Bradygames Okami Official Strategy Guide

This is a paperback copy of an in-depth walkthrough for a game called Okami, initially released for the Sony Playstation 2 in April of 2006. A port was developed for the Nintendo Wii and was released in April of 2008. An HD version was released for the Playstation 3 in 2012. Finally, the game received its latest release for Playstation 4, Xbox One, and Windows in 2017, as well as a version for the Nintendo Switch in 2018. 

This particular guide was published when the second iteration of the game was released for the Wii, as indicated by the text over the red leaf in the bottom right of the cover image. However, I received this copy as a birthday gift from my brother when he bought me the PS4 version, and as a joke, he scratched out the words “Nintendo Wii” and wrote “PS4” underneath. 

Okami is a highly memorable and visually unique game. Where most video games try to achieve some degree of realism in their visual graphics and textures, Okami is stylized after ancient Japanese art, accentuating the look of heavy brushstrokes and highly stylized characters. This even bleeds into the gameplay loop, wherein the player can pause time and “paint” things into the world to solve puzzles and fight the various yokai, or demons, in the overworld. This visual approach was unprecedented at the time, and hasn't been done since, at least not to a level of comparable success. 

Okami puts the player in control of Amaterasu, a goddess in Japanese mythology associated with the sun, heaven, and creation. In this game, Amaterasu takes the form of a white wolf with red spirals and markings, although these are only visible to the player and other deities; common people only see the white wolf. On her back is a flaming disc, which can be swapped out for a variety of swords and other weapons to be used in combat. The game takes the player through a fictional version of ancient Japan called “Nippon,” which is a romanization of the Japanese word for Japan (日本). On the journey, the player meets several deities and important figures in Japanese history and mythology. Some of the gods grant Amaterasu with a special ability or power that lets her/the player access new areas and fight enemies more effectively. The ultimate goal of the game is to rid Nippon of a deadly curse brought upon by the 8 headed serpent god Orochi, whom Amaterasu is destined to destroy. 

Video game guides used to be much more common than they are now. I remember going to Gamestop with my brother to get the new Pokemon games when they came out, and we would always buy a guide to go with it. These guides were not only helpful for elementary-school-aged-me, but also contained a lot of artwork and information not found in the games themselves. To a certain degree, it was almost expected that you should play the game alongside the guide, and this paradigm is a continuation of older games, where the little booklet that came with the game sometimes contained crucial information for the player to refer to. 

Game guides also served as a sort of showcase for the extra development content that might not have made the final cut. Concept art, diagrams, character bios, and much more found a home within the pages of these guides, but these are becoming more rare. I remember pouring through the pages of guides when I wasn't playing anything at all. It was like a way to enjoy the game without actually playing it. 

Now, in 2024, physical copies of these guides are much more rare, as are physical copies of the games themselves. With the internet as commonly available as it is, it's much more likely that a player stuck on some puzzle or enemy in a game will simply turn to google and see what pops up. In their place, we have seen new norms in the industry, such as bonus menus that let you view concept art and development of designs, and art books that similarly show off “unused” art in a physical format.