I’ve loved playing video games ever since I was a child, one that stands out is Shadow of the Colossus. A game from 2005 made by Team Ico. It is considered to be one of the best games of the last decade. In the game we follow Wander, a young man who travels to the “Forbidden Land” in hope of saving his sister, Mono. He finds a temple and there a voice tells him that if he kills 16 colossi spread around the land Mono will be resurrected. At this moment the adventure starts. Riding our horse and armed with a bow and arrows and a sword we play as Wander, on our way to kill the colossi. Even though it seems to be a simple story, the game isn't as shallow. First of all I would like to talk about its beautiful graphics, for a game launched on PS2 in 2005 its looks are stunning. I remember how amazed my brother and I were about it. It has a lot of details that just made it look so realistic, like rocks shaking when a colossus falls or their waving when they agitate.
What is even better is the character design. 16 unique and very different colossuses co-exist in a huge map. One of my favourite ones is the 8th one, Kuromori. A gecko-looking colossus that awaits us in an old temple hidden in the forest. In order to find the colossi, you have to draw your sword and wave it in the sunlight, then a light will guide you to where the next colossus to kill is at. But killing them is not as easy as it may sound, we have to find their weak point. Which is a blue symbol hidden somewhere in their bodies, most of the time it's in a difficult place to reach. There can also be multiple weak points. Another cool detail is their eyes, deeply inspired by mandalas. They look scary, kinda hollow.
I mentioned the map before but not the landscape designs. There’s a lot of different locations, such as caves, waterfalls, mountains, little buildings with little lizards in them and forests that build a dreamland. Each colossi has its own battleground, some are inside a temple that we need to find and others in a vast desert that traps them. Although not every place is meant to be a battleground, most spaces are just to discover and appreciate. The atmosphere is amazing, with a greyish and brownish type of palette we really get into the fantasy game type of history. Another big factor is the music, which I adore. A very emotional but also dashing soundtrack follows us through the game, setting the correct mood depending on the track.
Some fun facts about the game: - It had a remake in 2018 for ps4, which I haven't had the pleasure of playing since I don't own a ps4. - Originally, you were to fight 48 colossus but it got reduced to 24 and finally to 16 - You can have access to an occult garden if you climb the temple from the beginning, but you will need to kill all the blue geckos of the game so that they give the sufficient stamina to climb the tower As a conclusion this game will always have an important place in my heart as it marked my childhood. I grew up playing it on my ps2 with my brother and it's the root of my liking for video games.
