Games

Why should we be excited about The Last Guardian?

To understand where we’re going we must look back to the past – two whole console generations.
Written by John Robertson
6 min readPublished on
The Last Guardian

The Last Guardian

© Sony

So many of us are excited about The Last Guardian, not simply because of the promise shown through the information drip feed that has accompanied the Japanese-made adventure game’s pre-release hype, but because of what its creator has given us in the past. Fumito Ueda has bestowed upon us great works of art that rank high in the list of the most important video games ever created and, frankly, we expect him to reaffirm his greatness when his first release in over a decade is unleashed this October for PS4.
That’s right: one of Sony’s greatest visionaries sat out the entire PS3 era on the bench. Or rather, spent it at the drawing board, as The Last Guardian was delayed by years. It’s testament to Ueda’s skill that he can still harbour such affection in gamers despite this. With the PlayStation 2's ICO and Shadow of the Colossus, Ueda has demonstrated his mastery of blending narrative with gameplay. He is one of the few designers prepared to rely on the suite of tools available to a video game creator, as opposed to depending on, and shoehorning in, techniques developed by cinema, theatre and literature. Rather than extended cut-scenes, Ueda uses videogames' unique option interaction to connect with players.
It's the originality, eternal quality and emotional impact of these two classics of the medium that make us so expectant of further greatness with The Last Guardian. To play ICO or Colossus even now, 15 and 11 years since their respective debuts, is to witness works of timeless timeless quality from a legendary designer.
Ico and Yarda's quiet relationship is captivating

Ico and Yarda's quiet relationship is captivating

© Sony

To even classify ICO and Colossus within a rigid genre description is difficult, but modern lingo would likely single out the former as a 'platformer' and the latter an example of 'action adventure'. ICO sees you play as a small boy named Ico as he attempts to rescue an enigmatic young girl, Yorda, from a castle governed by seemingly evil creatures. Colossus flips much of the rescue theme on its head by tasking you, as Wander, with the more aggressive path of exploring a vast countryside with a view to hunting and killing ancient, giant God-like beasts.
What intimately connects both games is the trust that Ueda is prepared to show in the player. Neither game seeks to overtly control your movements or dictate to you how and when you should perform a given action. You're typically left to either work things out for yourself or given the option as to what it is that you think should be worked out. This sense of freedom allows his games to breath in a way that few other big budget, console exclusive releases are prepared to embrace even today.
As with most games that purport to be fully open and interpretive, however, on a mechanical level the works of Ueda are not so free. You're still locked into performing only those actions that have been programmed into the underlying code and so these limited opportunities determine your progress. The important thing, though, is that both games invoke a feeling within you that you are being given the opportunity to act exactly how you want. At the end of the day there are certain solutions that Ico needs to work out in order to get Yorda out of the castle and there are specific ways that Colossus' battles can be best approached.
The question asked by both titles, though, is whether it's the reality of the systems that matter or the reality of your experience? If you feel that, within the world of the game, you have total freedom to act as you wish, does it matter whether you really do or not? Such questions are presented by many games, not least the way Telltale Games' The Walking Dead is so capable of making you feel as though you're in charge of the narrative or how Mass Effect tricks you into thinking the universe is in your hands, but few evoke the same sense of grand free will as Ico or Colossus.
If Ueda managed to outdo these more modern examples with games he released over a decade ago, thinking about what he is potentially capable of now with The Last Guardian is mouth watering. With his obvious talent, and publisher Sony's readiness to so dramatically delay a game originally due in 2011, there's every chance that this October we're going to be playing something of outstanding quality.
Best of all, The Last Guardian seems to be retaining ICO and Colossus' minimalist approach to not only how it guides the player but how the game's characters communicate with each other. By relying on actions and indistinct sounds to converse and instruct within the game, there should be plenty of space for the player to be able to interpret the motivations and histories of everyone involved in the narrative.
Few games match The Last Guardian as a spectacle

Few games match The Last Guardian as a spectacle

© Sony

The lack of explicitly understood dialogue in both ICO and Colossus helps you implant yourself on the two game worlds in a way that is more powerful than games with strictly authored stories tend to be able to achieve.
Each individual player is, so long as they use their imagination to its fullest potential, capable of inferring and crafting something more personal and unique from an author that provides a limited framework than they are from an author determined to plainly state every detail. The Last Guardian, based on what we’ve seen so far, is following in the footsteps laid down by its ancestors in leaving the dialogue to one side and placing confidence in the players to infer and absorb their own reading of events.
This room for interpretation is similar to a technique used in movies that are big on horror and suspense. By withholding some information from the viewer the audience is able to fill in the blanks, their imagination creating something that is more scary, personal and dramatic than the director could. The director doesn't have knowledge of how a viewer's subconscious works, but a good director can trigger that subconscious to take control of the audience's emotions.
It's often the authors that allow the audience most room to breathe that are the best writers, just as Ueda is one of the best game designers through allowing his audience room to interpret their actions.
And it's this that is really what makes The Last Guardian so exciting. It's about what we might be able to conjure up within ourselves as we play, as opposed to the precise elements (visuals, gameplay, sounds etc) that we're given. ICO and Colossus' greatest gift was their ability to empower the player to come up with their own ideas and The Last Guardian promises the same.
The Last Guardian releases on October 25 on PS4. For more gaming coverage, be sure to follow @RedBullGames on Twitter and like us on Facebook.