E3 demo, temple areas

Its been a while, but a friend of mine found a copy of the sotc e3 demo that came with OPM issue #97. This video focuses on the temple area, which I'd heard was interestingly glitchy. I had in mind splitting it into smaller clips, but can't be bothered now that it's done - my apologies.

Things to note:
(07:38) The temple climb is somewhat different.
(11:54) A headless Mono stands in the gardens entrance.
(13:17) The garden blocks are perfectly arranged for climbing higher, except that you can't grab on to them!
(14:35) There are a lot of glitches in the garden - invisible floors, warped textures, and unfinished water.
(17:16) The temples bridge entrance is open - or is it? It depends which side you approach.

It's not in this video, but i tried running across the bridge - the floor suddenly disappeared and I fell to my death. The rest of the demo is less interesting. If you wonder out too far it just stops.

Videos by baxtertimewell

Someone called baxtertimewell has uploaded a lot of interesting stuff to google video. Its worth it to just go through all of their content, but allow me to point out the highlights:

Agro is dead; diving from the land bridge; doing a double backflip off of Agro; an impressive arrow shot; and a number of "rock climbing" videos.

Some of this looks like added content from the European release. I'm pretty sure I can't do any bridge diving.

Update: Baxter informs us that he is play the NTSC version. His own blog is worth watching for updates.

In depth article

Here's an article that goes in depth into the techniques used to create the world of SotC. And here's an English translation of that article. It seems to come from the developers themselves, with lots of "behind the scenes" pictures. Really fascinating.

(I'm not sure how I missed this - It's from way back in December of 2005)

Two glitches

First off, this funny "clamshell" glitch that occurs when struck by those tendrils while using the cloth of despiration. Actions like kneeling or getting on Agro seem to restore your characters model.

Secondly, if you havn't had the pleasure of falling through the level geometry while playing the game regularly, you might want to check out the space between these two rocks at the bottom of E7. It's particularly interesting if you use your parachute to slow your fall.

Time attack videos

Someone recently posted a link to this page of very impressive time attacks on the offical forum. Colossus 16 in 2 minutes, colossus 1 in 40 seconds!

Obligatory *spoiler* warning.

More production footage

As a follow up to the NICO "pilot movie" posted previously, more footage of SoTC in development. It shows earlier versions of colossi that made it into the final game (check out colossus 3s' sword and sweep-attack), iterations of the HUD, and fine-tuning of Agro.

Here's a link to larger and downloadable versions of the footage I've posted, as well as some other ICO/SoTC related videos (ICO tv commercial).

Agro / Argo

Video of Agro, including his brown and white version, which unlock by completing normal and hard time attack mode respectively.

Is it Argo, or Agro? "Agro" beats "Argo" 934 to 357 on google by a count of webpages returned (as of this post). It occurs to me that the name might be a reference to the Lone Ranger and his horse, Silver (the chemical symbol for silver is Ag, which derives from the word Argent). Our hero has the "lone ranger" part covered, and defeating all of the colossi under hard mode time-attack will give you a white version of Agro.

Fruit trees

This is where my absurdly large health meter comes from - eatting these fruit will slightly extend it. Defeating 10 normal mode time-attack colossi gives you a map to all of these fruit bearing trees, but they're not hard to come across otherwise.

In the video you'll notice a large bird briefly swoops through the tree top. This often happens if you're up there for a while - it might be worth seeing where it takes you if you grab on.

Unrelated to fruit trees, but still interesting: If you play on a memory card with an ICO save game on it, the white diamond on Argos' forehead will be replaced by an ICO 'i'. You can see this in the last frame of the video.

Temple doves

For each defeated colossus a white dove takes residence near the temple alter.

NICO and ICO development reels

Some footage from the conceptual design stages of 'Shadow of the Colossus', when it was still known as NICO, has been floating around the internet for a while now. In fact, if you put your SoTC disc into your computer and take a look, you'll see that the main resource file is still called NICO.dat :)

Similar footage from ICOs early stages is also available. It seems that originally Yorda had the horns. At one point you'll also notice glowing markings on Yordas arm bearing a resemblance to the vulnerable spots (*ahem*, i mean "special magical weak points") of the Colossi.

The scary old tree

Looming over one of the two entrances to the cave of the 10th colossus (the one on the same side as "ICO beach") is a scary old tree, looking more like something from a Tim Burton movie than the rest of SoTCs' world. Outside the caves entrance you'll find a spot which an unusually large hawk consistently swoops over. If you grab this hawk it will fly you above the winding mountain path leading up to the cave.

At one point the hawk flies very close to an otherwise unreachable platform in the mountains. I've try unsuccessfully to land on this platform by letting go of the hawk at the right moment - give it a shot yourself if you're up there and tell me if you have any luck.

A tale of two beaches

You might have come across this large beach while approaching the cave of the 10th colossus. Some have dubbed it "ICO beach" because of its striking resemblance to the final scene from ICO (*spoiler* - if you havn't yet played ICO you should probably skip this).

Mysterious undercurrent

Swimming along the wall on the far side of the lake that leads to the 12th colossus I suddenly found myself being dragged under by a mysterious current.

Navigating this current allowed me to briefly walk on the bottom of the lake (I guess that means the whole thing is a glitch).

Climbing the Temple

If you walk around the left side of the temple you'll find a wall covered in moss. Start climbing there. You might enjoy figuring out how to get all the way up yourself. If you find your grip meter isn't large enough, jump in upward diagonals. This takes longer but uses significantly less of the grip meter.

There are a few things to see onces on top: A garden with fruits that decrease your health; a frustrating arrangment of blocks; and ofcourse the bridge which leads to the world entrance.

Hang on

You can hitch a ride on much of the wildlife in SoTC.

At first I thought standing on Agro would make grabbing hawks easier, but now I think it's best to jump from the sitting position. When one swoops down over you and Agro quickly press Triangle and then R1.

Turtles seem immune to such harassment.