Final Colossus down

Over the past 2 days I’ve ticked off Colossi 11 to 16, then had the pleasure of watching the end story and the credits roll, and see how Shadow of the Colossus is the spiritual predecessor to Ico.

Never have I taken as many screenshots… except maybe Final Fantasy XV. Only this time I didn’t want to share them on Twitter as I was scared of spoiling the game for others.

Crazy eh? The game was released 13 years ago, and has been remade for the last 2 generations of PlayStation. How mad is it that this is the first time I’ve finished the story, and the 3rd time I’ve owned it? :p

Don’t know why it took me so long to complete. Like picking up Bloodborne to finish this time it wasn’t a challenge, no a problem, to play; but a pleasant puzzle, with an awesome story. Some achievement from a game with minimum dialog.

Agro is now my favourite all time companion and NPC. Although mentally I named him ‘where the fuck is the horse?’, and kept thinking Wander was shouting ‘Arrow’. The influence of Epona is obvious, the latter scenes near copycat… but the ending is so great that this doesn’t matter, find it’s a nod of recognition rather than theft. Although after writing that thought I know I’ll be comparing SotC and Z:OoT going forward… how did I not consider the similarities before?

Loved the ambience of the World, the scale goes without saying, and the variety of Colossi challenges is so cool. This is the only game that on completion that I immediately started a New Game Plus to gallop over the plains again.

As with the last 2 games I’ve finished (Horizon Zero Dawn, Bloodborne) before I approached the final ‘boss’ the completionist in me arose. Shadow of the Colossus drove me to find just one more fruit, save temple, or white tailed skink. I’m taking this as a sign of a games quality and depth, that I want to keep playing, but it could just be me.

I feel finishing this story is an event that most gamers will have achieved long ago, and I now look forward to being able to discuss the intricacies, and conspiracies, of the story line. This is certainly a game I will recommend to all, there’s an irony that I lent out my PS3 copy before I had completed it to a mate as I was raving about it so much; ‘he just had to see it!’ I will be playing through the New Game Plus when I need my Colossus fix, or feel uninspired by anything else, and I look forward to the day that my wife will allow me to play this with my son. FFS it’s only a game, but it’s truly in a league of its own [Rating:5]

Another game off my AAA list, what to finish next?

Shadow of the Colossus External links

91% Metacritic
Shadow of the Colossus wikipedia