Line #18 Fridge/ShadowOfTheColossus


1	As a reminder, Fridge moments are individual to each Troper. Please sign your contributions.
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3	[[AC:FridgeBrilliance]]
4	* The colossi, being [[spoiler:the scattered parts of Dormin subconsciously or not]], wanted Wander to kill them so that their essence could be released.
5	** It's also possible that they [[spoiler:knew that they were the scattered pieces of Dormin]] and the reason that they attempt to avoid Wander is because [[spoiler:they don't want to reunite him/her.]]
6	* What does [[spoiler:Wander turn into at the end]]? The Shadow of the Colossus!
7	** Alternatively, the title could refer to the shadows of the Colossi that appear over Wander each time he kills one.
8	* So the food items are fruit... and gecko tails. What? Why not the birds? Because the stat the tails improve is your ''climbing'' ability.
9	* So, Dormin speaks in [[YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe butchered, improper archaic]], which is kind of funny. But ''how'' long have They been sealed? They've probably half-forgotten how to speak!
10	** Old English from centuries ago is pretty much unrecognizable from modern English. More than likely it's not that Dormin forgot how to speak, but that they have been sealed so long the language itself has changed.
11	* The FridgeLogic section has a rather lengthy entry pointing out how... well, dumb the Colossi can be with regards to their environment. But, if they were designed to be containers for Dormin's essence, the designers would ''want'' them to be unimaginative automatons so Dormin couldn't turn them or trick them into releasing their charge.
12	* How about this one: the Colossi are in arenas specifically designed with ways and behaviors needed to defeat them for the reason that the creators wanted a method to undo the seal on Dormin. Whether after Dormin's sentence was up or as a SummonBiggerFish move, the only explanation that the colossi exist in the way that they do is because they are ''designed'' to be defeatable.
13	* A rather meta one. Agro's controls make perfect, elegant sense once you realize that you're never controlling the horse directly, like with mounts in many other games: you're still controlling ''Wander'', who's ''riding'' Agro. It's not like the horse is psychic.
14	* Malus, the last colossus, is positioned as far south as possible. When you stand on his shoulders, behind his head, you can see the whole land. What stands out is the beams of light from each Colossus' remains. Malus knew when each Colossus died. That's why he is so aggressive; he knew he is [[spoiler:the only one left before Dormin would be unleashed.]]
15	** Another reason behind his aggressiveness is because of his lack of mobility. As he's fixed in place, he has nowhere to run if ever Wander comes close to killing him and knows what has to happen since he can't escape: [[spoiler:either Wander dies and Mono is left alone in the shrine (either in her coma or dead), or Malus dies and Dormin returns to life.]]
16	* Dormin's name spelt backwards, as been mentioned numerous times, is Nimrod. However, it's not the term you might think it's describing. Before the common use of the word was coined by Bugs Bunny, Nimrod meant something along the lines of a great hunter, referring to a character in Literature/TheBible ''named'' Nimrod who was a pretty good hunter. Dormin wasn't looking for TheFool [[spoiler:to help release them with no questions about it]], he was looking for someone who was good at hunting down the Colossi, and their name reflects the latter, not the former.
17	** Also, the biblical Nimrod is often associated with the construction of the Tower of Babel. You know, a very tall and imposing structure, just like the very one in the middle of the map.
18	* If you try to cross the bridge to Malus without Agro (and you ''[[LordBritishPostulate will]]'' try to cross the bridge to Malus without Agro), you're going to fall. And when you fall, you'll notice a hunk of stone of the exact same shape, and with the exact same design, as that of the pieces of the bridge. With WordOfGod's confirmation that the Forbidden Lands were frozen in time until Wander showed up, and the last save shrine in that region being named 'The Broken Seal', it stands to reason that the bridge was already starting to fall apart when the Lands froze, and Malus' zone had a slight delay in the time resumation that kicked in when Wander made contact.
19	** Alternatively, a much more prosaic Doylist reason is that you're only really meant to get a good look at that area after the bridge falls; for technical reasons it was easier for them to include the "broken bridge pieces" models in the landscape from the start, thinking that the player would never see it until the intact bridge model was destroyed (i.e. removed during a cutscene.)
20	* After defeating the 8th Colossus, Wander has a dream where he hears Mono say his name and sees her wake up, before the scene unexpectedly zooms out. During the ending, these events happen in reverse: Wander is forcibly sucked away from Mono thanks to Emon's exorcism spell, and Mono does indeed wake up after everything's over.
21	* Sone of the Colossi that share the same battle theme are similar to one another:
22	** "Grotesque Figures" is shared by both Valus and Barba, two of the three minotaur-like Colossi.
23	** "A Violent Encounter" is shared by Quadratus and Basaran, who are slow-moving lumbering quadrupeds.
24	** "Liberated Guardian" is shared by Kutomori, Celosia and Cenobia, the three smallest and fastest-moving Colossi.
25	** "Counterattack" is shared by Dirge and Phalanx, who are both serpentine Colossi that are encountered in desert zones and can burrow into sand.
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27	[[AC:FridgeLogic]]
28	WARNING - (UNMARKED SPOILERS)
29	* Some of the stuff the colossi do is self-defeating.
30	** Hydrus is evidently a deep water creature, only coming up to take a closer look at Wander. Wander can grab its tail when it does so. Hydrus's next move, one might think, would be to dive down and force Wander to let go. Instead, Hydrus heads straight for the surface and spends several minutes rising above and sinking below the surface repeatedly. Handy for Wander, admittedly, but unless you're fast, Hydrus will at some point discover the benefit of diving deep.
31	** Dirge didn't need to open its eyes. It proves, repeatedly and conclusively, that it is quite capable of tracking Wander and Agro while it is blind in the sand.
32	** Pelagia's strategy requires you to trick it into rearing up so that its belly is exposed. Once you stab the weak spot enough times, Pelagia gets angry and destroys the building you were using to trick it into rearing up on its hind legs. Why didn't it destroy all the others?
33	** At least three of the Colossi require you to go directly into the palm of their hands in order to get to the weak point, but they never clench their fists.
34	*** Malus could actually have burned Wander as it creates fireballs out of its palms.
35	*** They don't seem very smart; if you injure an animal, they don't really do anything tactic-wise to fight back. Just panic. And I doubt they have any sort of instinct about how not to die, since they're not a species that evolves nor capable of being killed by literally anything else.
36	*** Clenching a fist on Wander would be an amazingly dumb idea. It would be like trying to crush a piece of cactus in your bare hand; sure, it might break, but you'll be impaling your hand on the very thing you're trying to not get impaled on. And with Malus, he might be able to fry Wander with his fireball magic, but most of the Colossi aren't immune to their own powers; he'd be blowing off his own hand, and Wander ''could'' still survive it, which means trying to fight him again means Malus would have to do it without a second hand.
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38	[[AC:FridgeHorror]]
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40	* At the end of the game, [[spoiler:Agro is shown limping beside a resurrected Mono. Sounds like as happy an ending as this game is going to get, right? Until you realize that while Agro may have survived. one of his/her legs appears to be broken. Which, for a horse, is usually a death sentence.]]
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Context Fridge / ShadowOfTheColossus