Despite the original being my favourite PS2 game and in my top 10 games of all time, I'd never wanted to play the remake before. The graphics and lighting always looked a bit 'off' to me, and lacking the atmosphere that those fuzzy, misty PS2 graphics gave off.

After I got used to the sharpness of the visuals though and the slightly terrible rendition of Wanda's face, I really fell for this remakes charms.

It feels like a real labour of love to a game that two decades on, is still one of a kind. It's been so long since I replayed the original that I can't tell if this is greatly altered, but it didn't seem to be to me.

That feeling of isolation, sadness and that you are doing a bad thing is still very much there. The ruined landscape is largely empty and devoid of life, but the glimpses of a lost civilization and nature are beautiful.

The music is as incredible as I remember it. And this remake is gorgeous. I lost track of how many times I stood marvelling at the vistas, colossus and world.

Gameplay wise, the quirks are still there that I largely like. The awkward controls convey this sense that you might fall hundreds of feet at any moment and that you are a small, insignificant blight on these majestic beasts. Some of the shoddy 20 year old camera work and controls did bug me on that final, disappointing colossus but that aside, they were fine for me.

The star of the show is still the colossi. I'd forgotten several of them and felt like a genius working out the solutions, only resorting to a guide once when I knew what to do, just not how to trigger it. Giant, living platforms to climb. A simple idea on paper, a staggering achievement in reality.

It feels like witchcraft to me, even now, how someone came up with that idea and pulled it off. And with such variety. I'm still not sure gaming has bettered that feeling of when you grab onto the flying colossus here or work out how to ride beneath the waves on another.

Ueda's work has always been magical to me. He's the greatest game designer in my eyes for his 3 titles to date. They represent singular, huge thoughts, executed to a level that whole AAA studios never get near. I understand why people get annoyed at the controls or how clear instructions are left vague; but that mystery and fragility are what make these games so special to me.

And you can see how Shadow of the colossus has inspired so many great games since; Breath of the wild. Xenoblade Chronicles. Bayonetta. Elden Ring.

I am so glad that it's now got a playable version that will endure for many years to come.

One of the most unique games I have played,
It feels like an epic.but also frustrating at times which I'll tackle in a later para.

The bosses are more of a big puzzle than enemies the puzzle is it figure out how to beat em which makes sense cause there's no we are winning in a fair fight.all the colossi designs are so good especially the final boss and the Ariel colossis how this game ran back in the ps2 is a god damm miracle.the grand scale of the fights is unmatched.

The world feels so gloomy and isolated that while traveling through it feels a slight sense of calmness before the next major fight.
the ost at time its calming and during few boss fights you can feel the adrenaline rush.

Now the frustrating part comes because in its skeleton its still a ps2 Era game with improved visuals and few mechanical changes Ig more like a remaster than a remake.

so it's still has few annoying mechanics which can be fixed if you know a few controls but the game dosen't tell you Like some bosses can put you in a stun lock loop because it takes your character 5-6 business days to get up that can be fixed by spamming your wepon change button. And you don't need to spam Triangle for agro to go fast just hold it down and agro avoids obstacles own its own you just gotta move it for navigational purposes.
Except these two the rest are minor complaints.

The 'masterful' aspect of Shadow of the Colossus comes from the set of rhetorical questions I couldn't help but ask by the game's ending. You are thrown into this world that's full of history and drama and you as the player really have no way of knowing what the 'truth' really is. There's a vagueness purposefully done that leads to your own interpretation of how you may feel about the events that took place. But ultimately what it all leads to, by the ending, is a moral ambiguity. Who's right and who's wrong? By the end of the game, I didn't know what to feel. I know majority of players felt this remorse and guilt from killing the colossi but I personally didn't feel that way. I didn't know how to feel about everything that took place and I think that is pretty much the point. The game doesn't explicitly tell you if something is right or wrong, although it might hint at it, but it just leaves it for interpretation and in that I think is what makes this game so great. Team Ico blur the lines of good and evil and execute it perfectly in Shadow of the Colossus.