Shadow Of The Colossus Review

As promised, I bring you the final copy of my Shadow of the Colossus review, which I wrote to apply for a job writing for a gaming website. Some of you may have seen it in some iteration as I did get a couple of people to give it a read and tell me their thoughts, but ultimately this is the final copy, as received by the website, and unfortunately didn't impress them quite enough.

Without further ado, I bring you, Shadow of the Colossus





Remember the awe you felt as a child when standing at the edge of a cliff looking down at the ocean crashing on the rocks below, or the wonder at looking up from the base of a towering waterfall? Can you recall that feeling of just how small you felt in the scheme of things? Team ICO seeks to bring back this feeling with the larger than life Shadow of the Colossus; an awe inspiring game which towers above the rest.

Shadow is a game unlike any other. Rather than follow the all-too-popular trend of rip-offs and rehashes, Team ICO has taken a bold step into the unknown, blending elegance and simplicity to provide a unique gaming experience not easily forgotten. Shadow's story follows an unnamed hero, who's brought his fallen love to an ancient temple in the hopes of returning her to life. A mysterious and intangible presence within the temple promises to revive her if the hero ventures forth and defeats sixteen colossi; the towering armoured creatures who call this place home.

As you begin your journey into this incredibly vast and open land, it becomes evident that the name “Shadow of the Colossus” isn't just another quirky Japanese-to-English translation. Everything in this world is huge; from the vast landscapes you're set to explore, to the colossi you must eventually defeat. With the whole world at such a large scale, you can't help but be reminded just how small and alone you are in your task; and with the exception of your horse, you won't find any other NPC's. Void as the land may seem however, any extra interactivity would simply detract from the games main focus; battling the colossi.

Navigating your way around and finding each colossus is rather straightforward. Raise your sword to the sky, and as long as there is sunlight, a beam of light will point out the direction you should be going. Another simple task is riding your horse. Pressing X will dig in the spurs, while pulling back on the thumb stick will yank on the reins and slow you down. Initially it may take a little getting used to, especially once you build up speed and need to stop suddenly, however it all becomes second nature and soon enough you'll be riding with the best of them.
While finding the general direction of each colossi is a somewhat easy task, actually getting to your destination is a different thing; rarely is the path merely a leisurely stroll from point A to point B. Occasionally you'll find places your horse cannot go, and will need to abandon him in order to climb up steep cliffs and across precarious gaps in a style familiar to a lot of gamers. Engaging in these acts of acrobatic daring are relatively simple, jump and take a hold of a ledge with your grip button and haul yourself up, and plan out your route from there. Don't feel too bad about leaving your horse behind, as a simple whistle will call him to you; as long as he has a clear path, he’ll return to your side.

Soon enough, after pulling yourself up that last ledge you'll come face to face with your first colossi. Now, I don't think I can put into words the feeling you experience when seeing your enemy for the first time, though the first thought through my head was: “I'm supposed to kill that?!” When looking at your modest sword and bow, the prospect of taking down these hulking monsters seems a little daunting and you wouldn't be blamed for thinking twice about your quest. Encouraged by occasional enigmatic clues given by our mysterious benefactor, you venture forth, wondering just what you've gotten yourself into.

In theory, defeating each colossus is a straight-forward task; clamber your way onto your foe, find their weak points, and stab until dead. Finding weak points is done in much the same way as finding the location of a colossi; raise your sword in a sunny area, and its beams of light will focus where your attacks will be most effective; usually an area of the body high-up and out of your reach

This is where the fun in Shadow begins. Climbing up onto a colossus can sometimes be as easy as running up to its leg, grabbing hold of a clump of fur and hoisting your way up. More often than not, however, you'll need to think and use your environment to your advantage; climbing up onto some precarious ledge to lure your foe over to take a massive leap of faith. Once you've gotten a firm footing somewhere on these massive monsters, you must navigate your way around, hoisting yourself up onto small spaces on their armour or body until you reach your goal, in a style similar to that found in the recent Prince of Persia games. Unfortunately for long time fans of that series, reaching for the rewind button yields no results, and you'll find yourself cringing as you slightly misjudge a jump and free fall towards the ground. Rest assured, our hero isn't quite as flimsy as the prince, and rarely takes fatal damage when falling from twenty stories up.
Once you've worked out your path to the weak point, you'll find yourself running and ledge-jumping like you're an accomplished free-runner. To make things a little harder, while you're carefully scaling these monsters, they're madly flailing about trying to shake you off like the annoying little pest you are. I don't think gaming has quite topped the feeling I had the first time I was shaken loose and free-fell, screaming “noooo” while mashing my grip button, only just managing to latch onto the tiniest of ledges with my pinky finger. I've never been bungee jumping before, though I imagine it feels a little something like that.
Finally defeating your first colossi is another breath-taking experience, and you're rewarded with a scene showing your now-bested foe come crashing to the ground. Looking back at his decimated ruin, you'd be hard-pressed to not feel proud and accomplished. At least until you realise you still have fifteen of these things to destroy, knowing each one will be bigger and more difficult than the last.

It's true, each colossus tends to grow bigger and more varied as you progress, and killing each is an accomplishment in itself. The styling of each colossus is fresh, and you'll never find yourself fighting a copy-paste version of the last one. From great beasts walking on all fours, to giant dragons soaring the skies, each colossi is a piece of interactive art, as is the land you'll find them in; varying from vast open and dusty plains, to mysterious fog-covered lakes and forests. The colossi themselves are seemingly a strange mix of organic beast and man-made architecture, and are simply stunning to behold. You'll be left wondering just how can the little PS2 pump out visuals on this scale; and at times it does have a little trouble, with a slight but non-harmful drop in frame rate occasionally, though that's easily forgivable.
Shadow's soundtrack complements its artistic direction in every way. While riding to your destinations you'll find little to no sound aside from the environmental ambiance and the clop-clop of your horses' feet, emphasising the already existing feeling of solitude; while meeting a colossus greets you with an eerie, almost curious score. Climbing onto a colossus and holding on for dear life rewards you with the music rising into a swelling crescendo befitting of your epic struggle.

Shadow's game play can seem a little short, lasting anywhere between 10 to 20 hours depending how easily you can defeat the various colossi, however after completing the game, you're rewarded with both hard mode and time-attack mode. Hard mode is pretty much self explanatory; and completing it requires a lot more creative thinking on how you're going to tackle each battle. Time-attack mode allows you to fight any of the colossi at your leisure or against the clock, and is a nice distraction if you're looking for a further challenge, or just to re-live one battle you enjoyed. If Shadow has you hooked, these extra modes should keep you interested for a while longer, however except for the increased difficulty, they don't offer much more. The lack of a multi player mode makes this a game you'd rarely bring out when having friends around, although it's likely they'd crowd around and cheer you on as you struggle and scale the various colossi if you did.

When all is said and done, Shadow of the Colossus is an amazing blend of art and gaming; it's an experience unlike any other found across any gaming platform, and is more than deserving of a place on any serious gamers shelf. It's not for everyone though, so if brain-teasing games don't take your fancy, you may not enjoy it. But do yourself a favour, give Shadow a chance, you just might be surprised. I know I was, and I will never regret a minute of my time playing it.





To those of you have read through it, feel free to drop a comment, tell me what you thought of it.