Shadow of the Colossus was released in October 2005, which means that Fumito Ueda and his GenDesign are celebrating 20 years since the release of their second work, highly praised around the world, especially by those who played the original version on PS2.
As part of the celebrations, Ueda spoke to Denfaminicogamer and recalled that the Shadow of the Colossus concept film, presented on a DVD given to the Japanese who reserved ICO, showed an experience with several players riding horses while chasing a huge beast in a scenario very similar to the game we know.
This was no coincidence, as Ueda wanted to create a multiplayer experience, in which several players would join forces to defeat the colossi, but were unable to do so at the time.
“Personally, I was interested in the experience of working together with other players online to achieve something. However, as I’ve said in several places, at the time, the team didn’t have the technical resources to make the game available online. After carefully examining what we could and couldn’t do, we decided to go in a different direction and forget about the online element.”
Ueda says that at the time, he was obsessed with Battlefield 1942 and its large-scale online multiplayer elements that encourage cooperation, but felt that even more important was the premise of encountering a creature that feels alive when you’re alone.
Most Shadow of the Colossus players will probably agree with Ueda’s decision to scrap the multiplayer design and go with a single-player experience, but his words suggest that he could have delivered Sony a Monster Hunter before Capcom did.
Source: https://www.eurogamer.pt/shadow-of-the-colossus-foi-criado-a-pensar-no-multiplayer
