Shadow of the Colossus

[Concept]

When the first Collosus clocked me and headed my way it was a real `OMG!` moment.

I know. I remember saying

Only this far in and the game is already providing me with a range of emotions. The feeling of accomplishment from scaling the first Colossus got me drunk on a feeling of power.

->Open Spoiler<-

I sunk the sword into its head

without really thinking about what I was doing, relieved to have actually made it to the top of something so immense and fearing that there was only one way down.

It was only when I felled the thing that I stopped to think about what had just happened. The exhilaration was replaced with... well, to be honest, a fair bit of guilt.

Note: only highlight the spoilers after you've completed the game.

In a sense, and this is where Shadow of the Colossus really starts to boggle with your mind... the destruction of each colossi

->Open Spoiler<-

twist back in on themselves when you consider who's doing the attacking. Dormin exists inside the hero/boy, and so from one perspective, the colossus could be said to be attacking themselves through a conduit. After all, Dormin is many, but it is also whole.

They're perhaps self-destructing on themselves to gain freedom. And this is again, where Shadow of the Colossus really begins to make you think. Dormin views freedom as becoming whole in one central shell (a body again), whereas out in the open landscapes, inside all the different colossi, isn't that what real freedom is about? It/he/they is/are nowhere near trapped as they eventually desire to become.

What had that poor thing done to me (aside from stomp on me a few times but that was my fault for getting too close)? And there I was, sword in hand having dispatched it, with no real reason for doing so other than some disembodied voice had made me a promise; with no idea of if it's to be trusted. Was it right that I felt closer to the dead Colossus than to the cold girl laying on the stone slab?

That's a good point. I don't see the battles with each colossi as a duel, but more of a dance, where each partner has to fill out their role and move in time with each other.

->Open Spoiler<-

Since each colossi is the representation of an entity fragmented, then it's arguably the same parts/souls that we're dueling with.

It's as though the colossi take their turn, and then expect the player to reply back in kind. A result of this is that it creates a very odd sensation. Mono (the dead girl) becomes as lifeless as the landscape around her, but as we become more accustomed with the surroundings and it gains more personality, even that pales in contrast.

I think one of the reasons these contrasts exist is to emphasise the fact that Mono is dead in relation to everything else, which seems to go under a constant change as the atmosphere builds.

Everything about this game is beautiful / inspiring / haunting and everything you can think of in between those definitions.

Absolutely. I think all three of those qualities you mention in Colossus are inherently linked. The landscapes have to be haunting to leave an impression and a mark after you leave the game. In turn, to achieve that level of atmosphere the design of the world has to be internally consistent with the high art design shown everywhere else in the overall experience.

Colossus reverberates because of how powerful it immerses us in nature. If you think, ICO was all about falling in love with the architectural. Man made ruins fallen from grace.

In contrast, Colossus expands on that tone by reversing the balance which previously existed.

[Akira]

great reviews by tim and yours jusatsushi.I find myself just staring at agro's model and his/her animation.It's the most true to life animal i've ever seen in a game.So many subtle things about agro's movement's just shock me.Plus seeing him giving it death across the screen when your battling the colossi is priceless.

Best sidekick ever! 8)

[Concept]

Another certain ?problem? that some people seem to complain about is that between the death of one colossi to start your journey anew and reveal the next one: there is nothing much to do between the sections except from riding your horse and draw out your sword to enable a blinding blue light guide you to your next foe. This means that there is no fighting, plat forming or relative puzzles to solves before meeting the next colossi. The games premise is to take down all 16 colossus and revive the love of your life in game - do not expect more than that.

Nice overview by the way.

It made for an enjoyable read.

While I can understand the frustrations some people have with the inactivity of the environments, I don't agree with them. The exploration of the landscape isn't to gain further abilities/items/rewards, but to take pleasure in the different changes which exist in the environment. Colossus shares with ICO that fixation on making the player become a being in the surroundings, so they completely swallow you up. I suppose it depends how open you want to be for it to affect you in the way it does.

The emptiness helps you to focus on not only the distance travelled, but on the relationship you develop with Agro too.

One thing that completely struck me about this game, just like Ico did: the atmosphere. I love the feeling of desolation, of a once great civilisation now completely deserted and ruined. The music is short and sparse, with the use of lifelike sounds whilst running on the horse across the barren landscape - just the sound of the horses galloping echoes throughout eternality. The wind changes across each landscape from a flat plains to a grand scale mountain or rock face, the use of sound is just ridiculously brilliant.

It is handled very well, though I did encounter a bug that a couple of other people mentioned. It only happened a couple of times throughout the entire game, but in transferring from place to place the sound of the wind can cut out as you look around, and it occasionally jarred. Apart from that, I thought the sound of the landscape and the way it shifted in tone from one location to the next, was very subtle. The team behind the game cleverly blended one of the key ingredients which made ICO's minimalism successful with a more conventional, recognished approach for the Colossi themselves.

When I plunged the final blow to the colossi head - showing a rather stylist and clean-cut bloody spraying everywhere - the once giant almost immortal force that you were hunger to kill, is just an innocent creature that you killed throwing all sorts of emotions at you: regret, anger, isolation and most of all leaves you upset because of the harmless natural to how they look when they come tumbling and crash down on the earth ending in a serene and eerie silent.

It's when they die, and the black smoke/ink starts to pour out which I find the most intriguing/disturbing, because it connects, traps and ensnares the hero/boy directly to the corpse of each colossi.

The following spoiler should only be read if you've completed the game.

->Open Spoiler<-

The transportation from the resting grounds to the temple almost (and this is obviously very deliberate) feels as though you're being taken into a womb and rebirthed out again.

This further implies the fact you're not only a spirtual vessel for Dormin, but equally, Dormin is a vessel through which you travel to reawaken back at the temple. The player and the bidder of the player go hand in hand, albeit for their own reasons.

Once you have seen the colossi fall down from the sky to the earth in a rather sombre manner, you get sent back to the temple to begin your epic quest to find the second colossi and you suddenly realise that the game is for real - it real does hit home after your have defeated the first colossi and you are feeling rather eager to continue your journey for the revival of your lost love, especially when you find out more about the two in the cut scenes.

For me it was the third colossi when

->Open Spoiler<-

I feel madly head over heels for the game. Just the location it's in (a lonely swamp with an incomprehensible building twisting up into the air), and the fact you have to travel hundreds of feet up really helped the scale of the game to hit home. Especially when you see the rest of the landscape being generated in real-time from your position... then when the colossi wakes and you have to climb his armour to get to his head, you're being flung all over the place, and from how high you are, (and how towering the giant is), you can see mountains, deserts, forests miles beyond.

I was completely shattered into pieces (like glass) when I encountered that moment. Atmopsherically it was just so well understood... in that it took a powerful part of ICO (in terms of the man-made machinery seen at the end of the game), and evolved on it to create a surreal, lucid sensation when you come across this secluded spot.

One of the many moments which took my breath away. And one I'll never forget.

[Concept]

Number six was awesome, I've seen many games attempt similar before, but never as good as this.

->Open Spoiler<-

Just sitting in the water, watching that thing swim under you...getting closer...closer...it looks small to begin with, but when it suddenly comes up to the surface and you grab the trail. Wow! A pretty easy fight, but by the time you reach the head it's like you've really tackled this huge beast. Love how it really takes you under the surface after a while, so deep that your breath cannot hold out.

I really liked the environment number 7 (the beast you mention in the above post) was found in. On my first playthrough (I played through the game again for 12 hours in total on Monday/Tuesday), I had a habit of returning to every colossi to see their remains and take time in exploring the surroundings they were in. Number 7's

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lake-filled remains are delicious... especially if you take the camera under water and look up into the sky, with all its different shades of colours, clouds, and lights streaming up into the air. The view on top of the spiralling tower near its entrance is also seriously impressive.

I loved the sense of abandonment at each location... how each one feels as though they've been forgotten. The colosseum (with the wall climbing lizard) is also beautifully ruined... and if you look up into the near-destroyed dome and up into the sky... the view is almost blindingly beautiful (as is its secluded entrace surrounded by a cave-like lake and waterfall).

The underground cavern leading to number six which you have to climb down to underneath the mountains also evoked a similar, intimate sensation.

As for a couple of my personal favourites in terms of bosses...

*Don't read if you're not up to Colossi 13.*

->Open Spoiler<-

Numbers 5 and 13 completely smashed me apart. The ambition is audacious - I never thought the team would be able to chereograph taking down flying colossi travelling hundreds of feet up at insane speeds. Just to see how high up I was, and being spun around upside down (and all over the show) felt simply mind blowing.

One of the standout moments in my entire gaming life.

The music when you take one down is one of the most memorable I've heard in a game, even if it does only last 30 seconds or so. It so perfectly captures the the gamer satisfaction yet human guilt. I've already said it, but it's such an achievement taking a colossi down, yet their death animation is so moving and perfectly animated that somehow it doesn't feel like you've done the right thing.

This is obviously the point of the whole game, but the fact the developer managed to pull off such a complicated mix of emotions is so commendable.

The music after they've gone down is highly elegant too... after the rough and tumble aggression the player and the colossi show each other when they fight, the aftermath when you've won is relatively serene and gentle. I think those wide ranges, and how they're intertwined sums up the game pretty well.

You're faced with taking down mountains, and when you do, the result is something far more quiet and contemplative.

Completed! I've done a review of this here if anyone fancies a read (no spoilers of course!).

What a game!

Nice review.

[HCE]

Received mine on Monday, finished it late last night. Awesome. Just an awesome experience. I won't try to compare it to ICO, one of my favorite games of all time, and judge which is better; it would be like deciding which of your two children you love more, I imagine. Besides, I want to give the experience time to sink in while I go through it again in hard mode. I will say that the moment I knew I was in love came around the time of colossus number 5.

[MartyG]

My copy arrived today and I've spent the last hour and a half trying to get into this and I just couldn't. I'm finding the control system so utterly annoying that it's making the game unplayable. It looks very nice, especially the camera rotation, and it's very nicely scored, but I really don't find it playable at all. I think this is one that'll just sit on the shelf.

[Concept]

Received mine on Monday, finished it late last night. Awesome. Just an awesome experience. I won't try to compare it to ICO, one of my favorite games of all time, and judge which is better; it would be like deciding which of your two children you love more, I imagine. Besides, I want to give the experience time to sink in while I go through it again in hard mode. I will say that the moment I knew I was in love came around the time of colossus number 5.

It isn't fair comparing ICO and Shadow of the Colossus to each other because they're in different genres, but in context of the fact they exist in the same world, comparisons are probably inevitable.

I agree with you that Shadow of the Colossus does need time to settle and sink in before its true scope can be properly realised. ICO is one of those titles which has become more and more savoured over the years, and I can see the same happening with Colossus... though as MartyG demonstrates, it isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea. This is something of a running theme with a number of my favourite games this year so far (Shadow of the Colossus, Killer7, Farenheit, Stranger's Wrath etc.)

My copy arrived today and I've spent the last hour and a half trying to get into this and I just couldn't. I'm finding the control system so utterly annoying that it's making the game unplayable. It looks very nice, especially the camera rotation, and it's very nicely scored, but I really don't find it playable at all. I think this is one that'll just sit on the shelf.

I said this at OpenSenses but there are small echoes of Panzer Dragoon Saga in Colossus. That's why I don't have a problem with the on-foot/camera controls, because the boy/hero handles similar to Edge. Many of the exploration elements on the horse remind me slightly of the free-roaming maps in Saga you could explore with the dragon as well. It wasn't mandatory to do so, but it often helped add to the experience if you did.

In a sense, the rewards in Colossus are built on how well it beds in for you, and if it manages to sweep you up and inspire.

[MartyG]

I'd really like to enjoy the game, it is visually very impressive, as people have said, the scale of the Colossi is impressive, it's a similar kind of fantasy like being in Jason and the Argonauts, but the control system is so sluggish, awkward and unresponsive. I always have an issue when games behave like that, it's one of the reasons I don't like the RE games.

[PeteJ]

I find that the controls are only awkward on the horse. Find it difficult to navigate in night spaces.

When fighting they are pretty much perfect I think...once you get used to the beauty that is the Grip mechanic.

[Geoff D]

I appear to be having my clock cleaned by Colossi number 9 - this is not a cry for help by the way, just an outpouring.

->Open Spoiler<-

My guess is it has to be something to do with the geysers outside his cave - I kept getting spanked by his fireballs though, so it was a bit tricky to confirm....

Never mind, shall go back to it shortly. Geoff D prevails.

[dazzx]

Received my copy monday and have to agree about annoying controls when riding the horse, apart from that enjoying climbing/killing the colossus am up to #6. enjoyed #5 very much, cheers

[Spatial]

Pics of the Japanese pack

Front Cover - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/wander-cover.jpg
Back Cover - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/wander-back.jpg
Manual - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/wander-manual.jpg
Game Disc - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/wander-disc.jpg
Reverse of sleeve - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/wander-reverse.jpg
Special Disc Cover (front) - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/nico-cover.jpg
Special Disc Cover (back) - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/nico-back.jpg
Special Disc Manual - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/nico-manual.jpg
Special Disc game Disc - http://www.tokyopia.com/deluxe/nico/nico-disc.jpg

[PeteJ]

That

->Open Spoiler<-

Nico cover

is great, shame they didn't run with that.

Sorry concept

[Concept]

I've got the Japanese game/special disc coming. Cheers for not linking directly.

I don't want to spoil the surprise.

[Concept]

That Nico cover is great, shame they didn't run with that.

I was hoping they'd use the same type font used in ICO for Colossus, so as to provide a small link of the two games together in the same world (though it's already fairly clear they are).

The team didn't run with that cover (which I'm assuming is drawn by Ueda as the ICO cover was) is presumably because Colossus changed design early through development.

Edit: It's alright Pete. I've seen the Nico cover on JPN Games website. And I knew about Nico years ago.

I just don't want to see close up/back cover/disc/manual shots yet.