Okami (For Wii)

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You know all those ads around the internets calling Okami "the greatest game you never played"? Boy is that ever the truth. Admittedly, despite hearing how good it was, I never got around to playing Okami on the PS2. Upon hearing it not only featured brushwork as part of a gameplay but it was coming out on the Wii with motion controls for just that, I resolved to buy it.

It was a good decision, and I was certainly not disappointed. It’s an inspired, well-made and artful game, full of wit and humor and many heart-warming moments. It may be an action-adventure open-world game, but it’s so unlike anything else I’ve ever played.

In this game you play as the goddess Amaterasu-omikami (called simply "Amaterasu" in the game), traditionally the Shinto sun Goddess. You may be able to see where the title derives from, "okami" is the Japanese for "wolf" but can also literally mean "king god" or "great god" (this is also the way it’s spelled in the Japanese title.) There’s alot of untranslated (and largely unexplained) plays on words and references to Japanese mythology in the game, which if you’re lucky enough to get are really quite clever and funny.

Unlike in Shintoism, Amaterasu takes the form of a white wolf with red markings, carrying a fiery weapon and with an ink-stained tail shaped like a brush. She’s never seen in a "human" form (and I’d speculate she doesn’t have one, who says gods can’t be animals?), never speaks, behaves more like a wolf than a person and I think this is all actually beneficial to the game’s story. It makes her both mysterious and unobtrusive, most people in the game can’t see her divine attributes and she performs miracles and good deeds in a clandestine manner. Some of Amaterasu’s most spectacular miracles revolve around the rejuvenation of nature (and if you get her running fast enough plants and flowers sprout in the ground she treads.) But don’t worry, you’re not going to see people talking to a silent wolf the entire time. You’re accompanied throughout the game by the spritely Issun: a tiny creature who refers to Amaterasu as "Ammy" and doesn’t seem to mind doing her talking for her, whether she appreciates it or not.

You also won’t want for action, where the game does focus heavily on art and nature you’re not going to solve all your problems by drawing flowers. Amaterasu has awakened into a world plagued by evil after being weakened in an incident battling the fearsome legendary Japanese monster Yamata-no-Orochi (the 8-headed serpent) 100 years prior and as such needs to relearn all of her "Celestial Brush Techniques", which without her have become gods onto themselves. These techniques give you abilities anywhere from a cutting attack to summoning wind, fire and lightning, to rejuvenating dead trees, and I have to say preforming these with the Wii motion controls is amazing and satisfying. I did run into a small problem however as more brush techniques were gained, which I’m sure was present in the original game. I’d find sometimes when trying to rejuvenate a tree (by drawing a circle on it) I’d accidentally summon wind or make the sun come out instead. Trying to draw lily-pads on the water I’d sometimes just move the water itself around instead. Man, being a god is tough.

You can also, of course, fight with Amaterasu’s various weapons that she gains throughout the game, eventually aquiring the ability to put a second weapon on your "Z" button for a secondary attack or defense. You fight by swinging the Wii controller, which isn’t as buggy as I initially believed it to be as I discovered after a while I was just trying to swing the controller too fast. You can acquire more moves from the dojo throughout the game, as well as other techniques like being able to headbutt big stones apart and dig in hard ground (which can help you find a variety of items and secrets.) You can also level up Amaterasu, which you do so using "praise" (as people’s belief in a god makes them stronger.) You can gain praise in various ways, helping people, rejuvenating trees, rejuvenating special clovers that are hidden throughout the world, and by rejuvenating cursed areas and feeding other animals.

The game itself is gorgeous, the characters may be cartoony but all the graphics look like a brush painting and you do occasionally get to see artwork made to look like sprawling, traditional scroll paintings of various characters and baddies. The graphical style may take a little getting used to at first, or you may not like it at all and I can’t really fault anyone for that. Adding to the game’s overall surreal and unique feel, the characters don’t really speak but have sort of dreamy gibberish voices with accompanying written dialog.

The story, despite nearly trying to do too much with one instance of time travel and an odd, almost sci-fi bent toward the end, holds up and is very good. There’s many funny moments and alot of funny characters, but there’s also drama and beauty to be seen. The game will fake you out, it’s much longer than it seems like it’s going to be, the world is full and ready to be explored and truthfully I don’t think I saw everything. Luckily the game gives you the option to play through again with bonuses based on how well you did the first time around. My ending score was something like cherry blossom tree, tree, tree with budding leaves, tree tree. …Eh… you’d understand if you played it.

Anyway, I highly recommend this game to anyone who owns a Wii, don’t let this masterpiece fade into obscurity a second time. If you like action-adventure games with big open worlds, long hours of play, problem solving puzzles, a good story and lovable characters you’d be all set with this one. I’d say the younger kiddies could handle Okami as well, it is rated T, and it says it contains "blood and gore" but I never encountered any in gameplay. All I remember is a monster falling into a pool of it’s own blood being mentioned in a backstory (but not shown) and blood depicted in a few of the gorgeous scroll paintings you see in the game that illustrate what’s happening in the story. There is also, yes, suggestive humor, but if you don’t think some cleavage and Issun hitting on every girl you meet is inappropriate for anyone over 9 or so then go for it. I mean you see enough boob cracks, seduction and flirtation in Disney films right? It’s also rated for crude humor, the worst of which I saw being two attacks Ammy can acquire later in the game called "golden fury" and "brown rage". Try to guess what those do.

And that’s it I guess. I now consider myself a fan! But to all you other fans out there… for god’s sake stop pairing Waka and Ammy, SHE’S A WOLF.