Ico — A Boy, a Girl, and a Castle in the Mist

Somehow, my Ico playthrough turned out timely too.

Upon mulling over the entire experience after playing it, I realized Ico is genuinely creepy in some parts — a viewpoint I realize isn’t exclusive to my playthrough. It’s nevertheless an interesting observation considering Ico has never been pushed as anything resembling a horror title. It’s a game whose main purpose involves a young boy named Ico, one due to be sacrificed due to being born with horns, pulling a girl named Yorda along with him in a journey to escape a mysterious castle. The objective is a simple one, but the road there will be treacherous.

The aforementioned perils aren’t referring solely to the game’s numerous puzzles, but also to the malignant, shadowy figures that literally creep up and try to kidnap Yorda. To prevent that, Ico has to beat them away to prevent them from taking Yorda down with them, while preventing himself from being incapacitated. She can still be saved while she’s being down into the black abyss, but watching the shadowy figures’ intense and fierce desire to sever your grip from a girl dressed in white is actually pretty harrowing to witness. Should you fail and she’s pulled down, the entire surrounding area will be turned to stone; the enemies have no use for the castle anymore.

I was personally looking forward to giving Ico another shot when the HD version was announced since I never finished the original on PS2. I got two-and-a-half hours into the game before I was far too bored to continue, and stopped at a part where I couldn’t figure out where I was supposed to go. Amusingly, when I arrived at that same part in this playthrough, it only took me two minutes to realize where I was supposed to go. I didn’t think my skills had advanced that much in terms of puzzle solving and environment analyzing in games, but all gamers need experiences like this to show how much progression you’ve made.

Having to carefully explore the environments is related to another aspect Ico does well: it does something many games these days get horribly wrong: it doesn’t hold your hand at all. It’s ironic considering the gameplay, but if you need some help to solve puzzles, you’ll find no assistance here. You have to wander around and think about each situation to find the solution to what you need to do because the developers wanted precisely that. Adding any kind of hints to help you would have pulled the player out of what is a completely immersive experience. Thankfully, the developers didn’t think to add that to the HD version.

That said, the controls are admittedly a little tough to grasp initially. The main character is an average human — albeit with health regeneration — and controls that way, meaning he stumbles often and can’t jump very high. Even so, he’s still considerably more athletic than Yorda, who takes a little longer to traverse around by herself. Ico will often have to help her jump up and over steep locations.

The game also doesn’t feel the need to shove its narrative down the player’s throat. By far the longest cut scenes are the opening and ending; you could count the number shown during the game on one hand, and have fingers left over. Part of that is because this isn’t a long game — you’ll have it done in six to eight hours. What’s important is that it feels substantial, because you’re the one in control of the game for nearly all of that time.

The development team set out to make this world completely different from the one we live in, which is why they went through the bother of making not one, but two separate languages for the game. Both Ico and Yorda speak different languages, meaning they can’t understand one another. This means they have to achieve contact through their mannerisms. Ico’s speech is translated into English, but Yorda’s will resemble Wingdings. It will be translated in a second playthrough, though, which is new to Americans.

There isn’t any music playing while Ico and Yorda are strolling around the castle. It’s a decision by the developers that pays off for gameplay purposes too, as having only the sound of nature in the background makes it easier for the player to think. This isn’t the first game to do this, but it’s always an appreciable quality when you see it. Music only pops up in cut scenes; the few of them there are.

The music the game has, though, is very nice. Ico’s soundtrack was composed by Michiru Oshima, who rarely does music for video games — she’s done more work for the anime genre. She also worked on the soundtrack for PSOne RPG Legend of Legaia, if you remember that game. The best themes are found in the introduction (the one that plays when the game boots up, not when you start playing) and the closing theme, but no theme in the game is bad.

Bluepoint Games, who also handled the God of War Collection, handled this version, and did an even better job here than with their first effort in the world of HD remastering. That’s partly due to the development staff at Team Ico, who redid the intro and most of the textures for this version. The PS2 version showed its PSOne origins in a few parts, which wouldn’t have upscaled well into 720p, let alone 1080p. It was also a little easier to handle since there’s no FMV.

And since you’ve read this pseudo-review here (assuming you didn’t scroll down to the bottom), you’ve likely guessed that I quite enjoyed playing through Ico this time around. That makes me feel better, because if I told someone I didn’t like Ico and they followed by asking me why, I wouldn’t be able to answer them. Saying “I thought it was boring” wouldn’t be enough because I can’t for the life of me remember why I thought it was boring.
I’m glad I was able to appreciate its merits this time around. Hopefully you will, too, if The Ico and Shadow of the Colossus Collection will be your first experience with it.