‘The Last Guardian’ demo let me play with a giant dog bird

Ah, “The Last Guardian.” How long you’ve eluded us. And now that you’re almost here, we can hardly believe it—or contain our excitement.

At ESGS 2016, Sony Interactive Entertainment granted me the privilege to try out the game we’ve all been dying to play since it was first announced in 2009. The result? One of the most excruciatingly difficult yet gratifying gaming experiences I’ve had in a while.

“The Last Guardian” is an action-adventure game with lots of environmental puzzles. That means you’ll be doing a lot of climbing, running, shimmying across ledges, pushing, and pulling.

You’ll also get to interact with a giant creature that’s as majestic as he is cute. Trico, as the adorable behemoth is called, is sort of a cross between a dog and a bird. And he’s the best thing about “The Last Guardian.”

Trico behaves like a real animal. He’ll curiously inspect new surroundings. He’ll sniff at and maybe even try to bite things he likes. If you’re lost and you don’t know what to do next, he’ll sometimes give you hints by pointing his snout at objects of interest.

And boy, did I need those hints. In my effort to solve the first puzzle—which was to open a large gate to the next area—I found myself running in circles and bumping my head into walls. I spent many embarrassing minutes solving absolutely nothing.

That would’ve been fine had I been alone in the Sony playroom. But there was a crowd behind me, watching and scrutinizing my every blunder. In my mind, I could hear their thoughts as loudly as spoken words:

“What a sad little twit.”

“Does he even know what he’s doing?”

“He must be a casual gamer.”

“Noob.”

But I’m not a casual gamer, damn it! I’ve not only finished “Bloodborne” three times, I’ve also uncovered 90% of its secrets and bested its toughest Chalice Dungeon bosses.

None of that prepared me for the punishing difficulty of that first puzzle, though. It wasn’t until a Sony representative approached me and taught me how to properly give Trico commands that I finally figured out what to do.

You can order Trico around in “The Last Guardian.” Want him to jump? Point him in the right direction and tell him to jump. Want Trico to follow you around? Simply call him over. Or, better yet, lure him with some of that delicious blue stuff he loves so much. You can climb onto his back and ride him as he leaps great heights, allowing him to transport you to otherwise inaccessible areas.

Still, the challenges continued to thwart me—to my great humiliation.

“Oh dear. Look, the idiot just fell to his death.”

“Is he trying to punch through a solid wall? Does he think he’s Adam Jensen or something?”

“Why doesn’t he just stick to Candy Crush?”

“What a loser.”

At one point, I had to break these eye-shaped glass discs that freaked Trico out and prevented him from moving forward. I completely overlooked the rocks on the ground that could be picked up and used to break those discs. At another, I totally misread the expression on Trico’s face that said, “Go ahead and jump across the chasm. Don’t worry, I’ll catch you. Trust me!” and ended up staring at him forlornly from the other side of the gap.

“The Last Guardian” plays like no other game in 2016. There are contextual cues—such as that expression on Trico’s face—that, if missed, will leave you dumbfounded about what to do next. The entire concept of forming a symbiotic relationship with a realistically intelligent animal in order to progress through obstacles is as refreshing as it us unique.

The controls will take some getting used to, as well. The startup animations take their time, so you won’t be sprinting at 20 mph in zero seconds flat. Upon pressing an action button, the boy winds up his arms, legs, or both before doing what you want him to do. This results in all his movements feeling rather—as a colleague described it—“floaty.” Of course, you’d be used to this if you’d just played “Ico” or “Shadow of the Colossus.” Unfortunately those titles are more than a decade old. So you’ll need to get yourself reacquainted with the character movement peculiarities of these games.

The Sony representative was kind enough to explain to me that one of the reasons the demo was so difficult was because it dropped me smack dab in the middle of the "The Last Guardian," instead of at its start. In other words, I didn’t go through the tutorial phase that would’ve taught me how the game should be played.

Well, whew. That explains it. Maybe I’m not such a huge noob, after all.

Overall, it was a wonderful experience. There were well-done cinematic moments that elicited gasps of shock from the crowd—and that had me, literally, at the edge of my seat. That part where I was falling to my death, only for Trico to catch me at the very last second with his tail? Utterly intense.

The puzzles were extremely well done, too, which made solving them that much more satisfying. The graphics have a gorgeous, ethereal quality to them, which makes the whole thing seem like a dream—the kind that slips through your fingers just as you’re about to wake up. And Trico is simply a beautiful creation, from his amazing, lifelike movements, to the detailed, individually animated feathers covering his body. — BM, GMA News

“The Last Guardian” is a PlayStation 4 exclusive. It will be released on December 6, 2016.

Images from Sony Interactive Entertainment