Before I ever played Shadow of the
Colossus (SOTC) I had rented a copy of Ico just because the cover
looked interesting. The problem was however that even renting video
games at that time was quite costly. Also you could only rent the games
for a few days so you had to finish the games in a very short time
which was pretty difficult even if you were on holiday. Most PS2 games
had more than 30 or 40 hours of game play. The consequence was that I
had to choose certain games to play and ignore games that weren't
appealing at first glance. And usually I chose popular games since
these were the games that were written about. "Ico" wasn't popular and
got rejected by me although I did notice that it was a beautiful game.
After having played SOTC I did not immediately felt the need to play
Ico,but upon seeing the title in a game shop I was curious if I would
love it as much as I did SOTC. Well,without a doubt I can say that I
loved the game. Although I found it more annoying at times especially
because of the camera that made it hard to see where I was going. This
games breathes the same atmosphere as SOTC with one slight difference.
The world of Ico was more livelier and colourful than SOTC. Figuring out
puzzles in Ico did take more time since absolutely no hint is given
what to do next. In SOTC at least hints were given when you were stuck.
In Ico you have to figure it for yourself. Also the girl didn't
respond as often as I would like (just as in real life Ha Ha!!!) but
soon got over this flaw once I saw the little boy holding her hand and
guiding her through the Castle,it never got tiresome. There is
definitely a cuteness factor that makes this game more appealing. As in
SOTC the story is left very abstract and it is not clear what is going
on exactly. Still the game managed to suck me in and finish the game
just to see if the boy succeeds in protecting the girl. The first
ending therefore was very hard to swallow and couldn't believe that
they would end the game like that. The second ending (after credits)
gives the player the hard earned ending. Ico is a classic that isn't as
epic as SOTC but still a beautiful game that manages to engage you
deeply.
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