Why Sony’s latest breakthrough in gaming software is such a major landmark lauded by everyone as a work of art & poetry? Is it all about technology? Fighting huge giants? We are trying to dig out some crucial uncharted specific features of Shadow and its equally glorious predecessor Ico that were shamelessly not covered by the same "everyone".
I wonder as i, Wander ride the solemn and vacant plains of this forbidden land: will i be able to strike down the sixteen colossi? Will I have the strength to accomplish this almost impossible task with my sole horse, my sword, bow and my bare hands? Will she then unrest from her lifeless sleep, as the voice above promised? Now the water is cold and the stone ruins around have a creepy dampness to them. I can sense the creature's lurking presence underneath the pitch black lake. Fear shall not fail me though i can feel distress, melancholy and despair pervading my entire body and soul, with every move, with every breath and with each giant i am endlessly putting down to rest. But love shall not fail me…
Last year, SCEI released a true major game. Being the successor of an already previous landmark game with-a-cult-following-albeit-poor-sales named Ico, Shadow Of The Colossus was the object of many many many people’s lingering wait. One year after its release, the game is going GOTY everywhere and the sales revealed to be much stronger than its beautiful predecessor. Moreover people talk of a work of art, people talk of poetry, all of this praise pulling out Shadow Of The Colossus from being just another numberless media to pop in your entertainment system for your silly pleasure. But where does this poetry come from? What choices and apparent references build up to it?
Inspiration: take a deep breath
Though coming from an internal Sony japanese team with the now superstar Fumeto Ueda as its lead game designer, Shadow, very much like Ico, share a strong occidental and european feel. It is not inusual in japanese animes, games and pop culture, but it rarely goes to such a high standard, critical, ethereal level. Within the videogames field, they seem to be inspired by such important titles as Jordan Mechner’s Prince of Persia (for the main character being trapped in a creepy castle, its outstanding animation) or Eric Chahi’s Another World (for the-beautiful-yet-sad-and-sometimes-harsh-out-of-our–world-atmosphere, the sidekick bonding) and Heart Of Darkness (for the hero being a kid, the foes with Gremlins like animation and behaviour). Ico’s artwork for the Japanese and European sleeve cover was already crafted as a truly piece of art, (much like Another World’s standout cover at the time) clearly standing at the exact opposite of the way games are usually marketed, and saying something strong about what's in the box: Ico and Yorda’s faceless characters are two but lost tiny shadows running away amongst gigantic castle ruins. The colors and style used there are directly refering to the works of the Greek native painter Chirico .
The artistic value of this sleeve doesn’t come only from being an homage to a renowned artist. It doesn’t either suffer for depicting a product made available in trivial places (put Warhol’s name here, quote Coppola’s Tucker when he says "what’s important is the idea. Then it’s only reproduction"). It made sense to the essence of the game, it truly expressed it in an unusual way, carrying out its mood upfront instead of selling it at any cost. And what’s the mood of Ico? It mainly deals about loneliness and facing the whole wild world. It’s what you do in order not to be alone. It’s feeling lonely for the other. It’s a total expression of a man’s vision of the human being. A simple one, but cleverly injected into an action-adventure videogame whose spirit, story, visual and gameplay mechanics rely entirely on this personal foray. In fact in Ico you are not even the stake of the game. Though you are controlling the title character, the deal is about Yorda. Sorry pal, you are only the Johnny Guitar guy around here, because she’s the one the evil forces in town are after! Rejecting the individualist position of the gamer while playing with its sense of solitude is certainly one of the boldest feature of both Ico and Shadow games.
Expressionism and symbolism
Before you even start the game, the sleeve cover says you are a tiny element in this world who is going round, empty or not and with or without you anyway. To express this sense of loneliness in these empty areas Ueda is portraying, light and dark are important elements of the two games graphic palette. It is no big deal risking to say there’s a true -ism central artistical movement that seem to affect Ueda’s aesthetics at play: expressionism. The goal and effect is mainly to emphasize the perspectives and your sensibility to your surroundings and the world is seen as a wide artificial setting. In Ico and Shadow, apart from the evil Vs good theme (that is totally twisted in purpose in the later game), light and dark express loneliness and other forms of pathos and personal views through the different ways it is used and the subsequent symbolism. To me, Shadow deals very much with the struggle one man’s got to face everyday for a living, the colossi symbolizing our History as walking ruins, growing urbanism and concrete, the world’s constant pressure upon your shoulders, place commercial here, fighting your one self, your shortcomings and blahs, even fighting the idea of death itself. It even maybe tackles our relation with religions, considering the almost god like status of these colossi.
Solitude standing: Where is everybody?
While you had to take care of a very special sidekick in Ico, a young woman for instance, Ueda's nonetheless insisted on the loneliness feeling, a sense that mainly lied upon a strangely empty occidental, medieval type castle and the permanent play with the characters set against huge solemn walls and the resulting powerfully evocative perspectives. In Shadow Of The Colossus, Fumeto pushed it farer. This time your sidekick is a horse, not a person. And your lonely prison is not a languid castle anymore, it is your own freedom. When you are not hunting for some new colossus to crush down and remove from your kill bill list, you can freely visit the plains of the forbidden land you have entered at the beginning of the game. And this time, as it was –almost- the case in Ico's castle, this land is totally empty, minus some eagles, birds, lizards, and of course the balance between the mountain cliffs' darkening shadows and the blinding rays of the sun. This loneliness emphasizes something that was very present in Ico and grows much deeper in its prequel.
A little thing called "amour courtois"
With its wooden stick as a main weapon, added to the fact that he is a kid, Ico is quite an unlikely "chevalier". And if you add the seemingly impossible fights between you and the sixteen colossi in Shadow, it surely rings a Don Quichotesque bell . But it’s not only about existential-fights-against-stronger-than-you-are forces. Fumeto Ueda takes a stand toward bonding, companionship, and really, heterosexual love. An here is our crucial point. Intentional or not, the sub themes of both games are those irrigating the middle age litterature called "littérature courtoise" and other epic european tales. Tristan and Iseut, Lancelot, Siegfried and countless other fondamuntal "chansons" are based on these following codes and themes: starcrossed lovers, the forbidden act of love, a cheated ruling king opposed to the runaway lovers, shared exile and solitude in pastorale surroundings, the "chevalier courtois" ready to do anything and kill anyone for his love, hence swords, horses, magic, castles and until-i-die-for-my-lady’s-sake fights a plenty, treason leading to the death of one of the lovers or both...
Every single of these essential codes is present in both Ico and Shadow with subtle variations. Ico does it very bravely by introducing a couple of kids. Ico is so touching because the nascent bond between them can only be pure and chaste. And chastity is a key point in "littérature courtoise". While Ico was said to be very important for introducing a gameplay where a young boy takes care of a young lady, it has almost never been clearly said that:
- Ico is the knight figure;
- Yorda as the princess;
- The opposing ruling figure to their bond is her mother the sorceress;
- They are both lost in a medieval castle.
Although never clearly said in main words, it is the main source (or at least the closest thing) ruling of Ico and his prequel’s look, feel, and gameplay.
In case we didn’t get it, Ueda once again took a step further in Shadow. This time, kids are asleep and we do handle a young adult love story. Yes again it is not clearly said that Wander and the dead lady he brings to the forbidden land are lovers. It is said otherwise, in a complying way to perhaps the most important Courtoisie code: Wander accepts anything to save his "dame". One powerful unknow entity tells him to defeat sixteen colossi and he says yes without a second thought. Why? Because he is stupid? Certainly not. He is ready to do anything to save her life. Remember: the means and the quest are always unquestionable. The riskier the quest is, the mightier love is proved to be. And if you consider that she’s dead at the beginning and that in the end he is the one to pass out, on a Star crossed lovers Greatest Hits, you couldn't get more explicit lyrics. And Ueda plays around well with the star crossed element and the must-be-done-at-any-cost quest. Don’t forget the trusty horse, the magical sword, the pastoral areas you are riding through, the fatherly opposing figure of Lord Emon, the forbidden land symbolizing the cheating part... And this time though there are still no sexual intercourse on screen, the presence of the baby in the end is quite clear. There is never a baby in this european litterature. They can’t make love because its cheating over the king and they die anyway at the end! How clever Ueda’s final gesture is. It is supposed to be our shrinked Wander, but hey, we know what’s the real sub meaning. Symbolically, it is simply their infant. Just throw in Wagnerian battles against the sixteen colossi and a bit of Siegfried and here you are. This is the kind of poetry it feeds on.
Farewell sweet knights
Shadow Of The Colossus blends poetry, doubt, solitude, through its radical gameplay choices, its orchestral music and its pathos from the most little details (like Agro's always awaited little jump or the falling rain in the intro), to gigantic effects (the gruesome and beautiful wagnerian battles against the all odd giants). Moreover, it dares sadness. In a time when pop culture is a major hedonistic trash bag and real melancholy an hard seller, we tend to forget that sad songs are often the most inspiring. And this one along with Ico is a truly emotional standout. And with all the –isms there, symbolism, existentialism, expressionism, Shadow does not only radically redifine the position of the loneliness of the long riding gamer, it pushes forward and manages to propose a variation of the golden rules from our romantic litterature and cultural history to deliver a strong modern and personal view about our present day. Unsurprisingly, it has been said that Ueda and his team are working on a new project for the PS3. Beware you keepers of truth, you guardians of beauty out there. Your barriers shall not be strong enough to avoid such a cultural shift, such a colossal tidalwave.
Sylvain Thuret 2007
This article was written for a job application to Edge in the first place.
