Ico Debug-Enabled Demo

We need to try this on HD ICO version on PS3.
Cos developers most likely rebuilded their game from alpha/beta to work with ps3.
So, on gta 3 on android (was rebuilded from alpha/beta too) we have found developers unfinished levels for multiplayer and more!

 

I'm really glad to see people using the debug menu and discovering new stuff! Sorry that I didn't reply to this earlier, it seems like it took awhile to appear, got moderated away, and then reappeared again!

There seem to be a few cases of stuff being left way outside of certain levels that I've seen so far. I think that the couch textures are the same, it is just missing the graphical overly "shader" to make it appear to glow.

"ba_test" is certainly interesting one. I have no idea why it seems to take so long to load and why ICO and Yorda immediately plunge to their deaths, but its nice to see something different left in of all the removed levels. Really great exploring though!

When I get a chance to look around the stage select again, I thought the st26 SEA level seemed interesting as it appears to be the level from the intro. Probably some leftover stuff hanging around out of view of the normal guided camera to find!

This goes along with my warning that my debug hack-in isn't quite perfect. I was thrilled just to get it worked so I released what I had as soon as possible, but in reality its clear that more needs to be done to get it to the functional state of the original debug demo. I am confident that the way tool and L2 option being broken has to do with missing character movement hooks that are not being "restored". This is also why you can move ICO around while traversing the debug menu, but in the actual debug demo you cannot. I'll definitely look into it but i cant promise anything as even with labels it can be difficult to figure out exactly what is missing that defines that behavior.

Very cool. Do you plan on doing more videos for the full game? I'm quite confident that there are plenty of things to find even without the debug levels present.

 

Yes, I posted my message but it didn't appear for a day or so, so I posted it again... then both appeared, so I deleted one, but then the images of the remaining message had disappeared, so in frustration I deleted it as well. Then strangely the message re-appeared (with the images) so that's why you missed it xD.

I'll have to check out that st26 SEA level and see if I can find anything, problem is you only have a few seconds before the next part of the intro loads and I have no way to 'freeze' it or stop it from continuing (unless you know a way?). The L2 function would be fun to play around with in the full version, but I can appreciate the difficulties in getting it to work - I'm amazed you were able to patch the demo to the full version.

As for another video, I may end up doing one and show some odds things I can find, but I have previously made a ton of Ico videos using the free camera (I was using Codebreaker codes back then) so I have pretty much covered all the beta stuff in the game as far as I know. I am however, working on a video that delves into the comparisons between Ico and Shadow of the Colossus... might take a while to finish though.

Do you think you would be able to help AndrewFM in getting the debug feature to work in the pre-release version of Shadow of the Colossus? He has hit a dead end so someone with your knowledge may be able to find a work around (hopefully).

http://www.assemblergames.com/forum...-Colossus-Potential-Debug&highlight=Ico+debug

Thanks again ; )

 

I'm not sure how st26 differs from the "logo" or "title" level, but it appears to start in an area I was unfamiliar with. Since it isn't actually a cutscene, there should be no forced demo scripting. May be worth a look.

I never noticed your old ICO videos before (though I have seen your in-depth SoTC stuff, very cool), but it looks like you already got a lot of the normal game covered with the free roam camera. Also, the Odds are that unless someone else hacked a camera code I'm not aware of, those are probably my very old Codebreaker free camera codes that you are using

I did notice the SoTC debug topic. It has always been a debug menu goal of mine along with ICO. Unfortunately the way that SoTC handles its loaders and elf files is very different than ICO, and it makes debugging it a real pain. I remember looking at that proto long ago when it was first released. Unfortunately it does not have any labeled elfs despite being a prototype, unlike the ICO debug that was released in this topic. Furthermore, the way it loads in files gives everything strange byte offsets that really screw with ps2dis referencing and readability. I'll definitely look into it again, but it is a much more daunting task. It at least already has some limited debug output functions (the colossus select menu and debug coordinates) that can be controller toggled, but without labels it is always a bit like stumbling around in the dark.

 

Interesting! I guess I 'was' using your Codebreaker camera codes after all, they are the only ones I could ever use and they only worked for the US version, although I believe they might have been converted for the PAL version... not sure. A Youtube user called Dark0ssX passed them on to me from memory.

I compiled all my old Ico videos into one compilation video a while back (runs for 1 1/2 hours!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kPzFGaTu5s&list=PL0FA103DF78ECB841

I checked out the st26 SEA level, and you're right, you can explore it without it moving into the intro cut scene. I guess because it's the model that's loaded before the title screen appears, it's the place where you see Ico and the soldiers riding through the forest at the very start of the game. In fact, if you take the camera over to the ocean between the bluff and the castle you will see Ico standing there above the ocean. Just standing there suspended hundreds of feet above the waves, looking around as he does ; ) I had been there before with your camera codes and it's in my compilation video. I was amazed at the time that no one had ever posted any videos of exploring with the camera codes, as I made them 9 years after the game's release!

As for the SotC debug issue, I guess we'll have to keep trying... one day someone might catch a lucky break, or discover some clever way that opens up new avenues of cracking it? It would be interesting to see all the debug tools in action, but as you said, at least we can still use the menus that are there, and use the 2nd controller to bring Agro to the secret garden!

 

Thank you for this release!

 

This is sick! Thanks for everyone's work!

 

Looking through other demos on the discs, and there's a few that also contain labelled ELFs, but nothing as well-known as Ico (Need for Speed, for example). If anyone wants, I can rebuild ISOs for some other demos that are noteworthy, like Yabasic and that Find My Own Way tech demo. Odd that there's a few incomplete demos on some discs.

 

any debug unlocks of any game are extremely welcome here.

another semi-offtopic: i'm almost sure there is lots of beta stuff and debug menu in the ps2 demo of "mercenaries playground of destruction" - but this is pretty hard to find on one of the official demo disks. also i can try to rebuild/upload this demo disks if someone want it:
PBPX-95514, SCED-53168, SCED-54043, PBPX-95506, SCED-53978, SCED-54406, PBPX-95520, SCED-54405, SCED-53169, SCED-54408, SCED-53167, SCED-54404
or i can create LBA list of files and folders inside, like this for PBPX-95514: http://pastebin.com/wXFiNFMz

 

Well, this is all (most?) of the demos I have:
PBPX-95205 Demo Disc
PBPX-95506
PBPX-95514
PBPX-95520
SCED-50313 Formula One 2001/Formel Eins 2001
SCED-50520 World Rally Champonship
SCED-50614 Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy
SCED-50844 ICO
SCED-50932 Smash Court Tennis: Pro Tournament
SCED-51075 Ratchet and Clank
SCED-51165 This is Football 2003
SCED-51484 Primal
SCED-50811 Selector Demo 01
SCED-51140 PS2 Bonus Demo 3
SCED-51486 Bonus Demo 4
SCED-52932 Bonus Demo 8 (old)
SCED-52970 SCEE Hits Demo

--Official PlayStation 2 Magazine--
SCED-50140 #05/January/2001
SCED-50143 #08/April/2001
SCED-50144 #09/May/2001
SCED-50145 #10/June/2001
SCED-50147 #12/October/2001
SCED-50152 #17/December/2001
SCED-50746 #24/July/2002
SCED-50750 #28/October/2002
SCED-51531 #33/March/2003
SCED-52052 #44// /* This is a confusing one. Case says #26 April 2004, disc says #44 January 2004, probably a mix-up somewhere */
SCED-52785 #50/July/2004
SCED-52169 #54/November/2004 (Christmas)
SCED-53292 #62/June/2005
SCED-53961 #66/September/2005
SCED-53939 #67/January/2006
SCED-53171 #68/February/2006
SCED-53978 #69/March/2006
SCED-54099 #71/June/2006
SCED-54045 #73/August/2006

 

ok here attached archive of missed lba disks from your list (say if you see some potential debug or stuff like that):

also just found interesting (not standart loader) demo disk SCUS-97313 - lba included in archrive too.


p.s. if you have Mercenaries demo inside of your demos, will be great if you will upload it.

 

I'd be happy to look into any game demo with a labeled ELF file. While most games have debug references in their string tables, without labels its a considerable undertaking to figure out what to do with them. Perhaps this would be a good point to start a new topic for PS2 demos with labeled ELFs? Just a thought. I have a pretty large collection of PS2 demos that I should probably look through at some point as well.

 

Hey fiber ; )

You asked me if I was going to upload any more videos about ICO... well here is my latest upload. A complete map of the game!

Until now, there was no definitive map of the game, only a few low res maps that you can find on the web if you search hard enough, but even then they are not very helpful... one has Japanese text and is just a black and white line diagram, the next is very low res so you can't make out any details, and another has good resolution but it's still hard to make out any details as the text covers all the significant areas of the map. I own the official art book and players game guide, but they both don't feature any maps of the game.

So I've spent the last month creating my own map which involved taking screen captures above each area (using the free camera mod) and assembling each piece in Photoshop. Here is the result:

ICO castle map_hi res.jpg 16.4 MB
https://mega.co.nz/#!UsdFCYYC!tXsZj1crg-i0jEuoARWRVG2V2ffdPN09wUonLi90OtY


ICO castle map_super hi res.jpg 49.6 MB
https://mega.co.nz/#!t0EUhbDZ!73rGBiTdTP4ohYYfYJcEPQgyga34e4LUn-2L-OO9ORs

I made a video that features each section with screen captures I took from the game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODOaFcgic0s

It took over a month to complete with over 400 screen captures! The perspective issue was a real problem... as soon as you move the camera over an area the image changes dramatically! What looks nice and level is completely skewed a few metres left or right, so I had to use a lot of retouching in Photoshop to make it all fit together... a real nightmare!

Anyway, it is done and dusted now - finally! Probably the most Photoshop work I have ever done on a single job.

 

Incredible work! Really a remarkable job all around. I loved the very laid-back video too. The only thing that had me wondering after looking through it all was the lack of the beach. Can it not be geometrically tied the beach to the cliff side meaningfully?

I can't believe that team ICO laid out the island so meticulously such that it fit together so well. Not to say I'm sure you didn't have to do plenty of tweaking of the finer details in Photoshop. But its especially impressive in the absence of the game ever rendering the castle all at once (I'm pretty sure the end cutscene uses a very low res/polygonal stand-in for the castle destruction wide shots). Very cool to see it all laid out in such detail. I really hope that The Last Guardian is released at some point... they certainly make some fascinating, beautiful games.

 

Thanks ; ) Glad you liked it.

There were a couple of sections on the map that had no roof textures (as you were never meant to see these structures from above) so I just filled them in with a similar brick texture taken from the roof of an adjoining building etc.

As to the beach, I have no clue as to where it is situated in relation to the castle. Fans like to speculate that Ico washes up of the shore of the forbidden lands (in SotC) at the secluded beach in B5 (the so called 'Ico beach') which does look remarkably similar, except for the texture of the cliffs... but I'm also working on another video at the moment which will touch on this idea, wild speculation of course, but there are some clues in Ico which may point to where the castle was located in relation to the forbidden lands.

I'll post a link when it's done.

 

Not sure that's what you're looking for... Check ops2m demo 56 (SCED-53132) out.

 

Thank you! Awesome collection of demo disks was shared there. Seems like i'm searching for E3 version and this is not official demo. anyway in this DVD i have found possible early footage from the game, witch is cool.

 

Hey fibre,

I managed to explore the 'Deja' stage - the one that always crashes. I messed around with the emulator settings and found a way to make it run without freezing. There is no sound and if you try to move Ico in any way it will freeze, so all I can do is use the free camera to look around.

It appears to be the level at the start of the game when Ico has his dream, which might explain its name 'Deja' as in deja vu perhaps?

It's stormy and it has that grainy effect we see in the dream sequences in Shadow of the Colossus (for instance after the 8th colossus is defeated Wander dreams about Mono waking up). In fact it is raining inside the tower where Ico first finds Yorda in her cage. I took some snaps:


Ico is standing under where the cage normally hangs


A shadow creature sits in the corner, still moving around. Sometimes it attacks Ico and the level freezes


Another time is was way down under the tower for some reason?


Yorda is outside the tower where the old bridge would be - she is like the shadowy figure we see in the dream






View of tower from a distance


When lightning strikes, the tower glows like this

I tried getting some of the other non-working levels to work but no luck yet.

 

@NomadColossus, cool, but you can also disable post-effects and things like blur and more in debug options for more clear screenshots.

 

Demo is also a bit different from the final build, at least from the XBOX one.

Here's my playthrough of the Playstation 2 demo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Q_I-xwhn7A

And playthrough of the XBOX retail game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cB1R5NEO5hU

When you carry an enemy you run instead of walk (retail) and explosion particles are triangles instead of complex polygons (retail). But maybe those are PS2-XBOX differences, i dont know.