The games people play

Despite my acute interest in the world of video games, I don't play all that many games, largely because only a small percentage of the games hold any interest for me. Partly it's because I'm a novelty seeker. "Different" appeals to some deep and primal part of my psyche and too many games do little more than rehash familiar old ideas without adding anything new to the mix. One of the reasons for my purchase of a Gamecube was that there were simply more games available for it that captured my interest, primarily the continuation of the Zelda series and the conversion of Metroid to the 3D. Sequels in the broad sense, it's true, but with exquisite execution, and hardly mindless clones of what went before (Zelda: Wind Waker brought cel shading to new heights, and Metroid Prime was a true first person perspective platform game). There were plenty more: Eternal Darkness, Viewtiful Joe, Resident Evil 4 and Pikmin, amongst others.

The PS2 on the other hand, despite it's dominance of the industry, has to date only a single game exclusive to the platform that I'm keen to play: the ethereal and hauntingly beautiful Ico. None of the other top titles for the PS2 pique my curiosity much, certainly not the Grand Theft Auto series, which is a little overly violent for my tastes. That however, is on the verge of changing. Katamari Damacy is finally scheduled for a European release (or rather it's sequel, the similarly odd We Love Katamari), the remains of Team Viewtiful are developing Okami, whilst the developers behind Ico are nearing the completion of Wanda To Kyoza (now rather disappointingly renamed Shadow Of The Colossus).

Katamari Damacy is the sort of game that I discovered I was keen to play before I even knew what play involved. References to it were cropping up on the net with increasing frequency and increasingly reverential tones, and this despite the fact that it had yet to escape the confines of Japan. From what I could gather, the game was something of a break for the norm, quite possibly even that rarest of things: a new genre. My curiosity piqued, I sought out further information. Underneath a delightfully bizarre plot involving the King of All Cosmos, his son, and an attempt to repopulate the stars in the sky (I believe the King of All Cosmos lost the stars after a heavy night in the Japanese original, though this seems to have been sanitised for the western release) and is possible the world's first roll 'em up. The game play appears wonderfully simple: In your Princely guise you control a ball - the eponymous katamari - with the joypad's analogue sticks and you have to increase the size of your katamari by rolling over items lying around the world. Larger items can't be clumped to the ball until the ball has reached a certain size. And that's pretty much it. What makes the game special is it's gratuitous sense of whimsy, from it's batty plot, bonkers art style and irrepressibly cheery music (I downloaded the score from the game - you'll either be carried away with it's charm or fall into a diabetic coma from it's sweetness). I should probably mention that at the start of the game the size of your katamari is measured in centimetres, and towards the end it's sweeps up clouds and rainbows and continents in it's wake. Have a look at the official site - it's remarkable in just how little information it offers about the game, but it'll give you a very good idea of it's style.

Okami, on the other hand, isn't quite so immediately innovative in play. From initial looks, it's shaping up to be a Zelda-esque adventure of which there have been plenty. Hopefully that description won't do the final game justice, however, since there are a couple of features that separate this from the common herd. The most immediately obvious of these is the art direction in the game. Okami, quite literally, looks like no other game I've seen. Rather than striving for realistic visuals, the game instead apes the style of Japanese watercolours and calligraphy. The effect, from the screen shots is simply dazzling, though less so when the game is in motion slightly ironically. The watercolour theme is also carried into the game itself - playing as a sun goddess in the form of a wolf, the player has to solve certain puzzles by using the wolf's tail as brush to paint upon the world itself. You may need to draw a bridge over a river in order to ford it, for example. It sounds like a lovely concept, although I'm a little skeptical about how it will work in practice. Still combined with the serenely beautiful visuals, and the pedigree of the development team, I'm certainly intrigued.

Lastly there's Shadow Of The Colossus. There's a been a fair bit of information released about the game, but there still appears plenty of questions left unanswered. I'm a little disappointed that it's not a direct sequel to Ico. Although set entirely outdoors on vast plains, compared to Ico's intricately detailed interiors, there's no mistaking the art style of the game - it's most definitely a sequel in that regards at least, and the game appears undeniably beautiful as a result. The game play seems entirely different however. The titular colossi are vast, mountain sized creatures, which you are tasked to find and stop, in what appears to be a spectacular fashion. Rather than playing as standard end of level guardians, each colossus is in effect a unique puzzle it's own right, with the question of how to scale and stop the creature forming the significant part of the game. It's not yet clear what the game offers outside of these creatures though - or what finding them entails. I'm hoping this will form a significant part of the game, otherwise it may devolve into monotony. That you're afforded a companion in the form of a horse (echoing Ico's Yonda, perhaps) as well as mystical sword that glows when pointed in the direction of the next colossus, gives me some hope that there's more depth to the game.

I'm not about to rush off a purchase a PS2 just yet, but if all the games above turn out as well as I'm hoping (and I do have a pretty good track record for such things, if you'll allow me a small boast), then I can see myself being tempted.