Team Ico’s classic PS2 game is remade from the ground up on the PS4, and instantly becomes one of the best games on the console.
The fact that there even is an argument over whether video games are art just shows how poorly regarded the medium is by the establishment. The Oxford English Dictionary defines art as ‘the expression or application of creative skill and imagination, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power’. The idea that video games do not, or cannot, fulfil those roles is, frankly, insulting. But there’s now an easier way than ever to show how a video game can excite you on a visceral, intellectual, and emotional level: play the remake of Shadow Of The Colossus.
Shadow Of The Colossus was first released on the PlayStation 2 in 2005, as a follow-up to the equally well-regarded Ico (last year’s The Last Guardian had a more mixed reception). The first two games were remastered for the PlayStation 3 as a double pack in 2011 by Texan developer Bluepoint Games, whose own love for the game led them to push for this full-blown remake. It does seem a little odd for them not to have remade Ico first, but a direct connection between the two games is only implied right at the end – and does not impact the central narrative.
Not that Shadow Of The Colossus has much in the way of traditional storytelling. It starts, with no explanation, as a young warrior enters into a forbidden land to beg a disembodied entity into resurrecting what is implied to be his dead lover. To do so, he is tasked with destroying 16 colossi, using nothing but a magic sword, a bow, and his loyal horse Argo. In plot terms almost nothing else happens until the shockingly bittersweet ending, but in emotional terms the game is alive with intrigue from the first moment.
The gameplay of Shadow Of The Colossus is just as streamlined as the storytelling, and while Ico was a relatively traditional 3D platformer its follow-up is essentially an elongated series of boss battles. To reach each colossus you travel across an enormous and beautifully rendered game world, but there is nothing to do in the open world: no smaller enemies to fight, no characters to talk to, and only the briefest of platform sections to navigate.
The remake adds at least one new Easter egg (and a photo mode) but in terms of design and structure this is exactly the same game that was released in 2005. The infamously frictionless controls have been tightened up but the most significant change is simply the graphics, which are now amongst the best ever seen on the PlayStation 4. The majestic plains and mountains of the forbidden land are now achingly beautiful, while the colossi are blessed with such realistic hair and fur you’d almost want to give them a belly rub if they weren’t 30-storey tall monsters.
In terms of gameplay, there’s a very regimented way of beating each colossus, where you first must locate their weak spot by shining your sword on them and then work out a way to get to it. It’s inevitably on their head, or some other inaccessible spot, and so you realise you need to get them to crouch, stand over a hot geyser, or perform some other self-defeating trick to help you up.
Although clambering over the often Godzilla-sized monsters is always exhilarating, except in two or three cases there is a relative lack of variety in the basic business of destroying them. The main mitigating factor to this is the game’s beauty and melancholy ambience. Even ignoring the new technical standards, the art design is incredible and the scale and detail of the colossi is literally staggering. The sense of weight and power as they slam a fist or foot into the ground is jaw-dropping, and it almost seems impossible that such a thing started life on the PlayStation 2.
More interesting even than that though is the ambiguous morality of your task. Your main character’s motivations and background are never explained, and most of the colossi have no interest in you and do not attack until you do. Shadow Of The Colossus’ story and atmosphere are not forged in words or cut scenes but in the bleak landscape that rolls by accusingly, as you ride towards your next doomed encounter. The plot has a beginning and an end but the details of the story are truly interactive, in that they’re formed in your mind by your own reactions to events.
Quite apart from the game’s own intrinsic qualities this is a superb remake, by a developer that clearly understands the original game perfectly. The changes to the controls are just enough to avoid frustration and yet still retain the character of the original. The visuals are equally without fault, with a standard PlayStation 4 running everything at a steady 30fps. Although a PS4 Pro has the option of either boosting the resolution to 4K or increasing the frame rate to 60fps at 1080p.
But it seems almost vulgar to dissect the game’s technical accomplishments when its real achievements are artistic. It’s great that the game looks better than ever, but it’s really no more or less affecting now than when it was on the PlayStation 2 – it’s just modernised enough for the graphics not to be a distraction.
Questioning whether games are art isn’t an issue of whether the visuals are pretty or not, but whether the game is able to inspire an emotional response from you – and ideally something other than just anger. Shadow Of The Colossus manages this with such effortless sleight of hand it seems almost literally magical. Although how exactly you respond to it will depend on your own life history and experiences – just like any great work of art.
Shadow Of The Colossus
In Short: A stunning recreation of one of gaming’s most enduring classics, and what remains a towering example of the art of interactive entertainment.
Pros: Some of the most assured and emotionally engaging art and gameplay design ever seen in a video game. Excellent remake, with superb graphics and updated controls.
Cons: If you’ve played the game before there isn’t really anything new here beyond the visuals. The gameplay mechanics and boss battles can sometimes seem a little too simplistic and repetitive.
Score: 9/10
Formats: PlayStation 4
Price: £29.99
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Developer: Bluepoint Games and Team Ico
Release Date: 26th January 2018
Age Rating: 12
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