Primal:Primal
'Primal is an Action Adventure fantasy video game released in 2003 for the Playstation 2. The game has been re released on the Playstation 3 as part of the PS2 Classics program on Feb 28, 2012. The story focuses on Jen tate in search of her boyfriend.
The battle to save the outside world starts within as Jen Tate, a young woman of our world, faces the demons of alternate planes and discovers her own supernatural origin. In Oblivion, there are four distinct realms, each occupied by a demon race. Two are aligned with order and two with chaos. But the scales of balance are overthrown, and chaos is engulfing Oblivion.
Description
"Civilization is only skin deep." Jen and her gargoyle companion Scree battle through four elemental realms to restore balance between Order and Chaos. Along the way Jen gains the ability to transform into four demonic forms.
Like it's Japanese counterpart Ico, the British game Primal is as much or more about experiencing the game's universe and interaction between characters as it is about gameplay. In stark contrast to Ico's minimalist approach, Primal spared no expense in its presentation production values.
Incredible amounts of motion capture, BAFTA nominated soundtrack, machine band combat soundtrack, lavish object and character models, luxurious textures, top-quality voice acting, richly imagined worlds, cultures and races, realistic characters with sometimes extravagant amounts of dialog. Like Ico, extensive use is made of lighting effects, via torches, ignitable urns, wall torches, and changing environmental lighting. Colored environmental light changes the coloring of Jen and Scree as they move through it. Shadows change to reflect the nearest light source.
Developed by SCEE Cambridge, the development team responsible for Medi Evil and its sequel, Primal (2003) is a PS 2 exclusive. A graphical tour de force in 2003. Even today, with the help of component cables, widescreen and 480p progressive scan mode on an LCD TV it can hold its own against more recent games. This is due to not following the current [Real Is Brown and Blurry] trend. Richly imagined, colored, and detailed environments and characters are everywhere. Marred only by its combat system.
It is a single player, two character action/adventure game focusing on Jen Tate, a mortal girl attacked when leaving a nightclub with her boyfriend Lewis, singer in the club's industrial music band.
The attack leaves Jen and Lewis unconscious in a hospital. A short, dark figure approaches Jen's bed and raises her spirit up out of her body. The figure reveals itself to be a small stone gargoyle named Scree. Scree explains that Jen's body is close to death and she must come with him to the Nexus.
The player can control either Jen or Scree, an animated stone gargoyle, as they travel through four fantastic realms to restore the balance between Order, represented by Lady Arella, and Chaos, represented by Abaddon.
Gameplay can be schizophrenic. Sometimes it's like a luxuriously animated old-school text adventure. Sometimes it's a fighting game with tricky combos.
Controllable Characters
- Jen, a snarky Goth girl.
- Slim enough to enter spaces too narrow for Scree.
- Jen obtains forms with different abilities in the various Realms. One of the forms is an almost unique aquatic form. This permits a full water level, as well as watery paths in later levels.
- Jen will do most of the fighting, using only melee attacks, despite the fact that some enemies have ranged attacks. During combat Scree freezes into immobility. If Jen can get clear of combat Scree will loosen up enough to let Jen heal by drawing energy from him.
- Scree, a possessed gargoyle statue. Powers include:
- Able to walk up some dressed stone walls.
- Carry a torch for light and incendiary purposes.
- Collect lodestones.
- Possess some statues, if he has sufficient lodestones.
- Store elemental energy from fountains, energy stones, blobs of energy and enemy corpses.
Jen's Elemental forms are healed by drawing elemental energy from Scree that only he can collect. Her human form is weakest, but regenerates naturally after a short time of not being hit.
Rated M for Blood and Violence.
Soundtrack
- Original orchestral soundtrack by Paul Arnold and Andrew Barnabas, performed by the City Of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus.
- Nominated for a BAFTA award.
- Combat Soundtrack by 16Volt, an American industrial music group.
- Both soundtracks were released commercially.
Notable Voice Actors
- Scree - voiced by Andreas Katsulas
- played G'Kar in Babylon 5 and
- the one-armed man in the Harrison Ford movie, The Fugitive
- Jen - voiced by Hudson Leick,
- who played Callisto as a recurring role in Xena Warrior Princess and Hercules The Legendary Journeys.
- Jared - voiced by Sean Pertwee.
- Son of Jon Pertwee of Doctor Who fame.
- Sean also voiced the Aquis Engineer uncredited. (You can't mistake that voice.)
Voiceovers were also done, by different actors, for French, German, Italian and Spanish. Like Ico, Primal was attempting to reach the broadest possible language base. Unlike Ico, Primal did so by providing many different translations, instead of minimizing the amount of language used.
Other
- The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London had an exhibition of original artwork from the Primal project, as documented at the now defunct website www.primal-art.com
- Along with European (PAL), USA(NTSC), and Japanese versions, a PAL "Collector's Edition" was issued with the game's initial release.
Development
Re Release
The game ws released to the PlayStation 3 system the february 28, 2012, for north american users as part of ps2 classics.
Gallery
Logo
Covers
Wallpapers
Posters
Trailers
New official trailer for ps3: