E3: Okami Hands-On

With its unique gameplay and visual style, Okami was undoubtedly one of E3's most refreshing and original games. Hands-on with Clover Studio's latest.

At a show that's usually dominated by sequels, sports updates, and run-of-the-mill FPS games, Capcom's Okami broke away from the pack, offering a visually fresh & stylish action adventure game that also boasts some unique gameplay ideas. While the version on hand at Capcom's E3 booth was still pretty early in development it still managed to captivate showgoers and left us wanting more.

Created by the studio behind the Viewtiful Joe and Devil May Cry series, Okami - which is the Japanese translation of the word, "Wolf" - is an action-adventure game steeped in Japanese mysticism and folklore. In Okami players assume the role of a great white wolf embodied by the mythical sun goddess, Amaterasu, who is said to be the ancestor of the Japanese royal family and the central deity of Shinto.

Having descended upon the Earth in wolf form, Amaterasu sets out to restore the now drearily barren world to its once natural, habitable state by ridding the lands of the curse casted upon them by the legendary beast known as Orochi.

As players guide Amaterasu through the game's beautifully expansive 3D landscapes they'll have plenty of opportunities to wield the goddess' powers against a host of evil monsters and other powerful beings.

The game's mythologically-themed gameplay sets players off on a quest to reclaim Amaterasu's powers, which have been scattered throughout the planet in the form of well-hidden godly embodiments awaiting recovery. With each power reclaimed, Amaterasu will become more powerful, further augmenting her abilities with additional moves and special attacks.

The demo featured a solid control scheme, allowing for easy control the wolf's smooth, quick directional movements, to perform a variety of moves including high jumps, wall jumps, a slash/claw attack, tackle move and whatever special attacks and other unique abilities that would later get added to its arsenal.

As we traversed the game's colorful landscapes we were smashing open treasure chests and other items by ramming them and collecting coins along the way, while interacting with her spiritual companion, Issun, and battling a number of strange monsters that appeared out of nowhere.

However, what makes Okami such a unique and interesting game are the added play mechanics provided by the use of a magical brush known as the celestial brush. The brush-writing aspect of the game is quite cool and ties in nicely with many of the puzzle elements encountered throughout the environments, turning the game world into your virtual canvas in a number of ways by emphasizing good brush strokes in order to proceed past certain areas.

Players can enter some type of brush writing mode by holding down the corresponding shoulder and face button, to bring the inked brush on screen. Afterwards, players can move the analog stick around in various directions in order to create the corresponding brush strokes.

The demo had us utilizing this cool gameplay mechanic in a few puzzle-type settings by creating brush strokes that in turn drew a bridge over a river we needed to cross, connected the dots within a bunch of star clusters, as well as finishing off a few monsters with her power slash move - one of the many unique special attacks that becomes available as Amaterasu regains more of her powers.

Probably the most noticeable aspect of Okami is its unique visual style. At a time when cel-shaded graphics are quickly on their way to becoming played out, Capcom has set out to implement other forms of visual expression with the gaming medium by utilizing a more traditional Japanese art style in Okami. Okami's vast and imaginative game world is beautifully vibrant with incredibly stylish design that gives off the appearance of animated watercolored art.

One of the more subtle but coolest little details that literally popped up throughout the environments happened while Amaterasu was running around the environments at top speeds leaving trails of stardust behind that seemingly brought the natural environments to life with flowers and other bits of vegetation blooming within the trail of stardust. A nice little demonstration of the goddess' power and a cool effect overall.

The galloping sounds of the wolf character running over various surface types, smashing through objects, as well as the environmental sounds, all sounded pretty nice. The game also contains some nice atmospheric BGM tracks that seemed to fit the game's ethereal atmosphere quite well.

Something that kept running through my mind while playing Okami - and struggling to use the celestial brush with the Dual Shock 2 controller - was the tremendous potential the game would have as a Nintendo DS title, specifically because of the brush writing mechanics of the game which would no doubt work perfectly with the DS's touchscreen & stylus setup, making for significantly faster and much more accurate brush writing than what's possible with the Dual Shock 2 controller. So, Earth to Capcom, you NEED to bring this game over to the Nintendo DS, like, now.

All in all, Okami was no doubt one of the most intriguing and captivating titles at E3, sporting some very solid and addictive gameplay along with beautifully stylish visual design. With such a long, grueling wait till the game's 2006 release you should definitely keep a close eye on this.

Joseph Jackson
Executive Editor, Kikizo Games