Okami HD has been announced! It’s headed to PSN on the PS3 this Autumn, apparently, and we’re going to cover it even though it’s going to clock in at £15.99. Why not, eh? Mental. What to say about it, though? Hopefully you’ve played it before and this is just the valedictory lap.
I know! I’ll tell you about the time I met Hideki Kamiya instead!
The date: June, 2009. The place: LA, during E3. Actually, “the time I met Hideki Kamiya” might be pushing it slightly. I was in the same room as him, anyway – a kind of clapboard confection put together for Sega’s backstage press briefings. He showed off Bayonetta, and it was easily the second-best game presentation I’ve ever seen.
This is how I remember it unfolding. We file in and take our seats. Kamiya is there at the front, sat under an HD screen and right next to a little table with hand sanitiser on it. He nods at an associate and the associate starts to play Bayonetta. No commentary is forthcoming, and the game is just insane: massive spinning attacks, boots with pistols built in, weird dimension-shifting effects and lots of running up walls.
The demo lasts for ten minutes - time in which Kamiya never speaks. He barely even moves. He just looks at the screen every now and then, then nods to himself confidently and smiles at us with a rather stern look on his face. Then it’s over and we all file out.
I don’t remember Kamiya saying a single word the whole time. (I might be wrong, but I hope not.) I understood little, and wrote most of my notes on my trouser leg anyway, thanks to the poor lighting and my own inherent lack of physical grace.
Regardless, I do remember thinking, “Gosh, that guy’s happy to let his games speak for themselves.” Respect.
