Playstation Update

2001 isn’t exactly retro in the rest of the world, but it’s really the infancy of the PS2’s life. I just finished playing 2001’s ICO, and it was really something else. The graphics were stunning. Not just technically impressive, which they were for a 2001 PS2 game, but artistically stunning as well. It wasn’t a terribly difficult game. It’s more of a series of puzzles than anything else, but there are mild action and platform elements thrown in for balance.

The story is that of a Ico, a young boy born with a set of bull horns (I thought he was wearing a viking helmet most of the game, guess I wasn’t paying attention to the beginning). Anyhow he’s sent off to be sacrificed, but due to some rather good luck, he ends up escaping this fate. He presently stumbles across a ghostly girl locked in a giant bird cage, who he frees. He then spends the rest of the game fending off smoky black beasts that come in several shapes and sizes. Fighting the smoky guys isn’t too difficult. You just have to make sure you don’t leave the girl alone for too long, or they suck her into a smoky puddle, and you lose.

Gameplay is really seamless. Load time is impressively minimal, especially considering the beautifully rendered world. Cinematic sequences are impressive, and don’t seem to intrude much. Figuring out the controls will take you all of about 30 seconds. You can run, jump, grab things, and swing your stick. Sounds dull, but the game is so well done that it doesn’t get boring. It’s also rather short at about 7-8 hours, but since you can pick it up for about $10 now, it’s quite a bargain.

Check it out, you won’t regret it.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 6th, 2005 at 6:39 pm and is filed under Reviews, Playstation 2. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.