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Platform: PlayStation
2
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Okami
One
of the biggest graphical trends to come out of the current generation of
games being developed is the concept of cel shading.
In the last couple of years it has gone from being a quaint
little change of pace to an over used gimmick with its cartoon-ish look
popping up everywhere. Now
Clover Studios is trying it’s own style of visual presentation that,
while appearing to be drawn, takes a totally new approach, as the
visuals look like old-fashioned Japanese ink painting.
Of course, the first thing that people think of when they think
of painting is color, and in Clover Studios’ upcoming PlayStation 2
title, Okami, players will be charged with the task of restoring color
to the land.
Throughout Okami, players will take on the role of the Japanese Sun Goddess, Amaterasu. As stated earlier, she is on a mission to restore color to the world, as demons have been going around imposing their own monochromatic agenda throughout the country. While in |
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her
wolf form, Amaterasu will have to destroy these demons, and make her
surroundings a lot more vivid.
However, the game isn’t just about running around, beautifying feudal Japan. Since Amaterasu is a deity, her main source of power comes from how many people have faith in her. If she doesn’t have a lot of believers in her camp, she won’t be able to do very much. As such, players have to make sure that the goddess has plenty of people believing in her at all times. This can be done by taking human form, and listening to what the locals have to say. If Amaterasu |
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works
to help the villagers
with their problems, they’ll start to believe in her more, and with
that she will become stronger, and gain more abilities.
The other way players can have more people believing in them is
to simply go around and bring color back to the land, destroying the
demons causing the problems.
Considering
how faith will play such a strong role in the game, one gets the sense
that a top priority with Okami’s developers is to make sure that that
the game’s visuals don’t stand out as a huge gimmick when playing
the game. Even though
Clover Studios has been working on the game for about a year now,
they’ve been surprisingly quiet about it all this time.
They’ve only been trickling out new media every so often, and
quickly showed the game at the Tokyo Games Show in 2004.
Hopefully at this year’s E3 we’ll be able to see more of the
game, and maybe a North American release will be confirmed as well.
Mr.
Nash (May 2, 2005)
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