Presenting, Team Ico
This article was featured on LevelFortyTwo.
Fumito Ueda was born in Tatsuno, Japan in 1970.Fumito was an imaginative child, loving all wildlife as well as having an obsession with animation, “Anything that moved” as he promptly put it. Much later, in 1993 he graduated from Osaka University of Arts. Yet just two years on he gave up pursuing life as an artist and focused his aspirations of the videogame industry.
Fumito became an animator for the now-defunct videogame developer WARP. He worked on Enemy Zero for the Sega Saturn and mentioned dislike for his time there as the team was always behind schedule and therefore always doubling effort to meet the demanding deadlines.
Again, two years later Fumito joined Sony Computer Entertainment as a first-party developer. Since then Fumito Ueda and his ever-growing elite team have contributed to Playstation 2 users in a way like no other.
With the history out of the way, the show can go on. Now, I will talk personally and with appraisal about Team Ico and their phenomenal games.
The inspiring Ico, originally intended for the first Playstation, managed to break gamers’ hearts worldwide when released in 2001. Unfortunately the game didn’t get enough publicity at all and to this day has only sold 700,000 copies, only which of 270,000 were sold in the United States. Eventually, rumour spread among avid gamers alike that this game was more than good, and that you should seek it out because one day (today) it would be an absolute nightmare to find in the shops.
Ico is predominantly a solemn, lone experience; its primary attraction being the lack of dialogue, use of colour and atmospheric environments all involving a twosome of very empathy-inducing, loveable characters on a seemingly never ending, impossible journey.
From the get-go the player is immersed into a beautiful world, foreign and deadly, yet very real and utterly believable. You control a boy, horned and therefore cursed by the radical laws of the territory. The boy breaks free of imprisonment and begins his dramatic escape from this humongous castle. Players are thrust straight into the game, with no real ‘objectives’ other than to find your own way out. Throughout the experience of Ico, you will encounter puzzling platforming sections; close quarters combat with ghostly spirits and traverse your way out of the most demanding environment ever virtually created.
Alas, the cursed boy soon finds Yorda. She is a woman who radiates light and speaks an alien language. Freeing Yorda from a primitive cage, the boy is tasked with her escape as well as his own. Ico involves the player so much in the experience, that this game is, controversially, seen as more than just a game. It is widely renowned as a form and variety of art.
I cannot overemphasize enough, the amount of willingness I felt for these characters. It is unbelievable, looking back that the combat, however one-button based it was, could emulate so much passion for the remarkable bond between the two protagonists. There is nothing like it, in any game. Defending the helpless Yorda with nothing but a stick against the evil queen’s spawn is a brilliant gameplay moment. Personally, I’ve never shouted at my T.V so much at any game, though not in frustration, as it usually is!
This argument aside, it is easily one of the most groundbreaking games of the last generation, showing deep emotion and design simplicity can overwhelm even the thickest of skins.
Team Ico didn’t shy away from critical success, anything but. Focusing on only improving on their skill and expertise with their latest and in my opinion, greatest game yet.
Shadow of the Colossus was a long wait for me, being in PAL territory; the United Kingdom didn’t get it until February 2006, while North America and Japan had it readily available for October 2005.
In Shadow of the Colossus, you take reigns (pun intended) of Wander. A young man who has lost the life of a woman he loves. In this dystopia, this gorgeous horizon, a rumour is ripe that a temple far into ‘forbidden lands’ possesses the power to resurrect the dead. And so, Wander travels to the temple and is set upon by a thunderous, transcendent voice that commands him to slay sixteen Colossi in exchange for the woman’s life.
I felt as though Team Ico wanted to grasp a wider audiences attention and so they made a more action-oriented game. Though Shadow of the Colossus did not loose any of the edge that made Ico so special. Instead of Yorda, there is your trusty steed, Agro. Again, personally I felt more attachment to Agro than to Yorda.
How is this possible, that I bonded more so with a horse than a human being? I suppose the motion capture and exceptional motion capture helps, creating the most lifelike animal ever seen in video gaming. It’s still not been surpassed, I’ve beaten Assassins Creed 2 recently, and while a great game in its own right, the horses still don’t match Agro’s credibility. Which is an amazing achievement.
A massive change of direction for Fumito Ueda was the hiring of the undeniably talented Kow Otani, in which his music is only really present when a Colossus is, and is extremely powerful. Ico didn’t have much music in the game at all; I wouldn’t even call it ‘music’, more ambiences. The forlorn adventure that Wander and Agro embark on is just amazing. Graphically, at the time it took the Playstation 2 to its limits, with bloom lightning and no loading times when riding Agro around a huge landscape.
With those game now very much in the past, Team Ico is in progress of developing and designing one of the most anticipated games of the year, The Last Guardian. I can see the resemblance between it and Ico and cannot wait enough for it to be finished and it is in my hands. But, in true Team Ico fashion, it will be done when it’s done, right? Look at for it Spring/Summer next year.
Fumito Ueda was born in Tatsuno, Japan in 1970.Fumito was an imaginative child, loving all wildlife as well as having an obsession with animation, “Anything that moved” as he promptly put it. Much later, in 1993 he graduated from Osaka University of Arts. Yet just two years on he gave up pursuing life as an artist and focused his aspirations of the videogame industry.
Fumito became an animator for the now-defunct videogame developer WARP. He worked on Enemy Zero for the Sega Saturn and mentioned dislike for his time there as the team was always behind schedule and therefore always doubling effort to meet the demanding deadlines.
Again, two years later Fumito joined Sony Computer Entertainment as a first-party developer. Since then Fumito Ueda and his ever-growing elite team have contributed to Playstation 2 users in a way like no other.
With the history out of the way, the show can go on. Now, I will talk personally and with appraisal about Team Ico and their phenomenal games.
The inspiring Ico, originally intended for the first Playstation, managed to break gamers’ hearts worldwide when released in 2001. Unfortunately the game didn’t get enough publicity at all and to this day has only sold 700,000 copies, only which of 270,000 were sold in the United States. Eventually, rumour spread among avid gamers alike that this game was more than good, and that you should seek it out because one day (today) it would be an absolute nightmare to find in the shops.
Ico is predominantly a solemn, lone experience; its primary attraction being the lack of dialogue, use of colour and atmospheric environments all involving a twosome of very empathy-inducing, loveable characters on a seemingly never ending, impossible journey.
From the get-go the player is immersed into a beautiful world, foreign and deadly, yet very real and utterly believable. You control a boy, horned and therefore cursed by the radical laws of the territory. The boy breaks free of imprisonment and begins his dramatic escape from this humongous castle. Players are thrust straight into the game, with no real ‘objectives’ other than to find your own way out. Throughout the experience of Ico, you will encounter puzzling platforming sections; close quarters combat with ghostly spirits and traverse your way out of the most demanding environment ever virtually created.
Alas, the cursed boy soon finds Yorda. She is a woman who radiates light and speaks an alien language. Freeing Yorda from a primitive cage, the boy is tasked with her escape as well as his own. Ico involves the player so much in the experience, that this game is, controversially, seen as more than just a game. It is widely renowned as a form and variety of art.
I cannot overemphasize enough, the amount of willingness I felt for these characters. It is unbelievable, looking back that the combat, however one-button based it was, could emulate so much passion for the remarkable bond between the two protagonists. There is nothing like it, in any game. Defending the helpless Yorda with nothing but a stick against the evil queen’s spawn is a brilliant gameplay moment. Personally, I’ve never shouted at my T.V so much at any game, though not in frustration, as it usually is!
This argument aside, it is easily one of the most groundbreaking games of the last generation, showing deep emotion and design simplicity can overwhelm even the thickest of skins.
Team Ico didn’t shy away from critical success, anything but. Focusing on only improving on their skill and expertise with their latest and in my opinion, greatest game yet.
Shadow of the Colossus was a long wait for me, being in PAL territory; the United Kingdom didn’t get it until February 2006, while North America and Japan had it readily available for October 2005.
In Shadow of the Colossus, you take reigns (pun intended) of Wander. A young man who has lost the life of a woman he loves. In this dystopia, this gorgeous horizon, a rumour is ripe that a temple far into ‘forbidden lands’ possesses the power to resurrect the dead. And so, Wander travels to the temple and is set upon by a thunderous, transcendent voice that commands him to slay sixteen Colossi in exchange for the woman’s life.
I felt as though Team Ico wanted to grasp a wider audiences attention and so they made a more action-oriented game. Though Shadow of the Colossus did not loose any of the edge that made Ico so special. Instead of Yorda, there is your trusty steed, Agro. Again, personally I felt more attachment to Agro than to Yorda.
How is this possible, that I bonded more so with a horse than a human being? I suppose the motion capture and exceptional motion capture helps, creating the most lifelike animal ever seen in video gaming. It’s still not been surpassed, I’ve beaten Assassins Creed 2 recently, and while a great game in its own right, the horses still don’t match Agro’s credibility. Which is an amazing achievement.
A massive change of direction for Fumito Ueda was the hiring of the undeniably talented Kow Otani, in which his music is only really present when a Colossus is, and is extremely powerful. Ico didn’t have much music in the game at all; I wouldn’t even call it ‘music’, more ambiences. The forlorn adventure that Wander and Agro embark on is just amazing. Graphically, at the time it took the Playstation 2 to its limits, with bloom lightning and no loading times when riding Agro around a huge landscape.
With those game now very much in the past, Team Ico is in progress of developing and designing one of the most anticipated games of the year, The Last Guardian. I can see the resemblance between it and Ico and cannot wait enough for it to be finished and it is in my hands. But, in true Team Ico fashion, it will be done when it’s done, right? Look at for it Spring/Summer next year.