Welcome to The Top Shelf, a weekly feature wherein I sort through my extensive PS2 collection for the diamonds in the rough. My goal here is to narrow down a library of 185 games to a svelte 44: the number of spaces on my bookshelf set aside for my PS2 collection. That means a whole lot of vetting and a whole lot of science that needs to be done - and here in the second round, that means narrowing our laser focus to one game per week (at least). Be sure to check out the Case File Repository for more details and a full list of games/links!

Extra Note: We've entered Shelftember! In this much-vaunted month, we will be processing one of the second round entries every day. I'll be spending one hour apiece with each game - inspired by DanielKempster's backlog-clearing series "An Hour With..." - and determining its fate from there.

Back when I tried to summon something, anything, for The Mark of Kri when discussing it in the first round of eliminations all I could muster was some non-sequitur comparisons to the Rygar reboot and something about Polynesian culture and animators. It's fair to say that the game didn't leave a significant impression on me the first time I played it, and after trying it again I'm wondering why that my memories of it aren't more vivid. The Mark of Kri has a very strong focus for its game design and art direction alike, a relatively sleek runtime, and an inspiration for its story that's uncommon but grounded in real folklore, so I don't imagine it would be out of place these days as an Indie game, or at least something akin to the "middle-tier" of game development that Ninja Theory is hoping to resurrect with Hellblade. It certainly strikes me as a labor of love for its developers at Sony Interactive Entertainment Studios San Diego, who are normally put to work producing the new MLB: The Show game every year in lieu of anything more interesting.

Its story concerns a group of glyphs that when combined would open a portal to what is essentially the Polynesian equivalent of Hell, and a hero's role in preventing the forces of darkness from making that happen. As the legendary warrior Rau (pre-legendariness), the player traverses their way through a series of mostly linear stages, killing enemies until they get to a boss fight after which the stage ends. There's no levelling, barely any collectibles, and a very small amount of story that - I'll admit - is depicted very well in these sketch-like animatic cutscenes between stages. These static cutscenes are probably my favorite part of the game's presentation, which cut in just before and after the player has control of Rau, and remind me of storyboards for a traditionally animated Disney movie of the Emperor's New Groove or Lilo & Stitch era.

As mindless as I'm making the gameplay sound, The Mark of Kri uses its brevity to its utmost potential, rolling out big game-changers to the hero's repertoire as the game continues. As far as I can tell the game has six missions, each about an hour long, and the first three are focused on the three pillars of the game's combat: the standard sword combat, which is actually fairly involved and requires "tagging" enemies with face buttons before using those face buttons to aim for them directly, sort of an early precursor and evolutionary dead-end to the Assassin's Creed/Arkham Batman approach to group combat; the stealth, which involves putting your sword away (which can be risky) in order to adopt a sneaky approach that lets you auto-kill enemies that don't see or hear you get close, and this factors in using your "spirit guide" bird friend to see enemy patrols and placements ahead of time and avoiding rustling or startling anything that might give you away; and finally the bow, which provides a way to instantly remove troublesome enemies from the fight (such as those stationed high up out of reach) but is understandably restrictive and conditional in its use. Each of those three early missions are designed to give you as much practice as you need to become adept with the sword, stealth and bow respectively, before the next three really test your mastery. The game's replete with pre-mission tutorials too, which are very handy for the uninitiated like myself.

While it can be a little repetitive, I can respect The Mark of Kri's focus and compactness. It controls well, once you get to grips with its unusual combat system, and regularly sending out your bird to scout while you carefully pick your time to strike down enemies has led to some fairly decent stealth gameplay. I'm not generally a fan of stealth because for the longest time it wasn't represented well in games, where so much vital information was delivered in vague and unhelpful terms (The Mark of Kri still has bits and pieces of this, like when the camera dramatically raises above Rau when he passes through tunnels, which makes spotting enemies on the other end unnecessarily difficult). It's also one of the oldest games I'm aware of to go for gruesome finishing blows of the type God of War is very fond of, and Rau seems to possess a suspiciously wide range of methods for brutally murdering people for a supposed hero (my favorite is when you stealth kill someone from behind a wall, and Rau just picks him up and rams into the wall several times head-first. It looks as painful as it sounds). For the most part, The Mark of Kri's been exceptionally fair. Maybe that's just because after only an hour spent with the game I'm still in the relatively gentle opening chapters, but it's left a better impression on me this time around. Since I'm already a substantial way through the game, I might just find a quiet afternoon to complete it before the month is out.

Result: Progresses to the Final Round.

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