As most of you probably know, shadow of the colossus is about a boy that travels to the forbidden lands with a corpse of a girl, which, according to him, died a wrongful death. He asks of the gods to bring her back, to which the gods respond with a request. That request is that he kills 16 colossi that roam the forbidden lands in return for the resurrection of the girl.
That's pretty all we get to hear until the very ending, seeing as there is no single line of dialogue that adds to the plot. For some reason though, I grew ridiculously attached to the main character and his trusty steed Agro as we traveled the completely barren land in search of colossi.
As I spent time with the two, as we conquered one obstacle after another, I became attached to them. His quest slowly started becoming my quest. His horse turned into my horse. I wanted them succeed, be able to bring the girl back to life, because he apparently has incredibly strong feelings for her. But the game never gave me the regular feeling you'd expect from such a tale.
The forbidden lands were devoid of all life (except for a few small lizards), which gave off the feeling of loneliness, of isolation. After every colossus battle, instead of an action-based win-theme, you get a somewhat sad theme, as if it was telling you that you weren't on a righteous quest. After each battle, your body deteriorates, until the very last battle, after which you can barely move.
Then comes the ending. A bunch of villagers have gotten to the shrine where the dead girl rests and where the main character gets his missions. They reminded me of the same villagers that locked up little kids to die a lonely death because of their appearance in Ico, so I immediately felt some hatred for them. They tell the main character that his actions were wrong and try to murder him. The gods he helped borrow his body and turned him into the final colossi, in order to survive their attacks. The villagers escape your grasp however and open a portal to lock back in the gods you just freed.
Now, the scene that got to me was the following. As they opened the gate, some powerful force started pulling you, the colossus, in. The music you heard during the downfall of every colossus starts playing. As the portal is trying to suck you in, the colossus form disappears and you turn into your normal self, which is still getting pulled into the portal. He reaches out for the girl, screaming her name from afar, after which they give you the controls.
And you know what you can do to escape from its grasp? Nothing. As you try to run away from the portal, it just starts pulling you back in. You try your best to reach the girl, which has been brought back to life (probably), you're so close to succeeding, yet so far. All you can do is delay the inevitable.
