This weekend me and my fiancée had a holiday off just to chill, stay home and rest.
I bought my PS4 back in 2019 from a friend. His excuse was that he only used it to watch Netflix and didn’t really have time for it anymore, and he gave me a pretty good deal too.
If I remember correctly, it came with Shadow of the Colossus when he bought it, I think it was some kind of bundle.
Ever since then we’ve always played whenever we can. Our last game together was Until Dawn (we’re always going to local fairs looking for used games, it kinda became a hobby for us). Anyway, I said I wanted to finally try it. I already knew the story, knew the reputation and quality behind it, but had never actually played it myself.
And man… what a surprise.
I don’t wanna sound like that guy or anything, but man, japanese devs really know how to make games.
Just dropping into a story knowing absolutely nothing, only small fragments. We didn’t even know if she was his sister, girlfriend, or someone from his family, all we knew was that the protagonist would do absolutely anything to save her. And the game simply throws you into the world completely free. No compass, no yellow markers, no HUD, nothing.
I was genuinely blown away by the quality of the game and the massive landscapes. One of my favorite games ever is Death Stranding and man… it gave me that same weirdly peaceful feeling.
But talking about this game means talking about the colossi, and honestly, the feeling was bittersweet. I never really felt satisfied after killing each one of them. Even though it was clearly something that had to be done, every fight left me feeling kinda empty afterward… Our favorite colossi were the bird, that giant sand snake, that electric water serpent, and the other bird too (sorry, I have no idea what any of their names are lol).
And honestly, some things I’d rather leave to my imagination. Who were those people? Why was the girl cursed? Why was that land forbidden? Who did that sword belong to? Stuff like that. Things that are more interesting because they aren’t fully explained.
I genuinely can’t believe it took me this long to finally play this masterpiece.
And I’m also still kinda in disbelief that most people experienced this back on the PS2. All of THIS was possible on the PS2?! What kind of witchcraft were they using back then??
Anyway, it was fun. Thank you Fumito Ueda for this.