Ико: Шадырлар қамалы мен қызды құтқару

2001 Japanese action adventure video game
the video game

is an action adventure game developed by Japan Studio and Team Ico and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 2. It was released in North America and Japan in 2001 and Europe in 2002 in various regions. It was designed and directed by Fumito Ueda, who wanted to create a minimalist game around a "boy meets girl" concept. Originally planned for the PlayStation, Ico took approximately four years to develop. The team employed a "subtracting design" approach to reduce elements of gameplay that interfered with the game's setting and story in order to create a high level of immersion. The protagonist is a young boy named Ico who was born with horns, which his village considers a bad omen. Warriors lock him away in an abandoned fortress. During his explorations of the fortress, Ico encounters Yorda, the daughter of the castle's Queen. The Queen plans to use Yorda's body to extend her own lifespan. Learning this, Ico seeks to escape the castle with Yorda, keeping her safe from the shadowy creatures that attempt to draw her back. Throughout the game, the player controls Ico as he explores the castle, solves puzzles and assists Yorda across obstacles. Ico introduced several design and technical elements, including a story told with minimal dialogue, bloom lighting, and key frame animation, that have influenced subsequent games. Although not a commercial success, it was critically acclaimed for its art, original gameplay and story elements and received several awards, including "Game of the Year" nominations and three Game Developers Choice Awards. Considered a cult classic, it has been called one of the greatest video games ever made, and is often brought up in discussions about video games as an art form. It has influenced numerous video games since its release. It was rereleased in Europe in 2006 in conjunction with Shadow of the Colossus, the spiritual successor to Ico. A high definition remaster of the game was released alongside Shadow of the Colossus for the PlayStation 3 in The Ico & Shadow of the Colossus Collection in 2011.

Ico is primarily a three dimensional platform game. The player controls Ico from a third person perspective as he explores the castle and attempts to escape it with Yorda.

Ico (イコ), a horned boy, is taken by a group of warriors to an abandoned castle and locked inside a stone coffin to be sacrificed. A tremor topples the coffin and Ico escapes. As he searches the castle, he comes across Yorda (ヨルダ), a captive girl who speaks a different language. Ico helps Yorda escape and defends her from shadow like creatures. The pair makes their way through the castle and arrive at the bridge leading to land. As they cross, the Queen, ruler of the castle, appears and tells Yorda that as her daughter she cannot leave the castle. Later, as they try to escape on the bridge, it splits up and they get separated. Yorda tries to save Ico but the Queen prevents it. He ends up falling off the bridge and losing consciousness. Ico awakens below the castle and makes his way back to the upper levels, finding a magic sword that dispels the shadow creatures. After discovering that Yorda has been turned to stone by the Queen, he confronts the Queen in her throne room, who reveals that she plans to restart her life anew by taking possession of Yorda's body. Ico slays the Queen with the magic sword, but his horns are broken in the fight and at the end of it he is knocked unconscious. With the Queen's death the castle begins to collapse around Ico, but the Queen's spell on Yorda is broken, and a shadowy Yorda carries Ico safely out of the castle to a boat, sending him to drift to the shore alone. Ico awakens to find the distant castle in ruins, and Yorda, in her human form, washed up nearby. He also cited his work as an animator on Kenji Eno's Sega Saturn game Enemy Zero, which influenced the animation work, cinematic cutscenes, lighting effects, sound design, and mature appeal. Ueda was also inspired by the video game Another World (Outer World in Japan), which used cinematic cutscenes, lacked any head up display elements as to play like a movie, and also featured an emotional connection between two characters despite the use of minimal dialog. He also cited Sega Mega Drive games, Virtua Fighter, Lemmings, Flashback and the original Prince of Persia games as influences, specifically regarding animation and gameplay style. In the three minute demonstration reel, Yorda had the horns instead of Ico, and flying robotic creatures were seen firing weapons to destroy the castle. Ueda stated that having this movie that represented his vision helped to keep the team on track for the long development process, and he reused this technique for the development of Shadow of the Colossus, the team's next effort. [[File:Ico north american cover. jpg|thumb|upright|The cover used for the North American release of Ico. It has been called one of the worst video game covers, in contrast to the cover used in other regions, Character animation was accomplished through key frame animation instead of the more common motion capture technique. The game took about four years to create. The North American version lacks this cover as well as additional features that become available after the player completes the game once. Since release, the North American cover has been considered one of the worst pieces of cover art for video games in contrast to the game's quality and the Japanese/PAL cover. On reflection, Yasuhide Kobayashi, vice president of Sony's Japan Studio, believed the North American box art and lack of an identifiable English title led to the game's poor sales in the United States, and stated plans to correct that for the release of The Last Guardian. The game was re released as a standard edition in 2006 across all PAL regions except France after the 2005 release of Shadow of the Colossus, Icos spiritual sequel, to allow players to "fill the gap in their collection". Ico uses minimal dialogue in a fictional language to provide the story throughout the game. Voice actors included Kazuhiro Shindō as Ico, Rieko Takahashi as Yorda, and Misa Watanabe as the Queen. Ico and the Queen's words are presented in either English or Japanese subtitles depending on the release region, but Yorda's speech is presented in a symbolic language. Unreliable source: date=October 2023

Icos audio featured a limited amount of music and sound effects. The soundtrack, Ico: Kiri no Naka no Senritsu (ICO～霧の中の旋律～), was composed by Michiru Oshima and sound unit "pentagon" (Koichi Yamazaki & Mitsukuni Murayama) and released in Japan by Sony Music Entertainment on February 20, 2002. The album was distributed by Sony Music Entertainment Visual Works. The last song of the CD, "ICO You Were There ", includes vocals sung by former Libera member Steven Geraghty.

A novelization of the game titled was released in Japan in 2004. Author Miyuki Miyabe wrote the novel because of her appreciation of the game. A Korean translation of the novel, entitled 이코 – 안개의 성 (I ko: An gae eui Seong) came out the following year, by Hwangmae Publishers, while an English translation was published by Viz Media on August 16, 2011.

Costumes (including Ico and Yorda), stickers, and sound effects from Ico are part of an add on pack for the game LittleBigPlanet, alongside similar materials from Shadow of the Colossus, after being teased by the game's developers Media Molecule about two weeks prior. Ico makes a cameo appearance in Astro's Playroom.

In 2010, Misher Films said that a film adaption of Ico may come about based on the success of their then planned adaptation of Shadow of the Colossus.

Ico received several acclamations from the video game press, and was considered to be one of the Games of the Year by many publications, despite competing with releases such as Halo: Combat Evolved, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, and Grand Theft Auto III. The game won two Interactive Achievement Awards from the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences in 2002 for outstanding achievement in "Art Direction" and "Character or Story Development"; it also received nominations for "Game of the Year", "Console Game of the Year", "Console Action/Adventure Game of the Year", "Innovation in Console Gaming", and outstanding achievement in "Game Design" and "Sound Design". It won GameSpots annual "Best Graphics, Artistic" prize among console games. It was one of three titles to win the Special Award at the sixth CESA Game Awards.

Ico influenced numerous other video games, which borrowed from its simple and visual design ideals. The Naughty Dog team used Ico as part of the inspiration for developing Uncharted 3. Phil Fish used the design by subtraction approach in developing the title Fez. Goichi Suda aka Suda51, said that Ico save game method, where the player has Ico and Yorda sit on a bench to save the game, inspired the save game method in No More Heroes where the player character sits on a toilet to save the game. Ico was one of the first video games to use a bloom lighting effect, which later became a popular effect in video games. Jenova Chen, creator of art games such as Flower and Journey, cited Ico as one of his biggest influences. Ico was also cited as an influence by Halo 4 creative director Josh Holmes. and Neil Druckmann credited the gameplay of Ico as a key inspiration when he began developing the story of The Last of Us. Film director Guillermo del Toro cited both Ico and Shadow of the Colossus as "masterpieces" and part of his directorial influence. Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead considers, of his top ten video games, "Ico might be the best one".

Shadow of the Colossus (ワンダと巨像), released for the PlayStation 2 in October 2005 in Japan and North America, was developed by the same team that developed Ico. The game features similar graphics, gameplay, and storytelling elements as Ico. The game was referred by its working title "Nico" ("Ni" being Japanese for the number 2") until the final title was revealed. Ueda, when asked about the connection between the two games, stated that Shadow of the Colossus is a prequel to Ico. Team Ico's third game, The Last Guardian, was announced as a PlayStation 3 title at the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2009. The game centers on the connection between a young boy and a large griffin like creature that he befriends, requiring the player to cooperate with the creature to solve the game's puzzles. The game fell into development hell due to hardware limitations and the departure of Ueda from Sony around 2012, along with other Team Ico members, though Ueda and the other members continued to work on the game via consulting contracts. Development subsequently switched to the PlayStation 4 in 2012, and the game was reannounced in 2015 and released in December 2016. Ueda has said that "the essence of the game is rather close to Ico".

Ico, along with Shadow of the Colossus, received a high definition remaster for the PlayStation3 that was released worldwide in September 2011. In addition to improved graphics, the games were updated to include support for stereoscopic 3D and PlayStation Trophies. The Ico port was also based on the European version, and includes features such as Yorda's translation and the two player mode. In North America and Europe/PAL regions, the two games were released as a single retail collection, while in Japan, they were released as separate titles. Both games have since been released separately as downloadable titles on the PlayStation Network store. Patch 1.01 for the digital high definition Ico version added the Remote Play feature, allowing the game to be played on the PlayStation Vita.