An Epic Adventure ... Brilliant
I heard about the rumors of an Ico 2 and such a long time ago. Well, no luck on that yet, but what did surface was a new title from the same creator ... Shadow of the Colossus. The name had me thinking already about the possibilities. Normally I'll go over the good, the bad, and the downright ugly ... but for this game ... let's say ... the great ... and the not so great.
The Great:
- What an incredibly unique journey this game takes you on. Even after buying the game, before I played it, I had no idea what to expect. The great thing is that you don't have to expect anything ... it will naturally set the mood and story for you. I enjoyed it to the finish.
- When I saw the first colossus I was thinking "oookay ... what do you want me to do now? ... what? ... you expect me to KILL that? ... um ... see that thing is like fifty feet tall ... I don't know if you noticed that ... what's that? ... I'm supposed to CLIMB on it?" It was totally rad. I remember the feeling I got after the first colossus. Overall, very impressive work on the colossi.
- Some of the most realistic horse movements I have seen in a game yet. - Simple elements of gameplay help keep you more focused on the goal rather than the button sequences you have to push to get there. Don't get me wrong, they definitely still make use of the character's abilities.
- An amazing and diverse landscape that is fully explorable from the beginning. I wonder what kinda toys this guy played with as a kid ... my guess would be wooden blocks ... no ... scratch that ... stone blocks ...with moss on them ... in small varying shapes ... outside ... by himself. Whatever the case, a few minutes into the game and you will easily see what I mean.
- Music that is queued up by your battle progression ... need I say more? :-p
The Not So Great:
-I guess one of the main things that got to me was ... however incredible the landscape may be ... while there may be plenty to see there is little to actually "do." I just think that maybe minor obstacles along the path to each colossus would have been kinda fun. Instead, you just trek to one part of the map each time easily.
- The game extras are nice ... but kind of too little too late. I would have liked to have used those extras my first time around. The time attack mode kind of makes a second go-around less appealing as you have to play each monster often several times to achieve the desired time ... and by then ... you're a freakin' colossi slaying master. Plus with time attack you don't have to ride the horse with little to do for ten minutes just to fight a colossus.
- Little puzzle-solving skills required outside of battle. The environment in Ico is what made it happen ... all the puzzles and such ... and this game had very little to none of that going on. I think this ties in with the whole "very little to actually do" category. Fight colossi, I got that part, what next? Oh ... I have to wait for a different game? I see.
I don't want to distort any overall appeal of the game, so I should definitely make it clear that this is on my personal top 10 best games EVER list. It should also easily make your top 10. It is a wowing experience from start to finish and you should definitely give it a go. Renting it would not be a bad choice, but it might be one that you end up wanting to pick up again later on ... even with next-gen consoles at hand.