The Last Guardian companion book coming in February

Superfans of The Last Guardian may be interested in its upcoming companion book, An Extraordinary Story, which will offer “countless details about the inner workings and inspirations behind The Last Guardian’s mysterious world,” publisher Future Press announced today.

Future Press worked with the makers of The Last Guardian at GenDesign and Sony’s Japan Studio to produce the book; the developers walked the publishing house through the game with “sketches depicting the designers’ intent, storyboard and screenshot comparisons of key moments, and never-before-seen illustrations.” Future Press visited GenDesign’s offices in Tokyo for interviews with the team.

In addition to offering artwork from the development process, An Extraordinary Story will function as something of an explanatory strategy guide. It will contain a “visual walkthrough” that touches on the subtle (and perhaps not-so-subtle) ways in which The Last Guardian hints at its story.

While there’s plenty to unpack from the game itself, we’re hoping that An Extraordinary Story will provide further details on the protracted development of The Last Guardian. Fumito Ueda and Team Ico, the studio behind Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, began working on The Last Guardian in 2007; Sony announced it at E3 2009 as a PlayStation 3 title. Over the years following its unveiling, the game’s long absence from the public eye led fans to believe it was vaporware. Instead, it resurfaced as a PlayStation 4 game at E3 2015, and was finally released on that console two weeks ago.

Part art book, part walkthrough, part development chronicle, The Last Guardian: An Extraordinary Story is scheduled to be released Feb. 28, 2017. The list price will be £27.99 in the U.K. and $39.99 in the U.S.; the 256-page hardcover volume is now available for pre-order at Amazon.