This PlayStation Exclusive Is A Masterpiece, But It Isn’t Fun To Play

I have played every Team Ico game and I’ve loved them all—except one. I experienced the thrill of climbing atop and felling giants in Shadow of the Colossus and the meditative puzzling of traversing through a beautiful world with a companion in tow of Ico. But when it came time to play The Last Guardian, I just couldn’t do it.

The 2016 title was one of the only games I’ve ever ragequit because it was just so frustrating. And yet, I still consider it a masterpiece and an important piece of gaming history. I never want to play it again, but I hope the original team and other developers learn from its successes… and its failures.

The Last Guardian Is A Breathtaking—But Flawed—Masterpiece

It’s Impossible Not To Fall In Love With Trico

The Last Guardian had a troubled development. To some, the game isn’t even technically a Team Ico title, since the game’s primary designer, Fumito Ueda, and other Team Ico members left Sony partway through development. The game suffered several delays that even led to speculation that it would never see the light of day.

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Against all odds, The Last Guardian was released for the PlayStation 4 on December 6, 2016, as a PlayStation exclusive like the previous Team Ico titles. The game followed a young boy and a massive griffin-like creature named Trico as they traversed through a beautiful but empty world of obstacles.

The game pulled ideas from the two previous games by the developer. It was absolutely breathtaking, featuring a crumbling world rendered in soft focus. It perfectly evokes the same feelings of melancholy and vast emptiness that Shadow of the Colossus did so well.

Trico embodied both the gigantic presence of the Colossi and the companionship of Yorda, the girl from Ico. I fell in love with Trico as soon as I met him. The young griffin reminded me of a mix between a cat and a playful puppy of a large breed, who isn’t quite aware of how large he is as he runs around knocking into things.

The connection to Trico was the central theme of the game, as Ueda allegedly removed anything from the game that didn’t directly contribute to the large creature’s relationship with the boy that players embody. If I could have simply played a game that revolved around the two characters coexisting in this crumbling world, I might have enjoyed that more.

Sadly, The Last Guardian Is Simply Not Fun To Play

Its Simplicity Is Its Downfall

Some games aren’t meant to be fun. Titles like Noita and QWOP are intentionally made to hinder the player at every turn, making a statement on the nature of gaming and exploration. The problem with The Last Guardian is that it simply wasn’t fun—and it wasn’t by design.

I fully believe that the game was supposed to be an enjoyable blend of bond-forming and light puzzling. By removing as many elements from the game as possible, though, progression became a frustratingly obtuse experience.

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Without any indicators of where to go next, I found myself lost most of the time. I never knew which action I was meant to take, and, without a direct way to control Trico, the adorable large creature was usually off doing his own thing. When I managed to get the boy to climb atop Trico and the creature to cooperate and move, I could only hold on for dear life and hope that the boy wouldn’t slip off, as he sometimes did.

These issues weren’t unique to me, either, with many fans echoing them. A Polygon review of The Last Guardian wrote that if Trico “isn’t refusing to move until you bring it food, it’s casually ignoring your shouts from across the level.”

I remember wandering around in circles around one small open area with pillars and a puddle of water. All I could do was climb atop the pillars and walk their perimeter, while Trico happily rolled around in the puddle, ignoring my frantic requests for assistance. This was the breaking point. I could take no more, and I stopped playing about a quarter of the way through.

Games Like The Last Guardian Are Still Important

It’s Not Perfect, But It’s A Key Moment In Gaming

Even though I didn’t like actually playing it, I still consider The Last Guardian to be an incredibly important part of gaming history. The game is simply stunning, serving less as something fun to play and more like an interactive work of art. It’s a callback to minimalistic world-building and a homage to an era of games that valued the experience over the gameplay.

Nearly every element of that game that I didn’t like was an intentional developmental choice. The boy and Trico were carefully made to be as realistic as possible, which immediately puts into perspective every time the puppy-like Trico refused to listen, or the young child struggled to hold on to slick feathers while moving at high speeds through the sky. The Last Guardian is a work of art. It’s just a shame that it wasn’t fun to play, too.

Team ICO, which is now operating under the name of genDESIGN, announced a new game at The Game Awards in 2024. This upcoming title (which has no name yet) looks like it continues the legendary team’s legacy. It shows a stark, melancholy world traversed vertically by a faceless protagonist.

Hopefully, this coming game will take everything that made The Last Guardian the masterpiece that it was, and leave behind the design elements that made it frustrating enough for me to abandon it.

Source: Polygon, PlayStation/YouTube

The Last Guardian

Released

December 6, 2016

ESRB

T for Teen: Blood, Fantasy Violence

Developer(s)

JapanStudio, GenDesign

Publisher(s)

Sony

Engine

Havok.