Epilogue: Those Who Remain

Epilogue: Those Who Remain

Since this inevitably ties into my philosophy of why I am doing this stream, I’m going to ramble for a little bit. I’ve posted this video in one of the earlier streams and I’ll link it here too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anKqA3ZyHW4

It really is the holy grail of Shadow Of The Colossus videos for me. For probably going on near 20 years of my life at this point, I’ve so badly wanted there to be ‘non-violence’ mode for SOTC where you just track and/or ride the colossi as they roam the Forbidden Lands.

I’ve had dreams about it, and whatever magic this person pulled off, while knowing how hard coded the colossi are to their arenas and what a nightmare it is to reprogram them to do anything outside of those arenas, it is amazing to see.

By virtue of it being a video game, what I want could never truly exist for this game. A goal is needed. The act of just watching these creatures, who were literal technical marvels of their time, without a goal in mind, to just let them exist and take that experience in, it could never be. That game in my mind would be review bombed as meaningless, boring, a waste of time.

A goal is needed and thus a version of SOTC cannot exist where Wander’s goal is not to kill these creatures and revive the girl he cares so deeply about, where he is not always punished for it in the end, for that act of killing, for defying death with death.

And yet, I am not Wander. I’ve booted up the game more than once just to vibe while watching the colossi do their thing, without landing a single blow on them. Wishing, dreaming, imagining them roaming outside of their arenas and that illusion of a video game giving way to something more natural. A world where living mountains can migrate. There is no ending in this. No end state or goal. There’s no ending where Wander decides what he’s doing isn’t worth it and decides to just make this place with these wonderful creatures his home.

There isn’t a version of this game where Wander defies the taboo on these Forbidden Lands to come here not to kill these creatures, but to merely observe them in all of their glory, and yet that it is what I have brought him to these lands to do on more than one occasion.

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