2018-07-30: Okami

I streamed a blind playthrough of Ōkami last week. I'd been wanting to play it for years, but I knew it'd be an extremely special and perhaps even emotional affair, so I waited until I felt I was in a good place to commit to it. This was one of the few games I'd dread starting and then getting bored of it and leaving it unfinished. With some of the games I managed to finish on stream over the past six months, I figured now was a good time-- even if I was worried about chat spoiling things.

I'd been warned it was a long game, and I think I kind of rushed it. It weighed in at 33 hours over 7 sessions. Honestly I usually only stream 2-3 hours at a time, but this was so engaging and addictive I was doing 4, then 5, and finally 6 hour streams before the end. I'd originally bought the HD remaster on PC to play, but ran into rather severe issues with it, so I ended up emulating the PS2 version-- this was not an ideal solution but it served well enough.

I'd gone in knowing two things: 1.) That the game was strongly linked to Japanese folklore and even a bit of spirituality (a thing I have close ties to myself) and 2.) The existence of The Sun Rises, which was a song I came across years prior and felt a strong attachment to, though I didn't know anything about the context in which it was presented in the game.

My chat was actually very respectful of my desire to experience the story completely blind. In general my rule is "Let me know if I'm about to miss a permanent miss-able, otherwise let me find things myself," Their desire to shield me from failure was perhaps a bit overbearing at times, but the game is fairly easy on its own anyway. So I got to at least experience the story without spoilers, and I'm glad for it.

I knew right from the start, when you conjure a river into being with a swipe of your brush that the game was going to be something amazing, but it wasn't until I finished up in Kimiki Village and headed out into the world map proper that I was left awestruck. For a game developed in 2006, that's saying something too. The art style is just amazing, and once I purified the first Guardian Tree, well... I was hooked on the game. Everything about the game just has so much care put into it, down to the small cutscenes you get when you feed animals.

The characters are all so memorable too. I think the garbled quasi-dialogue sound effects actually help to give them personality. Everyone you meet just has this unique and vibrant style about them; when you find yourself feeling remorse for the passing of a possessed sheet of paper, you know the character design is top notch. I especially liked the Canine Warriors, as short as their time in the limelight was.

I downed Orochi for the first time around the 12 hour mark and, even then, the game could have ended and I would have felt like it was a complete experience. However it kept going, sending me further afield to Sei-An City; a locale I came to know well across the next 12 hours and the 2nd chapter of the game.

Here though, the game punches you in the gut. This bright, vibrant, cheery game full of humor and references and wild takes suddenly gets serious with the introduction, and then brutal death, of the Queen of Sei-An. It was an almost "out of nowhere" experience, to have one of these identifiable characters suddenly torn apart by the chapter's antagonist; the cheery vibe and happy-go-lucky humor was gone as the stage set for the final battle of the arc. This chapter ended in a massive duel with a nine tailed fox at the end of the game's longest dungeon, and one of the most desperate and intense fights in the game thus far. And again, it could have ended there, but there was more.

As the nine tailed fox falls, she gives mention to the game's true antagonist: Yami. This is, in many ways, almost a Zeromus situation: where you defeat what you think to be the primary antagonist only for them to mention a new, larger foe that up until then had been completely unmentioned. However in this case there were hints of a bigger evil, so it's not quite out of left field. Part three begins with Amaterasu being thrown into the distance icy north, where evil is said to have found its source.

Here the story bares itself: how Amaterasu came to end up on Earth, how demons came to terrorize the world, and the nature of the gods within the game world. As you save the people of Kamui from an icy death at the hands of two clockwork demons holed up high atop a mountain, spewing ice and snow down below, you come to learn of the Ark of Yamato. It is here that both the Celestials and the demon first set foot on the world, having arrived in the ark from the Celestial Plane eons ago.

In the course of hunting down the demons, you also learn the truth behind the legend of Amaterasu: how her first death was not at the hands of Orochi 100 years ago, but she traveled forward in time to assist you in your hour of need, and died from the wounds sustained in a battle with the twin demons as a result. It's a little Deus Ex Machina, but an amazing twist to the legend you're told over and over again through the game, and even get to witness yourself via the same time muckery. You are the hero of 100 years ago, the hero of 100 years ago saves you from death in the present, you're both one in the same-- a thing Amaterasu knows, but since she does not speak in the game, the player never comes to hear it.

After that, the Ark opens, sending you into the final battle with Yami. As an eclipse begins, you as the Sun Goddess are stripped of your powers and left for dead at Yami's feet-- and then a miracle happens: Issun, who had been your smart-alec, smart-mouthed companion up until the Ark, paints a beautiful rendition of the Sun Goddess, running across the land to show everyone her glory, and they come to believe again after generations of darkness without the gods. The belief gives Amaterasu power, restoring her ultimate form and then...

And then the damn song began to play. This random musical tidbit I'd adored for nearly 10 years was the final battle theme, and I never knew. I lost my darned mind. It's a fitting end really, to vanquish the darkness that Yami had brought with the power you'd had all game to simply conjure the sun at will. And then a flurry of offense during which you are practically invincible, and the beast is dead.

Truthfully I thought The Sun Rises was the game's overworld theme. I was confused when I got to the end and hadn't heard it; then the punch in the chest when it begins to play as Amaterasu stands up and prepares to lay the smackdown on the darkness was very, very moving. The entire game was very emotional for me really; very beautiful.

I think at this point it's the best game I've ever played. I don't know, that's a tough call; it's definitely one of the ones most dear to me now.

tags: okami, game_writeup