Building a Legend

Today sees the 20th anniversary of one of the most beloved, esoteric video games of all time: Ico. As a quiet celebration of the PlayStation 2 classic's Ja?panese launch, developer genDES??IGN has released a short, never-before-seen proof-of-concept video �looking at some early development footage for a PS1 edition of the ethereal and compelling fantasy.

"This [PS1 footage] was created around 1998 to share the game’s concept with the development team," said genDES?IGN of the three-minute clip, as featured on Gematsu. "This video was a breakthrough for the team, the light at the end of the title, when the staff, including [game director Fumito] Ueda, were groping in the dark, not knowing what kind of game Ico would become. Despite video and sound imperfections such as scanlines and noise, ?as well as the debug display, ?we didn’t dare alter or edit the footage as to express the atmosphere of that time."

//youtu.be/bRxsgVksCDE

Released in Japan on December 6, 2001, (though it had already, surprisingly, hit North American shores months previously), Ico was a subtle and evocative adventure that broke the mold for 3D platform adventures. Ico sees players guide the titular young man as?? he attempts to lead a doomed princess out of a surrealist landscape, pursued by the shadows of the land's wretched monarchy.

Using minimalist imagery, key-frame animation, and a general atmosphere of disquiet, Ico was quite unlike anything ??that had come before �and has been referenced as inf??luential by hundreds (if not thousands) of game developers when creating adventures that are a little more leftfield than the norm.

Fumito Ueda and the Ico development team would, of course, go on to create the slightly less abstract but nonetheless as fascinating 2005 release Shadow of the Colossus, which again was met with praise from critics and players. The influence of Team Ico's work can be seen in many modern releases, from a plethora of bedroom-coded indie hits to titles as new wave as Heart Machine's recent Solar Ash.

Ueda and his team took a chance on a title that was always destined to be a niche release, and in the process not only reshaped the boundaries for what a video game could be, but paved the way for some of the gre?atest, most evocative, and most intriguing adventures that have blessed the gaming community since.

Ico is available to play on PS4 via the PS Now service. A remake of Shadow of the Colossus is also available on PS4.

[Via Gematsu]

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60fps for physical media stalwarts

The Physical Media vs. Digital Media war rages on, and it's a battle that I feel passionately about. Gimme codes for everything. I don't ne??ed mounta??ins of boxes to stash away. If that means losing some game I'd never replay a decade from now, good riddance (time of your life).

Score one for the other team. Apparently, Team Ico's The Last Guardian has some next-gen enhancements on PS5 but only if you have the disc. As NX Gamer presents in the video above, The Last Guardian runs at 60 fr?ames per second with the disc in the drive?, and 30 frames per second as a digital entitlement making use of PS5 backward compatibility.

Post-launch patches are the culprit. When The Last Guardian first launch?ed in 2016, it had an uncapped frame rate. That didn't play nicely with PS4 hardware, so it was patched to introduce a 30fps cap. It made the game much more stable.

Now, anyone who plays The Last Guardian on their PS5 with a disc is ??gettin??g the unpatched version; anyone who plays it on their PS5 in a digital format is getting served a patched version. That's why the disc runs better now that the PlayStation 5 is actually capable of hitting those higher frame rates.

Finally, The Last Guardian as it was meant to be played. Just a console generation later and only for people who are clinging to physical media. You've won th??e battle but you will?? not win the war.

The Last Guardian on PS5 runs at 60fps - but onl?y if you have the disc [Eurogamer]

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It's currently in the prototyping phrase

Fumito Ueda is video game royalty. That's bound to happen when you're the mind behind classics such as Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian. Ueda's next project aims to be ??about as big as these beh?emoths of game design.

In an interview with Famitsu Weekly (as reported by Gematsu), Ueda says his new studio, genDesign, is in the prototyping phase for its next game. "We're in a stage of various trials. This stag?e we're in, where we're actually making our ideas to test if they're interesting or not," said Ueda. He also mentions this is a full-fledged new title, not some sort of seque?l to his previous works.

Although relatively mum about details, Ueda does emphasize that genDesign wants this to be a substantially-sized game. "What we're making now doesn’t feel like an indie game. We're ultimately aimin?g for something on the scale of Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian," he says. If it ends up being even bigger than anticipated, Ueda's willing to? par??tner with an external studio to accomplish that.

All that being said, it certainly seems as if Ueda's next game is a long way off -- especially considering that they're currently prototyping. Anyone who has followed Ueda's career is used to waiting. Hang your hat ?on the old cliche: Good things come to those who wait.

Fumito Ueda's next proj??ect underway, rivals the scale of previous ti??tles [Gematsu]

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Don't read any further if you don't wanna know

Among all the enhancements and overhauls that were a part of the Shadow of the Colossus remake, there was one fairly substantial secret addition. There's a new collectible, something that fans have taken to calling "enlightenments" or?? simple "gold coins." There are 79 of them sprinkled throughout the world, and getting near one will cause a chime to play through your DualShock 4 controller.

We're a mere couple of days after the remake's release, and people have already figured out the purpose the enlightenments serve. Nabbing all of them will activate a secret door that leads to the bottom of the Shrine of Worship. A new items awaits? down there -- the Sword of Do?rmin, which is a powerful damage-dealer but reduces health regeneration.

For anyone unwilling t??o wander the land to find all of these, PS4Trophies has done the dirty work in a stream that lasted nearly three hours. The video embedded below starts right at the sweet spot, just seconds before they discover the new door. And with that, the remake's greatest mystery has been put to rest (unless there's something even more enigmatic out there).

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Perfectly aged

Shadow of the Colossus is a timeless masterpiece. Some of the greatest games exist as the best representatives of an era or a genre. They were groundbreaking and influential in ways?? that guided and evolved future game design. They're remembered fondly but maybe they don't hold up as wel??l as they used to.

That's not the case with Shadow of the Colossus. It's widely regarded as a popular candidate for the best game ever, and its design hasn't aged a day in the 12 years since its original release. That's not hyperbole and more than a decade of affection speaking either; this is the part where I feel obliged to confess this is my first time ever playing Shadow of the Colossus. This remake's fresh coat of paint isn't there to ??hide any flaws, it's there to highlight its perfections.

Shadow of the Colossus (PS4)
Developer: Bluepoint Games, SIE Japan Studio
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Released: February 6, 2018
MSRP: $39.99

Shadow of the Colossus is an obtuse and twisted fairy tale. It's a traditional "stoic hero performs ??feats of bravery to save a fair maiden" adventure but almost all exposition bookends the game. The narrative veers slowly and naturally without leaning on direct storytelling. There are themes of love, sacrifice, innocence, grief, and death. More than anything else, there's an underlying motif ?asking what lengths you'll go to for someone you love.

The immediate sacrifice our protagonist makes is that he's willing to slay 16 behemoths in order to restore life to this befallen woman. By the guidance of an enchanted sword, he sets off across the Forbidden Lands to track down each colossus. There's no real deviation or distraction from the plan. Each c??onquered titan comes with a sense of definite progression toward the ultimate goal, and an itch to immediately find the next one. Your mindset is monotrack.

For a game full of colossi that are mostly enormous in stature, Shadow of the Colossus is rema??rkably minimalist. The story is light on details in a way that leaves plenty open to interpretation, but the minimalist design carries over to the environment and the colossi encounters. The vast openness of the Forbidden Lands makes it feel largely empty except for the nooks where the colossi peacefully rest. The complete toolset for felling all of these beasts is limited to: A sword, a bow, and occasionally a horse.

The obvious juxtapositio??n is our hero??'s inconsequential size compared to the staggeringly big colossi. Less obvious is the juxtaposition between how quietly they dwell versus how aggressively we pursue them. All of these creatures are calmly confined to their lairs until we awaken them. It's only then that they become violent (although some of them stay docile throughout their dying breaths). It isn't long until you wonder how noble this pursuit really is.

The process of killing each colossus -- specifically, how unique and different these encounters are -- is what makes Shadow of the Colossus so special. Every fight is a new exercise in behavior recognition and environmental awareness. Figuring out the tactics and procedures to properly climb one of these monster??s is the task; the reward is the tactile gripping of their fur and the relentless stabbing of their sigils. Watching it??s life bar empty as your stamina drains will lead to you clutching your controller tighter the nearer you are to success.

It's easy to eventually lose the thrill of any single colossus to the collective goal of besting them all, but the memories will persist. Thinking back, you'll fondly remember every confrontation and what it entailed. That is the magic of Shadow of the Colossus. Nothing in this entire game is forgettable. For a game predicated on methodically finding and exposing these c?reatures' weak points, you'd be hard-pre??ssed to find a weak point throughout the entire experience.

As for what this remake has to offer, efforts have successfully been made to modernize Shadow of the Colossus without compromising Team Ico's vision. The art assets have been remade in high definition, so this PlayStation 2 classic looks in line with what's expected of a PlayStation 4 game. There are four control sc?hemes instead of the original's (controversial) one scheme. A handful of gameplay tweaks have been made to make things more user-friendly. PS4 Pro owners can have the option of 4K resolution at 30 frames per second or 60 frames per second at 1080p. (I don't have a PS4 Pro so I wasn't able to test this.)

From a more artistic perspective, the remake has a robust photo mode that lends itself to taking some incredible shots. The game can be paused at any time to take photographs. There's an entire editing suite of filters, shaders, balance sliders -- everything needed to get the perfect picture.? For anyone who's partial to a particular look, some of the filters can be left on while playing the game.

Not to diminish the accomplishments of this remake, but it's all possible because Team Ico's Shadow of the Colossus is so impossibly perfect. It's epic and majestic and emotional and imaginative and breathtaking. There are so many superlative adjectives you could attach. Shadow of the Colossus' reputation is as great as some of its tallest colossi. T?his remake might just help s??ome people see that a little more clearly.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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There are no wrong answers

The PlayStation 4 version of Shadow of the Colossus will release tomorrow, and we've already?? told you it's a fantastic remake of an incredible game. For some people, it will represent their third opportunity to happily play through this all-time?? classic. For others (like me for example), it's their first chance to see what all the fuss is about.

This article is not for that latter group. We're going to revisit our personal favorite colossi. If you've neve?r played this game, do yourself a favor and close this tab. Come back after you've experienced them all first-hand.

There are 16 colossi in Shadow of the Colossus and they're all capable of b??urning special memories into the minds of everyone who encounters them. For creatures that are all lumped under the nondescript banner of "colossus," there's a staggering degree of variance. Big and small; water, sea, and land; aggressive and docile -- no two of these are alike and that's why there's no clear best colossus.

One of these monstrosities bothered me more than the other 15, and that's why it stuck as my favorite.?? It's the 12th colossus, dubbed "Pelagia" by fans. Pelagia is a lake creature that doesn't seem to have any traits that are definitively animal or human by conventional standar??ds.

Unlike literally every other colossus, Pelagia doesn't have eyes. Eyes are surprisingly striking in Shadow of the Colossus. They? feel like a window to the sou?l. Eyes are the single feature that most makes every colossus feel like a living entity.

Pelagia's oddities don't stop at its eyes. Its head is more half-colusseum than skull. Teeth grow out the top of its head. Its back feels like it's covered in moss rather than fur. Whatever this ??is, its closest analog is probably one of those hellish prehistoric abominations that live a million miles under the sea. For the first time, I felt no remorse as I plunged my sword deep into this thing's chest cavity.

Chris Carter:

For a boss rush experience with minimal downtime, Shadow of the Colossus has an incredible way of ramping up its difficulty ever so slightly so it doesn't become overwhelming. But by that same token, ?it can also completely subvert your expectations.

It stands to reason that they'd want to save a flying colossus for one of the last encounters, but nope! Avion, aka Avis praeda, enters the fray fairly early. While the "grab" mechanic is typically stressful, the idea of floating up in the air moves it to panic levels. It's not a difficult fight (especially if you stick the landing on its fur right away), but it'??s one that's become burned into my brain for all eternity.

Very few games have captured the feeling of fighting an aerial foe wi?thout it feeling hokey and scripted in some way.

Peter Glagowski:

While pretty much every boss in Shadow of the Colossus is great ??and feels important, my favorite would have to be the 10th colossus, "Dirge." At this point in the game, you're starting ?to understand the implications of Wander's journey and begin to question your own morality in hunting down these creatures. So what does Dirge do? He gets pissed and hunts your ass.

This is the first Colossus to actually attack Wander without being provoked. He slithers around under the sand and pops out in an a?ttempt to swallow Wander whole. ??It is frightening and a real change of pace from the previous nine, relatively docile beasts.

This is also the battle that requires Agro the most. While Agro comes in handy for a couple of the battles throughout Wander's adventure, Dirge would be impossible without her. I also love how you need to get Agro into a gallop and then spin yourself around and snipe Dirge, which is something you haven't done before t??his battle.

Even if some of the other colossi provide a bigger spectacle, Dirge is my favorite simply for being so unique. He also gets his own specific theme song, a?nd that is awesome.

Darren Nakamura:

Shadow of the Colossus is full of surprises. Just when you think you know what to expect, the next colossus gives you something different. When it seems like colossi are all terrestrial, it throws in flying or aquatic c??reatures. By the time you get to Celosia (the 11th colossus), there's a prototype for what a colossus is, and Celosia breaks it.

Instead of a skyscraping beast, Celosia is only about the size of an elephant. Rather than bei??ng slow and lumbering, it's quick. Most importantly, where you've come to expect a colossus to have hair to grab onto, Celosia has only hardened armor.

Up until this fight, each colossus is a platforming puzzle with a relatively obvious starting point. The fight with Celosia turns the game on its head once again by being more of an envir??onmental puzzle?. Instead of figuring out the correct path to climb the boss, it's a matter of figuring out how to even expose its soft body for climbing and stabbing.

Every colossus brings something new to learn, but it ??wasn't until Celosia that I felt like? a colossus could truly be anything.

Occams Electric Toothbrush:

I've always feared the ocean. I saw Jaws at a young age, as many of us do and that was when it started. This expanse of dark void, teeming with all manner of life that ranged from breathtaking to nightmarish. I had a very vivid imagination growing up. Jaws opened the door to a lot of weird shit for me in terms of learning about the ocean, especially the abyssal plain. That's why when information about Shadow of the Colossus started coming out, I knew that the water boss would be the moment for me.

The colossi never felt malignant. It felt like the world you existed in was just as much theirs as it was yours. So jumping into the water with Hydrus didn't scare ??me. It gave me a sense of awe akin to what I'd imagine seeing a blue whale cresting. What did scare me though, was the feeling of oppression the water itself gave you. Even clinging to the back of Hydrus, when you'd take in the whole scene, it all felt very small compared to the murky darkness surrounding you. There was no other marine life to be seen. Maybe Hydrus was all alone. And the first time it encounters another living creature, you kill it. Damn this game.

I wish Hydrus had a friend. I wish I coul??d have seen the bottom of that water. Even now, I feel anxious about having to play that part again. I feel like the darkne?ss is going to reach up and swallow us both. That it's this thing that is bigger than we can comprehend. Sometimes a game is just as much about what you don't see than what is right in front of you.

CJ Andriessen:

Oh shit, you meant those colossuses.

Anthony Marzano:

Chris is a meanie poopie head who stole my absolute favorite colossus but that's okay, Shadow of the Colossus is not defined by a single boss battle but instead by the entire experience. It is hard to boil my love of this game down to a single battle, the entire package still ranks as one of my favorite games of all-time. It ?was beautiful when it released, and it remains to be one of the few games I try to replay every couple years.

Shadow of the Colossus plays a sneaky mental trick on you by telling you that there are only 16 colossi in the game so that by the time you reach the double digits you are growing weary of your task. It's the knowledge that there are only a few left that helps push you forward. By the time I had reached the 14th colossus in my original playthrough I was wondering if I could beat the game. Each subsequent battle had ramped up ??th??e difficulty where the puzzle elements became tougher and tougher to the point where some battles would take the better part of an hour. Then came Cenobia. A dog like colossus that sat atop a massive set of stairs. Upon seeing me as an intruder, Cenobia immediately went to defend its keep. Cenobia had no weaknesses, so the only thing I could do is run for my life.

Through the course of trying to survive, I was climbing over and through the ruins of a once noble city, all while my colossus hunter tried desperately to knock me down. While I scampered across ancient pillars and bridges there were two thoughts in my mind: "How the hell am I going to kill thi?s thing?" and "My god, this must have been a beautiful city; what happened to it?"

Ultimately, I did defeat Cenobia but not after quite a few deaths. As I was transported back to the Shrine of Worship, the questions from the battle still hung in my mind. The battle is like a microcosm of the entire game, subtle storytelling shining through the more prominent acti?on. It's not the hardest battle in the game but it forces you to change your mentality w??hich is a bold design choice but almost always makes for a memorable experience.

Marcel Hoang:

I recall one time I was listening to a podcast, and?? the question of your favorite colossus came up. Two of the hosts chimed in together, "The flying one!" and it seemed like the two disparate hosts finally had something in common.

"Avion!"

"Phalanx!"

And they were right back at square one. They say your favorite colossus can bring a bit of insight to your taste before learning anything else, but despite Chris' Avion being a flier like my Phalanx, they couldn't be anymore different. Avion instills a sense of panic as? he dips and yaws at high speed, moisture visibl??y falling away at the depiction of speed.

Phalanx is peaceful and awe-inspiring. It's probably not even interested in figh?ting back. To me, fighting Phalanx is like becoming a western bandit robbing a train -- except this train flies, so getting on it is half the fun. Even after getting on top, he continues soaring through the air on its strange air sacs. You get to take in the world around you as you run atop this airborne locomotive, unlike the active sense of struggle and combat with Avion. I loved the chance to view the world from up top while riding this majestic dragon.

----

You don't need the prompt, but I'm going to leave it here any??way: Whi??ch colossus do you hold most near and dear?

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Sharper shadows

The Shadow of the Colossus remake is nearly upon us, so Sony is amping up the hype train by taking us behind the scenes with Bluepoint Studios' work. While each video is short, you do get to understan?d how Bluepoint approached the project and what its decision was for tackling such a beloved game.

What is a real treat is the interview with composer Kow Otani. Shadow of the Colossus has one of the ??greatest soundtracks ever recorded, regardless of medium, so it is very intriguing to learn about why he chose specific instruments and what his score was trying ??to evoke. I really wish we could get a half hour video with just him, but I'll take what I can get.

Remaking a Masterpiece: Shadow of the Colossus for PS4 [YouTube]

SHADOW OF THE COLOSSUS – Kow Otani Interview | PS4 [YouTube]

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Surely a sound to behold, too

Creating memorabilia for Shadow of the Colossus has to be something of a double-edged sword. On one hand, there's no shortage of awe-inspiring material to draw from. On the other, Shadow of the Colossus is so revered anything paying tribu??te needs to be similarly incredible but with its own artistic flair.

Leading up to the release of the Shadow of the Colossus PS4 remake, this double LP vinyl from iam8bit p??erfectly straddles those two lines. It's a majestic work of album art (Nimit Malavia is the artist) that captures the mood of the game while still ?contributing its own stylistic spin. The major sigils emblazoned in the center of each record is a particularly nice touch. And, you know, it's also the beautiful and moving soundtrack from Kow Otani.

Unfortunately, this vinyl won't be ready for the remake. It begins shipping sometime in the spring of this year, and sells for $40. If you don't want to wait that long, there's a similar already-released Last Guardian collection that's just as stunning.

Shadow of the Colossus 2xLP Vinyl Soundtrack [iam8bit]

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Check out these example shots

Built-in capturing and streaming and photo modes continue to be a highlight for me this console generation. Some games benefit from the latter more than others and I'd say Bluepoint's Shadow of the Colossus remake for PlayStation 4 definitely falls into the "highly photogenic" group.

"Everything that I had access to as the Art Director, you have access to as the player [in the new photo mode]," says Bluepoint's Mark Skelton. "You can start with a filter and adjust all the way down to color balancing the shadows, midtones and highlights. Then on top of that, control the depth of fi?eld ranges and amounts, in addition to the vignette. That's an amazing amount of control."

He also notes that you can play Shadow of the Colossus with "some of the filters running," so even if you aren't into taking pretty pictures per se, there's a reason to dig into this p??articular photo mode.

I hadn't realized this was ou??t qu?ite so soon (February 6!) and now I'm extra stoked.

Shadow of the Colossus: Photo Mode Revealed [PlayStation Blog]

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Looks on brand

If you haven't been keeping up with Fumito Ueda, he's been a pretty busy man. Over the course of a decade and a half he directed Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian, a pedigree worth retiring over.

He's still at it though, and after leaving Sony he's back with his independent studio genDESI?GN which is presumably crafting its first game. This teaser by way of the studio's official website might be our first look at that project -- an image that contains a girl on an altar (possibly a princess of some sort), and possibly a beast (or just a hairy giant man).

It's not much to go by but it seems like Ueda hasn't lost his touch, and is still content with getting weird with dreary backdrop to augment said weirdness. I wonder if it'll be a little more confined this time now ?that they don't have the backing of a major studio. I wouldn't be surprised if it was a five hour downloadable joint.

Happy New Year [GenDesign]

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Upgrade YOUR TEARS

Team ICO's 2005 classic Shadow of the Colossus is getting a full remake for PS4 next year. Sony Japan's executive producer, Yasutaka Asakura, took to the PlayStation Blog to reveal a comparison video, showing off the har??d work thu??s far.

The video features the PS4 Pro release of the revamped adventure, running alongside the original PS2 version and it's PS3 re-release. Huge leaps have been taken in improving the game's visuals and, more importantly, its notorious frame-rate issues. It certainly looks great and moves with fluidity. Hopefully as much improvement will have gone into Colossus' unwieldy camera.

"Though we have repeatedly confirmed that Shadow of the Colossus on PS4 is a full, ground up remake of the all-time classic, it is a fact that is harder to communicate via text or stills," writes Asakura. "To make it more clear, we have created a comparison video... that shows the amount of work that has gone into this project to fully leverage the horsepower of modern gaming consoles."

In related news, a Special Edition will also be available for the title. Costi??ng around $50, the set features a steelbook casing with printed manual, PSN avatar and themes, Colossi sticker?s, art cards, a world map and some in-game cosmetic items.

Shadow of the Colossus is available on PS4 February 6, 2018.

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Look at that fur

Shadow of the Colossus is one of those games I can play again and again, even on its original platform. It still holds up despite the fact that it's on the PS2, not to mention the 2011 PS3 HD versio?n, or the upcoming 2018 PS4 edition.

Oh speaking of that PS4 build, Sony gave us another update on that during its Paris Games Week conference, and it still looks incredible. Even just roaming around? seems like it'll be worth doing all over again on PS4, and that fur!

It'll drop February 6 according to the flimsy YouTube trailer description, but we've reached out to Sony for an official confirmation -- this one doesn't seem like it's going to be delayed into oblivion like Last Guardian.

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Beats Shadow of the Colossus, but doesn't hit No. 1

The wait was excruciating, but it seems to have paid off for Sony's Japan Studio. The Last Guardian has sold better than both Ico and Shadow of the Colossus did on launch in the UK, but its performance hasn't placed it at number one. Losing out to titles like Infinite Warfare and Dead Rising 4, Team Ico's latest still managed to place ahead of Nintendo's juggernaut of Pokémon Sun and Moon. That is impressive, considering how consistently Nintend?o games tend to sell.

It should be noted that these sales are only taken from the UK release and that they do not include digital copies. I don't believe that the digital numbers would increase the sales position of The Last Guardian, but it could mean good things for the g??ame. Hopefully this will show Sony that sticking to promises and taking risks pays off, as most publishers would have cancelled this title a long time ago.

1. Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare
2. FIFA 17
3. Battlefield 1
4. Final Fantasy XV
5. Dead Rising 4
6. Watch Dogs 2
7. The Last Guardian
8. Pokemon Sun
9. Skyrim: Special Edition
10. Pokemon Moon

The Last Guardian outsells Shadow of the Colossus but fails to reach No.1 [GamesIndustry.biz]

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Well, shit

When rumours first started surfacing about the prospect of a new and more powerful PlayStation 4 console, I couldn't help but be a little concerned. Despite the fact that ??this is a tactic that's been employed by Nintendo in the past with both its handheld consoles and, to a lesser extent, the various expansions for devices such as the Nintendo 64, I've always been a little hesitant about mid-generational upgrades when looking ??at them from a pro-consumerist standpoint.

For instance, while many games perform reasonably well on both the original 3DS and the newer and more powerful console in its family, there are situations such as the one that occurred with the handheld port of Hyrule Warriors where some games simply do not run as expected on the older hardware. The biggest point of concern for me was of the possibility of something ?similar occurring with the PS4 Pro a??nd the older, less-powerful machine.

Unfortunately, this looks to be the case with Team ICO's long-anticipated The Last Guardian.

According to Digital Foundry, The Last Guardian fluctuates wildly between 20 to 30 frames per second on the original PlayStation 4, which results in a game that simply does not feel smooth or fluid to play. To put it simply, playing The Last Guardian on the original PS4 is a sub-o?ptimal way to experience it, which is a damn shame.

Things aren’t much improved on the PS4 Pro in its 4K mode, which suffers from similar issues, albeit nowhere nea?r as heavily. For the most part, the framerate is much better than that of the base console’s, but there are a few moments where it actually performs worse than the less powerful hardware. Either way, performance is nowhere near optimal in this mode, which is a huge let-down.

Even more worryingly, PlayStation Universe reports that the The Last Guardian’s framerate can even dip below 10, although this was seemingly resolved by restarting the entire PS4 console.

In order to get achieve a mostly consistent framerate, you’ll need to play The Last Guardian in 1080p on a PS4 Pro. In this case, the game will render at that lower resolution, so it won’t look as nice as the 4K mode does, but th??e console will then be able to dedicate the rest of its resources to the game’s overall performance, which in turn ensures that the game will run at a more stable 30 frames per second. This lower resolution mode on the PS4 Pro will still suffer from the occasional dips, but they’re nowhere near as extrem?e as those encountered on the base console and on the Pro’s 4K mode.

To make things worse, The Last Guardian will not allow players to manually select what resolution they want to play the game in when it's actually running. You'll actually need to go into the console's settings and change the output resolution from there if you want to run the game in a different performance mode. This means that if you're an owner of a 4K TV, you'll be playing The Last Guardian with significantly worse performance by default.&nb?sp;

I really and truly hope that both The Last Guardian’s framerate can be improved on both the original PS4 and the Pro’s 4K mode and that this sort of situation is the exception rather th??an the rule when going forward. If anything, I’d love it if the PS4 Pro’s more powerful hardware could just be relegated to ??being a rather nice -- but entirely optional -- extra, instead of something that’s going to be a mandatory purchase in order to play games at even 30 frames per second.

The last thing I want is for developers to neglect the older PS4 con??sole in favour of the ?Pro, as it only harms the early adopters of Sony’s current-gen console and those who simply cannot afford to upgrade to the new hardware.

Even though I was critical of the frame-pacing issues in Final Fantasy XV, it’s at least clear that Square Enix put a lot of time and effort into ensuring that the game runs at a nearly solid 30 frames per second on even the original PS4, with the Pro receiving some relatively minor-yet-welcome upgrades on top of that. Likewise, the soon-to-be-patched-in 60FPS mode for Final Fantasy XV that Square Enix is promising really does just seem like a nice upgrade that improves the PS4 Pro version of the game without adversely? affecting owners of the older console. I’d love it if more developers could take inspiration from this, as it ensures that every PS4 owner gets to play a perfectly functional game, while also giving Pro owners a superior experience.

The post If you want to play The Last Guardian at a reasonably stable framerate, you’ll need a PS4 Pro appeared first on Destructoid.

Hopefully not the last from Team Ico

How do you really prepare for a review for The Last Guardian? You can't.

I mean, you can try. I replayed ICO and Shadow of the Colossus once Guardian had a firm, really real release date, to try to have a fresh frame of reference, but going into a game from Fumito Ueda, you really nee??d to be ready for anything.

The Last Guardian (PS4 [reviewed on a PS4 Pro])
Developer: SIE Japan Studio
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Release: December 6, 2016
MSRP: $59.99

_{[Like Team Ico's other games, it's best if you go in completely blind, so I'll avoid major story spoilers.]}

The Last Guardian is framed as an in-medias-res narrative from an old man,???? recalling his experiences, and strangely, there is very little mystery at first. The narrator notes that "he" (the boy protagonist) has awoken in a jail-like area, has strange tattoos he didn't have before, and is host to a companion in his cell, a creature called "Trico," who is initially hostile. It doesn't leave much room for interpretation, which is a relatively jarring way to start.

Because when it came to Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, I was immediately left wondering what basically...everything was from star to finish. I still am in some ways, years later! It was an early red flag, but that concept of over-explanation was immediately shaken in the first 10 minutes or so. I realized that that initial area was basically serving as a tutorial for people who were maybe turned off by the recondite and mysterious past games. My fears were brief and unfounded. The Last Guardian is real, and it's good.

It's insane how organic Guardian is. It doesn't feel like a cookie-cutter puzzle platformer, and instead delivers on the promise of giving us an actual "advent??ure." If there's such a thing as the "co?mpanion genre," Team Ico has cornered the market. I appreciate that in this era of microtransactions and multiplayer-centric project, there's still room for something like this, tumultuous development cycle or not.

This is not a high-flying, frame-perfect action game for people who want to zip around with air dashes or dash cancels. This is more methodical, reactive. Trico is created to react like an artificial intelligence -- an AI of a mythological creature, even -- and won't always come or act on your command, especially at the start. You can jump, interact, crouch, call, and tackle/throw, all of which elicit actions from the boy, but not Trico. And these actions, mind, are all up to interpretation based on the context. Interaction can mean picking up an object, opening a door, climbing, as well as a dedicated "pet" button (aw). There might be only several actual solutions to a common problem, but with the way it's presented, it feels limitless.

Don't get too excited though, because if you haven't grown up with old-school 3D platformers, prepare to fight the controls a bit. They definitely feel archaic in many ways, like Last Guardian truly is a produc??t of the PS3, or even PS2 era, but the juice is worth the squeeze. I mean, there are barely any options at the start either -- it's basically just some minor camera alterations. You're playing it the way Ueda and his team unabashedly ??intended it to be played (as an aside, I had no idea I had to mash buttons to turn a seemingly endless load screen into a five second one, so there's a tip for you!).

My only real problem is with the camera, strictly when it comes to the framing during in-game events. It almost ruins some poignant moments because it's so stringent and doesn't allow you to fully view the environment. This is in part due to how large Trico is, which is no doubt a deliberate design choice. But there are many cases where we ?get a cinematic view that zooms out or centers a bit, so it's just not consistent. This isn't normally an issue with puzzle solving?? or traversal, just exposition, so it's not a big knock, just something to consider. Same goes for the noticeable pop-in with outdoor areas.

As old as it feels at times, I can see why it took 10 years just based on the animations alone. The boy and Trico are emotive in a way that most developers wouldn't even attempt. If you cried at the end of either Fellowship of the Ring or Return of the King, expect your tear ducts to work overtime. That's not necessarily a take on any big event tha?t happens, just little things that feel genuine.

There's also a tantalizing inherent fear to not having Trico around, if you have to crawl into a cave and part with it for even a moment. As a pet owner for roughly half my life (cats and a dog), I can definitely relate to that separation anxiety. Plus, just ?like real pets, they'll piss you off from time to time and not listen. It's even more impressive when you see all of the effort that went into making Trico a part of your journey (from a visual and audio perspective), drilling down to minute details like how he'd feasibly cross over into new areas. You??'re not dragging him along like a chore, he's with you the whole way.

Like Team Ico's past work, talking about The Last Guardian too much inherently drifts into spoiler terr??itory, but we have years to unpack this. For now, I'm confident in saying that alt?hough it isn't their best work, there really aren't too many directors out there like Fumito Ueda, and I hope for our sake, he continues making games.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: The Last Guardian appeared first on Destructoid.

Acknowledgement that it 'took longer than anyone expected'

The Last Guardian has had one of the most tumultuous development cycles in recent memory. It started development in 2007 before its announcement as a PlayStation 3 title at E3 in 2009. It was delayed repeatedly before shifting to the next generation of consoles, reintroduced for the PS4 at Sony's E3 press conference in 2015. Apparently, the PS3's hardware was insufficient to run The Last Guardian at a reasonable framerate. Before the shift, the game's director, Fumito Ueda, left Sony. Shortly after, the rest of The Last Guardian's developers, Team ICO, went silent, leading some to think the game had been cancelled. Even the PS4 version has been delayed repeatedly, but it looks as though it's finally, really coming out next week.

With all of that baggage attached, The Last Guardian has a lot of expectations to live up to. It's hard to work on anything for so many years without becoming attached, and it appears as though Mr. Ueda realizes that many people have been looking forward to The Last Guardian for a very long time. That's why the media kit for the game included a letter to fans who've had no choice but to wait patiently, posted first by Eurogamer:

In case you can't read the message, the full text is posted after the break. The letter mentions Ueda's "relief" that the project is finished, as well as the many "twists and turns" that have come between The Last Guardian's inception and the finished product. Ueda's message closes with a sketch of Trico, the titu??lar Guardian.

Dear Adventurers

It's been a long time coming, but I take great pleasure (and relief!) in knowing that The Last Guardian is in your hands.

When we first began work on The Last Guardian, I intended it to take from and build on our experience working in ICO and Shadow of the Colossus, making it something akin to a greatest hits album. Unfortunately, as you know, we ran into a few twists and turns along the way, and the title took longer than anyone expected. Still, just as ICO and Shadow of the Colossus are truly unique games, so too is The Last Guardian an experience unlike any other.

As you play, ta??ke the time to stop and enjoy the scenery as you follow these unlikely companions on their journey. And you de??finitely won't want to miss the ending!

The development team and I hope you all have a wonderful time with The Last Guardian.?? Nothing would make us happier.

Fumito Ueda

The Last G??uardian media kit includes a heartfelt message from creator Fumito Ueda [Eurogamer]

The post The Last Guardian’s director has a message for fans appeared first on Destructoid.

Oh, yeah, for sure, dude

This isn't spoilers for me, because I've already played through this bit, but this Japanese The Last Guardian promotional trailer condenses (quite a bit!) the intro into about six minutes, then includes some extra cool shit with evil terracotta-ass motherfuckers and some birddog-on-birddog action, all to a track that sounds ripped from Ni no Kuni. The Last Guardian is coming out, totally for real and everything, December 6.  For a much quicker briefing, check this very pretty CG trailer.

The post Watch the start of The Last G???uardian, which is definitely coming out appeared first on Destructoid.

Clifford's here to save the day

[Mid-game spoiler warning for Ico. If you haven't played it yet I suggest you skip the next three paragraphs, past the first?? image so as not to ruin a great ??moment.]

Everyone talks about how moving the endings of both Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are, along with a few other emotional scenes. While I do concede that SOTC is the better overall game, the scene that really hit me like a sack of rice occurred about mid-way through Ico at a broken bridge much like in this trailer for The Last Guardian.

The whole game you must lead Yorda through the castle complex by holding her hand by keeping a button pressed, as well as direct her limited movement all the while constantly protecting her from various enemies. She never helps or does anything, but Ico's determination is unfailing. It is only when a bridge is destroyed and Ico is about to fall to his doom when Yorda finally reaches out her hand to save him, finally? reciprocating all the care (and love?) he has done for her.

Besides the obvious implication of having someone finally show they appreciate all you do for them and reciprocate that love, it could be expanded to have various meanings. Not as lovers or friends, but as parents putting their heart and soul into providing for their children while expecting nothing in return, then eventually having the favor returned when the kids grow up, realize, and appreciate what has been done for them. More broadly it could stand to show that with en??ough hard work and dedication, eventually you'll break through?. None of these are a stretch. Art is not about what meaning, if any, the artist puts into something, but what you take out of it.

Director Fumito Ueda would agree, remarking that (on whether or not Last Guardian is in the same universe as the previous titles) “The way I see it, maybe they are from the same world, or the same universe. But anything further than that is really up ??to the player’s imagination. Everyone has a different level of relationship with the two previous titles, so we wouldn’t dictate that it is or it isn’t. It’s up to the player.”

While Ueda admits they didn't do everything they could have in the same way they didn't accomplish everything they set out to do with the previous games, they seem to have put a lot of passion and energy into this one, particularly with regard to the large griffin-like chimera called Trico, citing emotional experience rather than scientific research: "When I was younger, I grew up in a home that had a bunch of animals. My experiences with them are great memories that I still have...But it’s really all based on my childhood memories, the way I interacted with the animals, the way they reacted to me.” Ueda and company want the players to feel as if Trico is real and alive, reaffirming "at the end of playing through?? the game, if the player feels the existence of Trico, like it’s really there, then we have accomplished what we set out to do.”

When asked about "expanding the appeal of video games," Ueda thinks there should be less barriers to entry on the grounds of skill. He's quick to defend himself on that statement though, stating " I’m not saying that games need to be easy or casual or anything like that." He mentions arcade games are limited by a certain amount of time or lives, but contrasts that with console games, "there’s no need to put a time limit or game over screen — we want people to play longer. But again, whether it’s skill requirements, or continuous challenges until you feel like giving up… if they f?elt slightly more accessible, then maybe more people? would enjoy playing video games."

The Last Guardian: New CG Trailer, Q&A [PlayStation Blog]

The post New Last Guardian trailer reminds me of th??e best moment in Ico appeared first on Destructoid.

PS4 Pro patch detailed

The Last Guardian has been a running joke for the last five or so years. Team ICO announced the title in 2009 and the game vanished more than a few times since. People began to wonder if we would ever see the title, which then resurfaced at E3 this year (before being delayed until December).

Now, with the PS4 Pro being a device, I guess the next question was whether or not this former PS3 exclusive would take advantage of the new consoles features. Well, fear not all 10% of you with a 4K television, because The Last Guardian will definitely support 4K upscaling.

Along with that and the requisite HDR support (which doesn't require a PS4 Pro), The Last Guardian is also going to have some minor performance enhancements, at least according to Eurogamer. I suppose you might? as well, at this point; the game has been delayed for so long, people are probably not going to enjoy it anyway. Why not let the less frugal among us get smoother gameplay?

The Last Guardian is getting PS4 Pro support [Eurogamer]

The post The Last Guardian may have taken a decade, bu??t it will have 4K! appeared first on Destructoid.

Now we just need a Last Guardian painting in this style

Art dealer Cook & Becker has come out with a pair of licensed giclee prints -- one for Ico, the other for Shadow of the Colossus, both excellent. Can you spare $95? Your wall will ??be better off for it.

The Ico print (40 by 34 cm) is of course based on the PlayStation 2 game's far superior Japanese and European box art, while the Shadow of the Colossus piece (40 by 28 cm) is a painting by designer Fumito Ueda from before the team had settled on that name and still referred to the project as "Nico."

These prints are limited to a 500-piece run. Even if you're unwilling ??or unable to buy them, the "about the artwork" pages serve as a nice little history lesson and detail Ueda's inspirations.

Ico [Cook & Becker]
Nico [Cook & Becker]

The post These Team Ico art prints look so great together appeared first on Destructoid.

So good

Shadow of the Colossus is one of those games that we'll be telling our kids about. Or if you already have kids, a game that you'll show them as "required reading" one day. It's so universally loved that it's cliche to even talk about it, but as usual, Did You Know Gaming manages to ??find some neat little informational nuggets for it.

Some of it spans the development process, some of it spoils and explores the lore a bit, and we also get to see some early footage of it. I still pine for that "Nico" concept, complete with multiplayer support. Team Ico deserves to be way more popular than it is, but maybe The Last Guardian will blow everyone out of the water and sell g?angbusters with t?he high PS4 install base and change all that.

The post Excuse me while I go play Sh??adow of the Colossus yet again appeared first on Destructoid.

Hands-on preview with The Last Guardian

The years-long layup leading up to The Last Guardian's release has been, Oh I just fucking know the cute dog/bird/animal thing is going to die. The death of a beloved animal pal is an easy emotional trigger that can easily backfire if done badly, but Team ICO doesn't make bad games. At the same time, unless that potential Old Yeller moment is incredibly hard-won, it's probably a bolder move to try to equal that theoretical emotional resonance in a less e??a??sy, less expected way.

I don't know how it's going to end, but I do know that The Last Guardian is real. I mean really real. This isn't just a surprise trailer, the form it appeared in at last E3. This year it got a release date and I actually got to play it. And seven years later I'm still picking up? what Fumito Ueda is throwing down.

I played what might be The Last Guardian's first 45 minutes or so, none of which included the live gameplay that was demonstrated at E3 201?5.

There's an artful opening set to light music that cuts between and pans over taxonomical drawings of animals -- bats, types of flies -- with what might be their scientific names. It feels like something out of a Jules Verne novel. The black sketches on white paper soon give way to intrigue, though, as classic fantastical creatures like the phoenix or gryphon follow the more familiar. The sequence ends on a drawing of The Last Guardian's Trico, with the word "Trico."

Ahead of? that is a short scene: a close-up on some gleaming object partially unearthed in the dirt. You can hea??r children playing in the background. The game properly opens up with the boy mysteriously waking up next to a chained-up, spear-pocked Trico.

The boy you play as serves as narrator here, but as an old ma?n recounting the tale of the game in retrospect. He notes that the tattoos all over his body were not there before, just as unexplained as his ending up there. He does have tertiary knowledge of Trico, though, a "great man-eating beast" talked about in hushed tones by his elders.

Trico is wary of the boy to begin. It hisses and recoils. Climbing up on the beast (R1 to grip, triangle to jump; it feels like ICO and Shadow of the Colossus), the boy removes one spear and gets knocked out as Trico bucks and cries in pain. And I have to give an extra nod to the fantastic animation work, from the boy's high-stepping stairs walk we talked about last year, to the realistic scramble he does when jolting away from off the floor. He moves around?? like a proper kid with goofy extremities that are still growing.

The game quietly takes its time building this relationship, though if you dawdle too long, the narrator will chime in as if he were recounting a story, but it amounts to a gameplay hint, e.g. feed the poor pup some grub to get thing??s moving?? and get him more trusting of the boy.

A bit later on, the boy worms his way through a vertical crevasse and ends up in a strange, circular, blue-ish white room with an ankle-deep pool in the middle. At the other end is an alcove with some kind of stone structure in the floor -- it looked vaguely human shaped, like a sa?rcophagus, but bigger. I was thinking c??eremonial grave. At the head is a mirror that looks to be the same gleaming object that opened the game.

The boy holds it like a buckler and can use it to create a beam of concentrated green light. As I made my way back to Trico, this spartan room absent further plunder, I learned the point of the light: Trico will shoot a magenta bolt of lightning from its tail, which has puzzle applications as ?you try and figure out how to get out of this place. It's also the most direct control you have over ?Trico

No combat in the 45 minutes or so I played and nothing else too new. It ends on the boy crawling out of the mysterious ruins and bidding Trico adieu until Trico jumps a few stories out of a large hole in the top of the structure and the two look out at the expansive, austere land. It feels like a seamless extension of ICO and Shadow of the Colossus despite the huge gap.

The post Well, at least I know the boy doesn’t die in The Last Guardian appeared first on Destructoid.

That boy ain't right

It's not just Gravity Rush 2. IGN has (part one of!) another exclusive to end this week, this time the fabled The Last Guardian which is certainly, definitely coming out this year. It's hands-on with the first 45 minutes, mind, and doesn't seem dissimilar from what we've seen so far (mostly at E3 last year in the game's half-sur?prising re?surgence).

But it does show off our tatted-up boy swimming, which pretty immediately threw me back to Shadow of the Colossus and how much the Leviathan fucked me up/paralyzed me with fear. It was my Jaws. And then, finally braving the water and seeing the fucker come up towards you and realize shitty PS2 draw distance is why it looked so small swimming around down there but no holy shit it's fucking huge oh my god help me.

I am still jazzed as hell for this game.

The post Oh great, Last Guardian’s boy can swim appeared first on Destructoid.

'We don't want to show too much'

Sony gave us a look at the long-awaited The Last Guardian at E3 -- just enough to whet our appetite. Confirming that "Yes, it definitely still exists," we were shown seven minutes of boy palling around with bird-?dog-thing. It wasn't meaningful outside of the context of, again, "Yes it definitely still exist??s." That was all by design.

In an interview with GameSpot, PlayStation head S??huhei Yoshida said that Sony's intentionally withholding footage because of the nature of the game. "Development is going well, but because it's all about the story, we don't want to show too much," Yoshida remarked. He continued "We wanted to show that it exists, it works, it runs. It's not like we won't show anything before launch, but I think we will try to limit what we show about the game."

That's not much of a departure from the past several years. At this point, we've been conditioned to not expect to see footage of The Last Guardian. That'?s why when Tokyo Game Show and Paris Games Week go by without any news, it's pretty easy to acc?ept -- even if we all just want to see some more running, jumping, and climbing with bird-dog-thing.

L?ast Guardian Footage Purpose??fully Being Held Back, Here's Why [GameSpot]

The post It’s no mistake that Sony isn’t showing us more of The Last Guardian appeared first on Destructoid.

Not quite 'playable'

【TGS2015】→→ A life-size Trico, controlled by the same AI system as in the game, is waiting you. pic.twitter.com/ORtaRRYMBN

— genDESIGN (@genDESIGN_Inc) September 16, 2015

After The Last Gaurdian's modest resurrection at E3 2015, quiet. Understandably, some people are unsure about the veracity of the thing, strung along for so long. Team ICO's new company, Gen Design, tweeted about the PS4 game's presence at T?okyo G?ame Show 2015, and it's a bit different. It's a virtual pet. (There also seems to be a separate theater screening, likely of the same E3 demo)

I'm going to go play with it soon; we're just getting off? the train out to the TGS co?nvention center.

The post The Last Guardian is making a…unique appearance at TGS 2015 appeared first on Destructoid.

Plus the blurriest screenshot ever

Sony has been worryingly quiet about The Last Guardian since E3. It wasn’t at gamescom, it was??n’t at PAX, and it hasn’t been announced for EGX.

But then Fumito Ueda’s studio genDESIGN descended from the sky to rally our spirits and continue trudging along in this dreary world without The Last Guardian. In other words, it tweeted it's going to be at the Tokyo Game Show thi?s w??eek:

We are thinking about how to take Trico to the Makuhari ( in a new and different way). pic.twitter.com/Z1IKxPkOtF

— genDESIGN (@genDESIGN_Inc) September 11, 2015

M??akuhari Messe is the convention center just outs??ide of Tokyo, where TGS will be held September 17-20. Expect a deluge of new information about the game this weekend.

The post The Last Guardian’s making an appearance at TGS appeared first on Destructoid.

Original script translated

Video game writing is so bad, guys. I mean, most writing is bad. Most books are bad, most movies are bad, most television shows are bad, this article is bad. That's just how it goes. But games have a long history of not e??ven hiring writers, let alone good ones.

So it's a good thing that Fumito Ueda is the opposite of Hideo Kojima?? and subscribes to less being more (cliche). Of 115 original subtitle cards, only 38 make it into the game. Over 70% were cut. Editing it important.

GlitterBerri's translation, which is translated directly, so it differs from the localized English translation, also deciphers Yorda's non-English dialogue. And much of what was left out is so superfluous, so unnecessary ("Nice to meet you, Yorda! That thing might come back
aga?in, so let’s hurry."), I'm qui?te glad to have it cut.

Though some o?f what was cut, while still not necessary, does shed more light on the obscure story, bits about the Queen calling Yorda her "sole heir," and Yorda's exclaiming a possibly figurative "You are not my mother." Still, final product is an impressive exercise in restraint that more games could use rather than having combat barks and filler dialogue just to traipse about our earwax.

Unused Dialogue & Script Retranslation [GlitterBerri]

The post Thank Dormin: Team ICO cut over half of Ico’s script appeared first on Destructoid.

Mark Cerny rumor 'totally bogus'

Ah, so here's a thing. Director Fumito Ueda just gave an interview with Game Informer where ??he put the delay on "a corporate decision by Sony" and not just technical issue?s. "There are always d?elays in production, as you know. Technical being one of them, but there were many others that were out of my control as well," he said. "I probably would have been comfortable with the end result ... The PS3 was not restricting me from doing something."

On the other hand, the always affable Shuhei Yoshida, head of Sony's Worldwide Studios, when asked by Eurogamer about the technical challenge of originally getting The Last Guardian to run on PS3, said, "And simply, we failed! We decided, no, we cannot make it. The trailer that we showed at E3 2009 was speeded up. It was from the development system but we t?ook it frame by frame and made it run smoothly."

He explained that this PS4 version is indeed the same original vision, "Because of the technical difficulty, running the game at the frame-rate required that the team look to compromise some features - the number of characters that Ueda-san wanted to do - if we were to continue on PS3. But because we moved to PS4, now he can make what ??he wanted. So people say it looks like the same game - there's a reason!"

Yoshida also explained the work flow and what we thought was Ueda's new company, Gen Design. "Gen Design is a small studio created by [Jinji] Horagai-san, he's the lead programmer of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. Ueda-san is independent. So Ueda-san and Gen Design and Japan Studios are three groups working as one team. Gen Designs guys include some lead animators from Shadow of the Colossus and some character designers, so that veteran team creates lots of the creative side of content for the ??Jap??an Studio team to implement. Ueda-san does the overall direction of the game design, art direction and animation."

Then there was some rumor stomping. The Last Guardian isn't costing a fortune. "No, no, not at all," he said. "The team is much smaller. Teams in Japan are much smaller in general than teams in the US and Europe... Horizon is a much bigger budget title than The Last Guardian! It's not so small, it's much bigger than Ico or Shadow of the Colossus, but it's not a US or European-style budget."

And PS4 architect Mark Cerny having took over the project? "[T]hat's totally bogus," Yoshida said. "He's been giving advice and consultation to many first-party projects...The Last Guardian team is one of them. Because it was a technical issue that made the project so long, he and other central tech groups that we ha?ve, many smart people, helped Japan Studio to re-engineer and test it."

Shuhei Yoshida on saving The Last Guardian and ??PS4 in Japan [Eurogamer]

The post Sony: ‘We failed,’ technical issues on PS3 ‘compromised’ The Last Guardian appeared first on Destructoid.

It was fine on PS3, even finer on PS4?

The Last Guardian drop?ped off the face of the earth for a few years, didn’t it? Well, turns out that may have been less Team ICO’s Fumito Ueda’s decision and more due to behind the scenes decisions?? at Sony.

In a lengthy interview with Game Informer, Ueda is poked numero??us times as to the decision to move development over to ?the PlayStation 4, despite originally being announced for PlayStation 3.

In the interview, Ueda hints at more than simply technical reasons being behind ?the delay:

There are always delays in production, as you know. Technical being one of them, but there were many others that were out of my control as well.

Ueda also mentioned that he believed he’d have been happy with the PS3 version of The Last Guardian, and the technical iss??ues or the quality of the game were never doubte??d by the team:

I probably would have been comfortable with the end result – originally, this game was designed for PS3. Assuming that all of the game architecture and all of the game design was suited to deliver the experience I envisioned, given those assumptions I think it would have been a good product… The PS3 was not restricting me from doing something.

Eventua?lly, Game Informer outright asked Ueda about his evasiveness on the topic, and got this interesting response:

It was pretty much a corporate decision by Sony. And that's where we'll leave it. [laughs] Sorry.

So there we have it: for some reason beyond our understanding, Sony held back The Last Guardian. It seems interesting that Sony would push one of its seemingl?y most anticipated games to over a year after their newest console’s debut. But at least we now know who to blame.

The Last Guardian's Long? Journey: An Interview With Fumito Ueda [Game Informer]

The post The Last Guardian went ??silent because of Sony, not Team ICO appeared first on Destructoid.

Timeless

I had a chance to get another, slightly extended look The Last Guardian demoed by creative director Fumito Ueda himself. Ueda left Sony in 2011, though it was said he remained on in a contract capacity. Ueda explained the game was in development between Sony Japan Studio and his new company, genDESIGN, which has a nifty little website up here. genDESIGN is largely comprised? of former Team ICO staff.

The demo, which Ueda was playing live on a PlayStation 4 dev kit, started a few minutes earlier than the E3 trailer. The boy -- who has been "kidnapped under mysteriou?s circumstances" -- walks over to a sleeping Trico (the catbir??ddog), climbs up and pulls some spears out from his hind eliciting cries.

From there the boy tossed wooden barrels at Trico, who happily ate them and eventually stretched up to a high perch, at which point the boy climbed his feathers and was able to access a previously gated area. After some whining, the boy o?pens a gate and the two both head outside, to the start of the E3 demo.

Ueda didn't dish much while playing. It was as if time froze and the last few years of absence didn't exist. You'll have to "utilize the strengths and weaknesses of each of the characters," he said. That is dealing with ??Trico's animal nature, which can't be directly player-controlled, and the boy's limited physical abilities.

Of course there was stuff already shown off in the trailer. The boy's delightful high-step running animation, along with a slow, adorable creep walk I didn't see yesterday. I also noticed for the first time what looks like a blue orb at the end of Trico's tail. And that second slow-motion jump where the boy grabs Trico's tail? Ueda fell to his death and respawned at right before the purple windmi??ll thing got pushed down, so it's not a cutscene, you'll still have to make the grab.

That fall was emblematic of the sense of height and depth Ueda likes to instill in his games. Trico serves as something of a ??"safety net" to help keep the boy safe, "overcome the psychological stress" of the fraught architecture.

"ICO...was about the cooperation of the boy and Yorda," while Shadow of the Colossus was "about the dynamic interaction" between Wander and the monsters. The Last Guardian is the "best of both worlds," as if Shadow of the Colossus isn't a decade old. I kind of appreciate that lack as lip service paid to the lengthy development, however interesting a behind the scenes story it may be. George Miller just came back and made a new Mad Max after 30 years. Ten ain't shit.

I'll likely have a pleasant time playing The Last Guardian next year, without mad hype or pent up disappointment??. I hope Ueda manages to realize his visi??on after all the rigamarole, because his last two games are fabulous.

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