nothing amounts to the first play through. Fighting each colossus for the first time is an incredible journey that forces a player to drastic measures requiring brave moves and out-of-the-box thinking.
Approaching each colossus triggers a cut scene, where Team Ico proudly boasts their earth and rock creations as they slowly begin to move and approach Wander. Hulking in size, the colossi are mostly unique from one another (I saw mostly because two are strikingly similar to each other, the environment is just different), each built differently with different weak spots. The task will seem impossible at first as the massive beings attempt to crush you with their feet, clubs, wings, etc.
The battles are beyond exhilarating and require a puzzle-like way of thinking to come out victorious. Each colossus will have their own environment, their own build and their own attacks The ground shakes as you approach, dirt is kicked up and the screen blurs as players move the camera quickly. In the bottom right hand corner, a pink circle represents Wander’s grip gauge. This gauge is dire to the game and notifies players how long they have before Wander will completely lose his strength and let go of the colossus he is trying to scale (or hold onto for dear life).
You’ll struggle and explore the environment you’re in to find the best route of attack against your goliath of an opponent. Sometimes you’ll have to scale walls, jump from bridges, swim through lakes, all in efforts to just reach the colossi. Each setting usually adds to the experience, whether it’s a sand worm jumping at you from the ground, or a lizard-like colossi scaling the walls and spitting lightning breath.
The trait of bravery is needed to succeed in these battles. You’ll be standing underneath a downward moving hoof four times your size, aiming at a glowing weak spot with your tiny bow. Completing such feats gives players a rush that is experienced over and over again. It’s absolutely invigorating.
Upon defeat of a colossus, however, there is a twinge of sadness and regret. Since there is a lack of explanation, I ended up wondering why I was killing these creatures. They made no moves to hurt me. The story itself is an emotional ride that definitely forces a player to look at the acts they are committing.
No game is perfect, however, and SOTC is no exception. Getting lost on the large map is annoying if it happens, and considering there’s nothing except colossi, a journey can quickly turn from gorgeous to miserable.
In the end, when it comes to SOTC, the combination of story, visuals, soundtrack and colossus battles make the game one of the best I’ve played ever. SOTC is another unique game that the videogame world has yet to see again. Such a game stands alone, unchallenged and has stood the test of time. The re-release is an even better excuse to live or re-live the journey. The magnificence and awe are almost impossible to do justice to in a review and I strongly encourage you to experience it for yourself.
The Collection disk also offers a few things that the original PS2 games did not that deserve recognition. Obviously there were no trophies on the PS2 versions, but they are added and a nice touch to the PS3 collection. Extra features are also included on the disk which allows players to take a closer look at the development of both Ico and SOTC. There is even a concept video they had for SOTC before it existed that involved online cooperative play to take down a colossus. To be honest, Team Ico should continue to pursue such a project, it would probably do well considering how much thought and time goes into the creation of these games (aka I’m still waiting on The Last Guardian…). There is a small fault with the disk, being you cannot change games after picking a title to play. You’ll have to restart your PS3 to switch between games.
BLAST FACTOR: In the first season of Mad Men, Don Draper pitches a product called The Carousel. He said, “…in Greek, nostalgia literally means ‘the pain from an old wound.’ It’s a twinge in your heart, far more powerful than memory alone.” It’s safe to say that the Ico/SOTC Collection is a powerful blast of nostalgia. I smile at the travels of Wander and Agro, although with a small sense of sadness as I cut down each majestic colossi all in the name of love. I fondly remember the massive spiraling staircases and the brief interactions of Ico and Yorda. These are definitely games of the past, but they’ve been etched into gaming history. I used to keep my PS2 plugged in, so when I felt the yearning for Team Ico’s masterpieces, I could pop them in whenever. The re-release of both titles was beautifully amped with high definition graphics, making already visually stunning games look even better. Although Ico can be a bit much at times with Yorda’s constant lack of commitment to survival, SOTC reigns tall as the perfect re-release. It’s a great excuse to replay these games (not that you really need that), and a huge reason for Team Ico newbies to dive in. Buy this collection. It’s worth every second. And on top of that? Three words: The Last Guardian.
Final Grade: 
I cannot disagree more with your annoyance at Yorda. People seem to hate on escort missions as if no good can come from them… I have never played a game with an escort mission (aside from Ico), and thus I am not tainted with any pre conceived notion that an escort mission is bad; I am able to judge Ico on its own merits alone. (I have never heard anyone praise an escort mission except in the case of Ico, so I assume for the most part that all other examples were poorly implemented and now it’s just something no one wants to deal with).
Ico is built around the concept of developing a relationship by “holding hands” as opposed to verbal communication, as such the ideal way to play the game is to be holding her hand most of the time. If you abandon her or are annoyed with her inability to defend herself, then you have missed out on a large portion of the author’s artistic intent (though you may still appreciate gameplay, I think the story’s impact as a whole almost entirely relies on the player’s in-game interaction with her). When you don’t hold her hand, she often will run about, looking for a way to continue, which is why she might not always follow you like a pet. She has more individuality than that. If you don’t touch the controller for a while (or maybe if you just don’t call her for a while) she will call you, and when you go to her, she will point out to you (with a questioning word) a lever or box or place you can climb: she helps you solve the next puzzle if you take too long to do it. When shadows come to take her away, she actually responds somewhat intelligently. If she is near you, she will go to you. If she is not, she will run away. If she is surrounded, she will, as you said, stay put (and her running away almost always results in her being surrounded, which explains your experiences). Sometimes she will not run away because, as I interpret it, she doesn’t want to leave your side, or to leave you behind. This is most notable when she gets ferried back and forth between two holes: you pull her out, get hit in the process, and she is taken to the next hole while you recover from being hit.
She actually can climb ledges by herself, but after careful observation I think that she actually has a quantifiable amount of energy that gets depleted the more she does things by herself. If this energy is depleted, she cannot climb without your aid. This is to be expected; how would you fair if you were locked away in a cage for an extended period of time? Muscle deteriorates without exercise; she likely has atrophied muscles all over her body.
To really experience this game, you must see her as a girl that needs your help, not as annoying baggage to your otherwise awesome adventures in an old castle. You must feel fear for her safety and well-being when she gets taken away, not annoyance that she is about to make you get a game over. You must lift her up ledges to help her preserve her strength so she may carry on, not complain and treat it like a chore. Pay attention to the subtle aspects of her character: she is, as I mentioned before, a well programmed AI, not a wagon that you drag around the castle. Feel the vibration of the controller as you tug her around, sit on a couch with her a while and watch them fall asleep together. I very much enjoy the interactions between Ico and Yorda, while they don’t understand each other’s language, they do talk to each other at times: sometimes when you’re climbing a precarious ledge, she will watch you with a concerned expression, and sometimes even call out to you, as if to say “be careful!” or “come back!” And when you call out to her, if you hold down the button long enough (repeatedly calling to her), she will respond if she cannot get to you, perhaps saying, “I can’t”. Really, this game is beautifully crafted with a number of minute details… and while I think the game does an excellent job of characterizing Yorda, sometimes you half to meet the game halfway. What I mean by that is: when playing a game, I immerse myself into the world and try to experience it as if I were the character, or I try to understand the character’s plight, motivation, thoughts and reasons behind actions, as opposed to just dismissing the story and merely play for the combat or puzzles. This involves forgiving any shortcomings due to the hardware limitations, or sometimes design flaws (and sometimes story flaws… I generally can enjoy a bad game by looking past its faults and seeing the spirit of what it was trying to accomplish). If a game isn’t drawing you in on its own for whatever reason, you might miss a lot of content and dismiss it as a bad experience; if you try to immerse yourself into the game might start noticing the finer details or elegant aspects that manifest themselves in the game/story whether or not the creators intended for it to be there. A lack of proper immersion does not inherently imply a lack of a good story. This is not a skill many people employ; in fact, to my infinite annoyance a friend of mine refuses to play Mass Effect because, I quote, “the way he runs looks funny, I can’t play through this entire game watching him run like that”. All. My. Hate.
While you seemed to enjoy Ico, as I mentioned before, I do not feel you have appreciated it in full. A story is supposed to move you; it’s supposed to make you feel. If a story isn’t affecting you, then you’re going to lose interest unless you find some way to relate to what is happening, and you’re definitely going to miss out on much of what the story was trying to convey. OK, I’ll stop saying that, I must have said that at least 5 times in different ways; I just hope I got my point across.
Funnily enough, I’m working my way through SotC and I’m having a lot of trouble immersing myself into the story and otherwise appreciating the game; I’m underwhelmed both because it doesn’t compare to Ico in story (and it doesn’t help that the game doesn’t feel quite as polished as Ico), and NieR presented more colossal boss fights than any of the 8 colossi I have tackled so far. SotC just feels so empty and devoid of plot, your horse being the most relatable and appreciably human character in the game. Wander might as well be a robot; he is wholly unilateral and rather unfazed by any of his experiences. Hopefully the end redeems itself or offers some further insight on the game’s characters so that I might play it again with newfound respect.