Tales from the Zoo

Finally finished Ico. It's been a long time I know. Anyways, interesting. Losing Yorda towards the end was more frustrating than I imagined. You spend the whole game slightly annoyed with her, but then when you don't have her you miss her. Especially since you can't save once you're separated (well, that was my biggest frustration).

I'll admit I knew some of the ending, so it wasn't as shocking as it could have been. The game's just been around long enough that I'd heard various bits. The fight with the shadow creatures before the end was still somewhat depressing. It's hard to know if I would have picked up on the fact that they were all horned boys had I not known, but even knowing it was still depressing. The fact that you could now one-shot them (instead of being kinda a pain to kill), and that they didn't even attack and instead ran cowering into the corners. I'm guessing that's because of the sword, not Ico, but still rather sad.

The fight with the queen is somewhat...simpler than I imagined. I think I made it harder by not realizing you could move the pillars, but still managed. I was expecting more puzzles, but I suppose a simple hit with sword was kinda nice (especially with the no saving for awhile). It's interesting to me that the devs were able to work in the no-saving at the end in a seamless way. No Yorda, no saving. But, it's really about cost and suspense. If you fail now, you have to go waaay back. You can't take a break and finish later. Brilliant.

The end was, well, somewhat expected? I'm kinda curious what exactly happened to Yorda. Does she become the new Queen? Does she just sink under the sea? Will go read some theories and see how I feel. All in all a great experience.

From stupidpetowners the LJ group stupidpetowners (someday I need to figure out how to link those). (thanks liannaa)

Free to a Good Home

EXTRA-CUTE™

I saw a coyote this morning while walking the dog. It was trotting towards me down the path, and I first thought it was a loose dog. The coyote ambled up and left the trail, passing maybe 10 ft from me (obviously it was not particularly afraid of me or the dog). It then proceeded to hunt mice (leaping and pouncing) about 20 ft from where I stood watching it. I have to say that that it was almost surreal to watch. I've seen coyotes before around here, and I've seen them run by me and others with very little care, but that it stopped to hunt right in front of me was kinda weird. After a few minutes, another person came by with a dog (a very small dog), and the coyote wandered off. An interesting experience, I may have to look up more on coyote lore.

Since my summer is effectively finished after this week, I decided to head to the zoo before chains of school surrounded me again. The weather was decent, cool when I got there but was getting pretty hot when I left. I was hoping for the forecasted thunder-storms in the afternoon, but that was not to be (perhaps later).

The okapi were out roaming around, which has been common lately but rare previously. I spent some time sketching them and the elands. A bongo was right up in the front of their enclosure, so I got some really great head shots of him/her (her I think, but not sure). The wolves were up and roaming around in the afternoon. Their enclosure is full of sunflowers at the moment, which makes for neat pictures, but also difficult to find wolves. Apparently one of them had caught a mallard earlier in the day, or so said the keeper who was cleaning the pen. The wolf pen is apparently not the safest place if you are a duck. The baby hyenas were out with their mother, but the glare on the glass kept me from getting more good pictures. Oh well, I guess I'll have to live with what I've already got.

The real treat today was seeing the two month old snow leopard cubs...all three of them. Apparently three is the average snow leopard litter size, ranging from 1-5. I think five snow leopard cubs would be quite a handful, or pawful. They're about three pounds right now, and incredibly cute. Since the zoo wasn't as packed as the last time, I was actually able to get close and attempt to take pictures. With the indoor lighting, and through the thick plexi-glass it was kind of hit or miss whether the picture worked out, but at least a few turned out decent.

Overall, a pretty good trip. Now I think I'm going to take a nap.

Due to the upcoming changes to LiveJournal's business model, I've been thinking and reading about advertising on Social Media sites. An interesting, and well-thought out argument can be found on Synecdochic's LJ.
Along this same vein, I've been kinda evaluating my own interests with LJ. I'm not exactly pleased with the changes, but I can kinda see the company's point (after all, they are providing a service effectivly for free). The effect on me basically boils down to this: am I willing to allow LJ to show advertisements on my blog. The upcoming changes will show ads on my blog to anyone who isn't logged in to LJ. I'm guessing that most of my readers aren't going to be logged in, so they will see the ads. I'm debating between quitting LJ entirely, just letting things be as they are, or upgrading my account so that it always shows ads but at least I get to play with more features (mainly, space to upload some pictures). Any reader's have any thoughts?

The infamous windmill. The only part I've had to look up so far. And, actually I'd figured out what to do, but (I guess) didn't quite have the timing right because I couldn't catch the blades. (Probably would have just kept trying, but the last couch was awhile back and I wanted to save before taking a break.) Mainly more puzzles thus far, and getting progressively more difficult. The number and frequency of attacks by the shadows are increasing. Amazingly enough, Yorda still isn't terribly annoying. Although about half of the game is about getting her across obstacles (often getting Ico across isn't to difficult, it's usually one or the other that's the tough part), that's part of the fun too.

I do have the mention that the camera is driving me crazy. Somehow I forget about the camera when writing about other stuff, but (as with SotC) fighting the camera is sometimes half the battle. The camera in Ico is almost worse, because the pivot point is not Ico but the camera itself. I'm getting more used to the crazy cinematic camera angles, but I sometimes wish it'd just follow me.

So, at last we have met the "real" antagonist, the Queen. First, we must fight through a significant number of shadow creatures, far more than seen before. We then reach a courtyard, with the gates wide open. After the somewhat frustrating battle, the open courtyard seems to mean freedom, but the player is thinking "can it really be that easy?". We know the game has not gone on long enough, or tested our skills hard enough yet. As expected, the gates immediately close. Given that the player probably doesn't think the game is over already, this isn't particularly surprising.

The Queen appear tall, very pale, and clothed in shadows like the ones that have been trying to capture Yorda. She speaks to Yorda in a language we don't understand (although I looked to translation up...more on that later), and then to Ico. The appearance of the queen, using a portal similar to the shadow creatures, marks her as an enemy. She does not really threaten Ico in any major way, she just seems "in charge".

The Queen speaks to Ico, and basically tells him to leave her daughter alone, and that Yorda comes from another world. However, after saying this the Queen simply vanishes, leaving both Yorda and Ico unharmed. The player is left wondering why she simply left...why not take Yorda with her? This segment has solved one mystery (who Yorda is), but given the player another, who is this Queen and why didn't she stop Ico? Putting Yorda back in her prison doesn't seem to be beyond the Queen's power, so why does she just leave? And what is this other world? Are both Yorda and the Queen from there? Is that why they're so pale?

In order to more fully understand the story, I've been looking up the translations of Yorda's speech. The fact that translations are available (as opposed to just literally being made up), means the designers wanted the player to get the other half of the story just not right away. In general (up to this point), lines spoken by Yorda, or in her language are not really crucial to understanding the story. We can pretty much gather what's going on by what happens, and hearing Ico's speech.

Ico is not divided into nice segments like SotC so I'm doing the best I can with titling these.

So, Yorda is not quite as clueless as she seemed. She will move away from the shadows, if she's standing. She doesn't move very fast, which is both blessing and curse.

The puzzles are getting a bit more complex now, usually requiring several steps and a lot of running back and forth to help Yorda across. I did finally look up the controls (I had most of them figured out, but had missed a few things...like being able to pull Yorda out of the shadow portal), just because things were starting to get a bit frustrating. Things like getting Yorda to jump across gaps took me awhile to figure out.

I'm kinda starting to pick up on things early on, which saves me a lot of running back and forth. Things like noticing the trolley cart before running all the way down to the other end of the track and needing it. Or, hey, these look like bombs...wonder where I can get some fire? Noticing these things before I need them makes me feel kinda clever. Of course, the designers probably kinda planned it that way. I also feel kinda stupid when I laboriously climb and jump my way up something, and then discover a ladder nearby...oh well.

Not much new in the way of plot yet, but that is in keeping with SotC. I'm told the game is pretty short (though I'm not really sure what that means), so I should be coming up to a bit of storyness sometime soon. At the moment, the player seems mostly there to escort and protect Yorda. Yorda maintains her "helpless and fragile" appearance, and thus encourages the player's desire to help and protect her. The way she is kinda jerked around when Ico takes her hand and runs is somewhat endearing. The soft cry of surprise when the shadows attack, and her complete inability to do much without Ico's help help maintain her fragile persona. She has not yet become annoying, probably because the player is still feeling rather protective. I have to admit that the line between "helpless and fragile" and "helpless and annoying" is probably a difficult one to maintain.

I have to note that I enjoyed the save point couches. Clever, and cute. Especially since Ico and Yorda "wake up" when you load a saved game and (keeping with the whole endearing Yorda to the player), Yorda has her head on Ico's shoulder when she wakes up.

Wow, this game does make you feel like a child with no idea what's going on. No tutorial or anything to teach you the buttons (maybe the booklet had them, but my used copy didn't have a booklet). And no "marker" to show you what you can interact with in the environment. A lot of trial and error, and just looking for things you might be able to do something with (hmmm, there wasn't a chain in the last area...maybe I can grab it?). However, this is kind of fitting with Ico's situation at the moment, so it works well with the game.

Yorda (or I assume so, she hasn't really been introduced) is very white compared to the darkness of the dungeon around her. I assume she is supposed to look "pure", or magical? She doesn't seem human either, as her ears seem to long. She seems to speak a different language than Ico, but is very gentle. We have rooting interest in her as well, because we first meet her caged unfairly (we assume, seeing how kind she is). She appears in the same cage we saw black goo dripping from in the opening cut scene, so we know she is probably more than she seems. The ugly blackness of the "thing" that grabs her is a big contrast to her whiteness. The player is encouraged to go and rescue her.

Yorda seems a bit, unaware of what's going on around her. She doesn't try to fight the black shadows, even when they grab her. She follows Ico willingly enough, and does seem to have some power we don't yet understand (she opens a door that was blocked earlier). Her kind of vague awareness of the world is likely supposed to make the player feel more protective of her...I think it's likely to get annoying pretty quickly.

So, again I'm going to be using this blog to post my feelings on a video game. This time for Ico, which was made by the same people as Shadow of the Colossus. It's supposed to take place long after SotC in the same world, but was made several years before. Even having just started the game, you can see the similarities. The graphics aren't quite as nice, although the artistic style seems much the same. I am not as happy with the horses in this game, but I'm guessing they play a much smaller role than Agro. Ico, the horned boy, seems to be somewhat similar to Wander in SotC. Both are young (although Ico seems much younger), and wear a tabard-type garment. Ico doesn't seem to be wearing pants (just an observation).

Opening Credits
Similar to Sotc, we begin the game with a journey. Three men traveling with a horned child. One of the men is robed, perhaps a town or spiritual leader. One wears a mask with horns...interesting considering I know horns have a lot of symbolism in this game. The masked man seems to be part of a ceremony, as he carries and wields a special sword. The third man seems somewhat nondescript. The men travel to a temple of sorts (I think I've seen it in a dream somewhere...weird), and leave the child in a large stone coffin-type thing.

The opening sequence sets us up with a mystery. Who is this child, and why is he being left in the temple? Why is it for "the good of the village" (as one of the few spoken lines states). This immediately creates interest in the game, as we want to discover what's going on. We also immediately have "rooting interest" in the horned child, because he seems to be being abandoned for no good reason. We feel sorry for him, and want to help him escape.