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[Prospero]

Okay--three years late to the party, I finally finished Ico tonight.

Pros--

--ace level design. I liked the way that the castle seemed all of a piece, instead of a bunch of separate rooms.

--nice art direction and character design, esp. the enemies.

--decent, uncomplicated, whack-a-mole combat to break up the platforming bits.

--nice music.

--nice length for a puzzle-based platformer--I finished in eight hours.

--great ending, especially an end boss that

Spoiler

had the good grace to die quickly once you figured out how to beat her, and didn't have six forms, each one more annoying than the one before. And chewing through those minions with a sword that kills in one hit was fun, fun, fun.

Cons--

--though all of the areas of the castle blended together nicely, much of the platforming was pretty tedious. Lots of climbing needlessly tall ladders and pushing blocks over long distances and such. Climbing ladders probably takes a third of the playtime. I actually preferred Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time's level design to Ico's, even though I still think Ico's design is ace. In general, I think PoP took everything that was wrong with Ico and fixed it.

--Poor controls. The hot spot for Ico to perform an action or execute a jump is never clearly defined, so that simple actions like lighting torches with sticks are a bitch and a half; Ico moves with respect to the camera, not his own body, which leads to missed jumps when the camera isn't player-controlled and whips every which way; poorly chosen perspectives for the camera lead to more missed jumps when Ico has to jump toward the camera without being able to judge the distance. The final stretch of platforming before the end boss exhibits all of these flaws in spades, and frustrated me more than any other game I've played this year.

--Yorda has terrible pathfinding AI. How many times did she stand at the foot of a ladder and refuse to climb it because she apparently couldn't figure out what it was? Too many. And why can't she follow Ico on her own? Most of the time I had Ico pulling Yorda around like he was going to yank her arm out of its socket. Again, this is something that PoP:SoT fixes.

I spent more time harping on the negatives than the positives because that is the GAF way, but also because even with the game's positives, they are almost dealbreakers. Worth the $15 I paid for it, but if I'd paid $30, or if the game had been even a hair longer than ten hours, I'd be dissatisfied.

 

[Amir0x]

I'm going to stab you in the face for saying ICO had poor controls.

ICO owns, one of the best games of this generation, one of the best games ever... and it can never be overrated by anyone.

I have spoken!

 

[Mejilan]

ICO was one of those mistakes I was suckered into buying after reading all of the impressions on GAF.

 

[Prospero]

I'm going to stab you in the face for saying ICO had poor controls.

I hope you're going to try to stab me with Ico's sword, the one that you need about three attempts to cut a rope with before you can get the game's camera to give you a favorable perspective on the swing.

 

[Amir0x]

I hope you're going to try to stab me with Ico's sword, the one that you need about three attempts to cut a rope with before you can get the game's camera to give you a favorable perspective on the swing.

No it only took me once chance.

Also I'll use the secret mace.

 

[J2 Cool]

Ico has great controls

 

[Ill Saint]

Never once had a problem with the controls or camera. Can't fault it. Maybe if you run around like a headless chicken jumping all over the place you'll have issues, but otherwise I don't really understand how they could be a pain.

 

[Fafalada]

I disagree with most of the negatives.
I liked both controls and camera better then in PoP to be honest.

As for Yorda - you may actually be right, but thing is, it's clearly a game design choice.
A smart Yorda that never wandered aimlessly, would never need my guiding hand, and would always find paths with no problems, would completely ruin the game's experience for me.
The fact that both of characters occasionaly feel&look helpless, and only have each other to fallback to, was the very heart of ICO experience for me.

 

[Kobun Heat]

(spoilers)

Not to nitpick, but no, there aren't any spoilers in here. It's impossible to spoil a game that's been out for three years. If we can't have this discussion now, when can we have it?

 

[kumanoki]

ICO was one of those mistakes I was suckered into buying after reading all of the impressions on GAF.

You, sir, have no taste.

 

[Kobun Heat]

You, sir, have no taste.

He can taste these nuts. lol am i rite

 

[Mejilan]

You, sir, have no taste.

You, sir, have no basis for such a claim.

 

[jenov4]

He can taste these nuts. lol am i rite

:lol he can taste mine also!

This thread needs more ICO love! Wanda can't come soon enough.

 

[olimario]

I loved Ico's controls.
It's the combat that stunk.

 

[kumanoki]

You, sir, have no basis for such a claim.

I can infer from your statement that you a) did not like Ico, which makes you wrong on many levels (Ico = good game, Mejilan does not like Ico, so Mejilan does not like good games) and b) were willing to blame your fellow GAF members for your 'mistake'. Therefore, I have made a hypothesis based on what I have witnessed.

 

[Amir0x]

You, sir, have no basis for such a claim.

I think not liking ICO is as good a basis as any

 

[Ill Saint]

Considering the type of game ICO is, the combat is fine. Most battles could be skipped, in any case...

 

[Mejilan]

Not really, it's purely subjective. I liked ICO's visuals, but found the gameplay to be severely lacking. I picked it up along with a slew of other titles when I first got my PS2 (this was a bit after I got my GCN, so I came to Sony a bit late, as you'd gather.) ICO was one of my bigger disappointments then, and remains so to this day.

Specifically, I didn't like the controls or the puzzles, and absolutely hated the combat. I just found the game to be largely empty and boring. It was immersive, and aesthetically pleasing, but still too empty for my tastes.

 

[dock]

Ico rose to become my favourite game of all time.
I don't think even Wanda will threaten it, to be honest.

It's interesting to hear people struggling with the controls though. I wonder whether this comes from a background of playing first-person and western 'drive the person' control mechanisms, whereas more japanese titles opt for camera relative controls (MGS, Ico, Mario, etc).

I loved the control and camera in Ico, and whilst I think I may have missed the chain with a sword swipe once or twice, the game design allows for that. Did it really spoil the experience? There's no pressure on you when you're doing these things, so I think the controls are fine.

 

[kumanoki]

I stand by my original comment.

Saying you dislike ICO is tantamount to saying you really only enjoy killing puppies on the weekends.

 

[Ill Saint]

ICO is an adventure / puzzle game in the purest form. Totally minimal. This is what the creators set out to achieve -- A game free from menus, icons, fountains of dialogue, statistics, item grabbing, fancy gameplay tricks and all the rest of it. This is specifically what appeals to me about ICO, and why I admire it so much (aside from the gorgeous aesthetics and sound). I don't think they failed in this regard.

Now the combat, it can be argued may be frustrating, unnecessary or bad. The kid already has a "3 hit combo" so I'm not sure what more people would expect. Most battles can be bypassed anyway, and on the first playthrough especially, they add a nice bit of tension to the proceedings.

As for the camera and gameplay, I said my bit.

 

[Mejilan]

I stand by my original comment.

Saying you dislike ICO is tantamount to saying you really only enjoy killing puppies on the weekends.

But... I love puppies. Platonically, of course.

Regarding the control complaints. They were gripes, for me, certainly not game-breaking. Some of my favorite genres are the adventure game, and the action RPG, so I certainly didn't have a problem controlling Ico. Just felt that the controls were too loose, not tight enough. More a distraction and annoyance than a hindrance, and it wasn't something I couldn't get used to.

And I totally get the minimalist approach. I was actually rather impressed by how they pulled that off. I also liked how... surreal, everything about the game felt. The setting, characters, "story", etc. Very unique.

 

[cubicle47b]

--decent, uncomplicated, whack-a-mole combat to break up the platforming bits.

Uncomplicated, sure, but I thought the combat in ICO was a pain in the ass that got in the way of a *decent* puzzle/platform game.

The strong points of the game were art direction and its minimalist style of storytelling.

 

[Fafalada]

Just felt that the controls were too loose, not tight enough.

All depends where you're coming from.
For me, in terms of controls/gameplay, ICO is the perfect evolution of AnotherWorld and original Prince of Persia, and both of these games also featured "loose controls" as you describe them (AW arguably even more so then Ico).
Similarly I feel that new iterations of PoP are something of a step back in that respect, but nevermind that.

There's also a lot that could be said about how control scheme fits with the visual style of the game, but I'm not gonna write essays here

 

[heavenly]

Spoiler

--great ending, especially an end boss that had the good grace to die quickly once you figured out how to beat her, and didn't have six forms, each one more annoying than the one before.

Are you throwing a jab at Metroid Prime?

 

[kumanoki]

Are you throwing a jab at Metroid Prime?

You misspelled Final Fantasy.

 

[heavenly]

You misspelled Final Fantasy.

Sorry, I wouldn't have known since I really don't play RPG's outside the time I had with Earthbound (SNES).

 

[Justin Bailey]

Yeah the controls were a bit weird, but I got used to them when I played Prince of Persia for the SNES.

 

[Vlad]

--great ending, especially an end boss that

Spoiler

had the good grace to die quickly once you figured out how to beat her, and didn't have six forms, each one more annoying than the one before. And chewing through those minions with a sword that kills in one hit was fun, fun, fun.

Neat thing that you may have missed about those minions... they weren't the usual minions. You did notice what room that fight took place in, right?

--though all of the areas of the castle blended together nicely, much of the platforming was pretty tedious. Lots of climbing needlessly tall ladders and pushing blocks over long distances and such. Climbing ladders probably takes a third of the playtime. I actually preferred Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time's level design to Ico's, even though I still think Ico's design is ace. In general, I think PoP took everything that was wrong with Ico and fixed it.

Yeah, you can defintely see the the ICO influences in SoT. One thing I liked about SoT was that the Prince was pretty quick about doing certain movements. He didn't climb down ladders, he slid down them. I also loved how he'd move a box faster the longer you were moving it (not to mention the fact that you could move a box any direction from any side, not just backwards and forward). The thing is, Ico isn't the Prince. He's just a kid, and the movement and fighting really makes it feel like you're controlling a kid, not some bad-ass warrior or anything.

--Poor controls. The hot spot for Ico to perform an action or execute a jump is never clearly defined, so that simple actions like lighting torches with sticks are a bitch and a half; Ico moves with respect to the camera, not his own body, which leads to missed jumps when the camera isn't player-controlled and whips every which way; poorly chosen perspectives for the camera lead to more missed jumps when Ico has to jump toward the camera without being able to judge the distance. The final stretch of platforming before the end boss exhibits all of these flaws in spades, and frustrated me more than any other game I've played this year.

What's wrong with the character moving with respect to the camera? Isn't that what's done in most platformers? I may be misunderstanding you, but if a character isn't controlled relative to the camera, then you have RE-style controls.

And I actually found the camera to be one of the best automatic cameras I've ever seen. It always panned and gave you the best angle on the jump you were supposed to do next, and I can't think of a single time where you had to make a jump towards the camera. The end stretch was no exception, and the camera was a total non-issue. I'm usually extremely anal-retentive about a crappy camera, but I can't think of a single part in Ico where the camera gave me any problems. Can you name a specific part?

Also, there aren't any "hot spots" where you have to press the button to make Ico jump. You just press it and he hops, although there is a bit of a delay. Even if you missed a jump, you almost always grabbed the ledge and could pull yourself up.

--Yorda has terrible pathfinding AI. How many times did she stand at the foot of a ladder and refuse to climb it because she apparently couldn't figure out what it was? Too many. And why can't she follow Ico on her own? Most of the time I had Ico pulling Yorda around like he was going to yank her arm out of its socket. Again, this is something that PoP:SoT fixes.

As others have said, Yorda isn't supposed to be the same character as Farrah. Farrah was more independent, and could do some good damage with a bow and arrow. The whole point of Yorda's character is that she's completely innocent and defenseless. To get her to climb a ladder, you need to call her from the top of it. One thing to remember is that she usually won't climb a ladder if you're still on it. I only had a few problems with getting her to try to hop up to a ledge so I could pull her up, but it's pretty easy to recognize when she's going to be difficult, and moving to a different spot on the ledge always snaps her out of it and gets her to come up.

I hope you're going to try to stab me with Ico's sword, the one that you need about three attempts to cut a rope with before you can get the game's camera to give you a favorable perspective on the swing.

Again, I think that's just you. If it's a suspended rope, all you need to do is jump straight up and swing your sword while standing near it.

All depends where you're coming from.
For me, in terms of controls/gameplay, ICO is the perfect evolution of AnotherWorld and original Prince of Persia, and both of these games also featured "loose controls" as you describe them (AW arguably even more so then Ico).
Similarly I feel that new iterations of PoP are something of a step back in that respect, but nevermind that.

Do you mean Out Of This World?

I agree though, that the loose controls give the game a very specific feel. If Ico controlled like Mario or Dante or something, then the feel of controlling a kid would have been lost. Ico was never meant to be agile, and it's not like the controls are unresponsive, they're just purposefully loose.

The thing about Ico, too, is that yes, the gameplay itself is a little on the empty side. There are a few neat puzzles, but otherwise it's all pretty straightforward. However, Ico is one of the few games I've ever seen that can get away with it as it focuses so much on the atmosphere of the game.

 

[nitewulf]

I hope you're going to try to stab me with Ico's sword, the one that you need about three attempts to cut a rope with before you can get the game's camera to give you a favorable perspective on the swing.

:lol :lol
anyway, you make a good case for yourself, though i loved ico. however, i must admit i am surprised that you picked combat as one of the pros. IMO it was the most under developed and least enjoyable part of ICO. i agree with many of your other gripes, except i found the platforming to be rather forgiving (compared to say tomb raider), as in the hot zones were pretty large, so it made platforming simpler for me.
i could initiate a jump within a large area and pretty much look away from the screen knowing that i made it, or perhaps i just had a pretty good feel for the timing. but of course, this situation consequently made the controls very imprecise, as pointed out with the torch example, and i agree it was quite annoying.
another example where the controls inpeded the gameplay was during the bomb throwing puzzles. it was an ordeal of trial and error.
i think i forgave the poor controls and combat due to the atmosphere and art style. and of course i found the puzzles themselves to be very well integrated with the environment.
frankly speaking, sometimes labour of love projects can get an A from me, even if flawed.

 

[kumanoki]

I think we all agree:

Ico > Alundra

 

[Greenpanda]

I think we all agree:

Ico > Alundra

I'd probably agree, but Alundra is still pretty great.

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

I <3 Ico.

I have no more to say.

 

[JasoNsider]

I don't want to start this again. Anybody who wants to take part in some in-depth ICO discussions, just dig up the old topic(s) we had going a while back.

While I'm here, I should mention that I'm still going 100% strong on my Wanda media blackout. How are the others doing thus far? Are there any non-spoilerific tidbits available on the game yet? As in release date, development team news, etc? The blackout is killing me, as I really want to read about the game and see the media. Must stay strong...

 

[Matlock]

Ico was pretty damn disappointing, I'll admit...both in style and substance.

(as an aside, we can assume that Mejlian has never played it, but still owns it)

But...WANDA LOOKS SO FRIGGING AWESOME.

Seriously, how couldn't you love that?

 

[JasoNsider]

Matlock, you fool! I just finished talking about being on a Wanda media blackout :lol. Have some compassion, man! Heh.

 

[Matlock]

I didn't read your post--but eh, too late now. :lol

 

[Doom_Bringer]

I didn't like it Ico at first, played it thought it was boring. But during the long boring winter break I decided to re-start the game, finished it in 8 hours and now its one of my favorite games on PS2. (same situation with Final Fantasy Tactics )

Fantastic game can't wait for Wanda.

 

[JasoNsider]

I didn't read your post--but eh, too late now. :lol

<Arnold> "...You son of a bitch" </Arnold>

Morally opposed to the edit button or something? :lol

 

[8bit]

Ico was pretty damn disappointing, I'll admit...both in style and substance.

(as an aside, we can assume that Mejlian has never played it, but still owns it)

But...WANDA LOOKS SO FRIGGING AWESOME.

Seriously, how couldn't you love that?

I wish there was an acronym to express my concurrence with the opinions of this fellow.

I found ICO somewhat lacking, but I guess that's because I found Yorda utterly inept from the outset and got bored of dragging her retarded form around.

As to Wanda, it does look nice. Hopefully it will have the something I found lacking from Ico.

 

[jarrod]

I think we all agree:

Ico > Alundra

Hell no. Ico's a medicore game saved by stunning presentation. Alundra's a stunning game with fairly mediocre presentation. Personally, I enjoy playing games that, y'know play well quite a bit more.

I do love Ico though, with it's rich world design, inspiring lighting and elemental storytelling. I do wish more game makers would pick up on what Fumito Ueda achieved with it.

 

[JasoNsider]

I think I know what you're getting at Jarrod, but to be fair, these flaws you mention were really intentional. In a way, it is meant to be the anti-thesis to the modern game design. Instead of having a complex control scheme and complex combat mechanics, it tries a simple yet elegant design.

The truth is - the game is practically trying to push away the hardcore gamers asking for "bigger and better" everything. For that, I truly admired the entire package and loved every second of the experience. Even though the logical design was still really clever, the focal point was now the "air" around you and the odd characters you are helping.

 

[Prospero]

Neat thing that you may have missed about those minions... they weren't the usual minions. You did notice what room that fight took place in, right?

Yes, I noticed that. In general, I liked the way that the game's sense of narrative was woven into the design of the castle (and the cutscenes at the beginning did a really good job of setting up the ending).

What's wrong with the character moving with respect to the camera? Isn't that what's done in most platformers? I may be misunderstanding you, but if a character isn't controlled relative to the camera, then you have RE-style controls.

For me it's not just that the character moves relative to the camera, but that the camera also moves a great deal during the execution of a series of maneuvers. To compare to PoP: usually when the Prince is about to execute a series of moves along a wall, the camera is mounted at a fixed angle and tracks along the wall, following the Prince. The result is that left on the controller is always to the Prince's left, or straight ahead, or whatever, but that position is fixed until the Prince finishes the series of moves. Then the camera swings to the next wall, establishing a new set of control directions, but it stays constant until the Prince finishes the next series.

Ico is different, however, because the camera will often assume several different angles even during an action as simple as running down a corridor. Those angles look nice, but they usually don't give the player any more information, and they also mean that actions like moving along a perfectly straight ledge or pipe usually involve pushing the stick left, then slowly angling up and to the left, then straight up, then up and to the left again, and left. Not a deal-breaker, but unnecessarily annoying.

I'm usually extremely anal-retentive about a crappy camera, but I can't think of a single part in Ico where the camera gave me any problems. Can you name a specific part?

--Any section (but especially one in the end sequence) in which a chain is hanging from outside the top of the frame and Ico has to jump from the floor and grab it. Most other platformers would give you a circular shadow or some other marker beneath the chain as a visual cue, even at the expense of realism, but Ico doesn't do that--as a result, jumping to reach the chain usually involves guesswork.

--In the area at the beginning of the end sequence that involves jumping from one swinging platform to another, the camera would have been better positioned at an angle perpendicular to Ico's jump, rather than parallel to it. That's an example of jumping away from the camera rather than toward, but as it is it's not even immediately obvious to the player that the platforms are swinging significantly enough to cause you to miss a jump. But there are at least two bits in the end sequence that involve jumping toward the camera--one in the water wheel area, and one in the circular chamber that immediately follows.

As others have said, Yorda isn't supposed to be the same character as Farrah. Farrah was more independent, and could do some good damage with a bow and arrow. The whole point of Yorda's character is that she's completely innocent and defenseless. To get her to climb a ladder, you need to call her from the top of it.

It's interesting that as AI has advanced in games like this, we see these "helpless women" far less. (Natalya from Goldeneye is the most infamous example of this kind of NPC--if some of her behaviors showed up in a game released in 2004, that game would get laughed out of town.) I agree that the narrative of the game attempts to compensate for Yorda's poor AI by justifying it, but that doesn't make her AI any less poor.

And there were so many times when calling Yorda from the top of a ladder would result in her standing in the empty space between the ladder and the wall to which it was mounted and looking around plaintively.

The thing about Ico, too, is that yes, the gameplay itself is a little on the empty side. There are a few neat puzzles, but otherwise it's all pretty straightforward. However, Ico is one of the few games I've ever seen that can get away with it as it focuses so much on the atmosphere of the game.

I have to say that overall I did like the mellow mood of the game, and the lack of stats to keep track of and whatnot. It made for a greater sense of immersion, and I wish more games were stat-free in this way.

 

[Yusaku]

--ace level design. I liked the way that the castle seemed all of a piece, instead of a bunch of separate rooms.

Funny thing is, all the rooms/puzzles were designed completely independantly of each other, then assembled into a coherent castle. Suprised it worked.

 

[Elios83]

I think I know what you're getting at Jarrod, but to be fair, these flaws you mention were really intentional. In a way, it is meant to be the anti-thesis to the modern game design. Instead of having a complex control scheme and complex combat mechanics, it tries a simple yet elegant design.

The truth is - the game is practically trying to push away the hardcore gamers asking for "bigger and better" everything. For that, I truly admired the entire package and loved every second of the experience. Even though the logical design was still really clever, the focal point was now the "air" around you and the odd characters you are helping.

What Jason says.

 

[Donkeypuncher]

Had this game sitting here for 2 years and never touched it until two weeks ago. Finished it the other day. I loved how you felt as if you were in a movie and wanted to see Ico and Yorda get out alive.

We need more games like Ico.

 

[AssMan]

Boy. Some people in here are or were expecting ICO to be an action game with heavy emphaises on fighting. The game was purely made for exploration and platforming.

 

[cubicle47b]

Hell no. Ico's a medicore game saved by stunning presentation. Alundra's a stunning game with fairly mediocre presentation.

Well put.

 

[jarrod]

I think I know what you're getting at Jarrod, but to be fair, these flaws you mention were really intentional. In a way, it is meant to be the anti-thesis to the modern game design. Instead of having a complex control scheme and complex combat mechanics, it tries a simple yet elegant design.

The truth is - the game is practically trying to push away the hardcore gamers asking for "bigger and better" everything. For that, I truly admired the entire package and loved every second of the experience. Even though the logical design was still really clever, the focal point was now the "air" around you and the odd characters you are helping.

Intentional or not, 'elegant' is hardly the word for Ico's muddy combat and 1998 block puzzles. Minimalist design shouldn't have to ensure archaic, sloppy game mechanics... saying Ico plays badly because it's suppossed to is a cop out at best. Ico could play much better without adding unwanted complexity.

 

[Parallax Scroll]

Ico has a better camera than every other third person 3D action/platform game ever made.