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Shadow of the Colossus

When game developers talk over their biggest influences, Shadow of the Colossus is bound to come up. This beloved PS2 game released just a calendar month before the Xbox 360 hit shelves, and capped off the sixth console generation with an instant classic. More a decade later, Bluepoint Games has rebuilt the entire game for the PS4, and the results are stellar.

On our sister site IGN, Shadow of the Colossus (2018) earned an "Amazing" score of nine.seven/10. The fundamentals of Fumito Ueda's design hold up well, and reviewer Marty Sliva thinks very highly of the numerous nips and tucks made for modern audiences. Even 13 years afterward, Colossus deserves the same level of praise as the original outing.

Over at Metacritic, Colossus enjoys a 93/100 aggregate score based on a full of 68 reviews. Fourteen outlets (including Destructoid and The Telegraph) gave this remake a perfect score while sites similar ShackNews and GamesRadar handed out lxxx/100s at the bottom. In that location's no doubt that both Bluepoint and Sony are thrilled with this initial critical response.

Since Sony owns Shadow of the Colossus, it's no surprise that the 2022 release is a PS4 exclusive. Notwithstanding, there are three different implementations here that we need to consider. Outset, the original PS4 and PS4 Slim run the game at 1080p30 – plainly and simple. If yous're on the PS4 Pro, y'all get to option between 1080p60 in performance mode or 1440p30 in the high-res mode. And cheers to the exemplary anti-aliasing and motility mistiness implementations on offer, the epitome on screen looks superb regardless of which resolution or frame rate y'all're seeing.

Over at the Digital Foundry, John Linneman thinks that this is "1 of the all-time remakes of all time." Near every aspect of the original game has been revisited, and given the attention it deserves. From the core geometry to the lighting to the water physics, Bluepoint has turned this classic into a legitimately modern experience.

Because the original game pushed the PS2's aging hardware and then hard, it featured a notoriously terrible frame rate. Long sequences would be stuck at 20fps, and dips into the mid-teens turned it into a slideshow. The PS3-era remaster – as well from Bluepoint Games – bumped the resolution and frame rate significantly, just this is the first time Colossus has ever been able to hitting 60fps. After analyzing hours and hours of gameplay, Digital Foundry only found a handful of torn frames. Every bit such, it'south fair to say that the frame rate remains almost entirely locked for the base of operations, performance, and high-res modes.

Information technology's likewise worth mentioning that this update goes beyond the visuals and frame charge per unit. The command scheme has been updated for modern sensibilities, and the team even threw in the classic controls for super-fans. Better however, it seems that the input latency that plagued the original game has been solved. That's not to say that y'all'll never accidentally slip off a colossus, but the frustration level has been dialed way back. All said, it's clear Bluepoint has turned in an excellent finished product.

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