Shadow of the Colossus players and their search for the secrets within

More than seven and half years after the release of Shadow of the Colossus, a dedicated group of fanatic players is still scouring the forbidden land, searching for the hidden treasures they were perhaps never meant to find, as detailed in a Eurogamer feature.

The article explores the community of Shadow of the Colossus secret-seekers, a contingent of fans who long ago moved past relatively well-known Easter eggs like the hidden garden atop the Shrine of Worship. By exploiting the game's physics, including using a technique known to the community as "Agro-launching" — having the player character, Wander, jump off his horse at the right time to fling him forward — they were able to reach areas inaccessible by traditional means.

In forum threads that run for hundreds of pages, the players debate theories of possible secrets, glitches and previously undiscovered locales in the Forbidden Land. They found new wonders like three large hawks, the Lokis, different from all the other birds in the sky. Wander can grab onto these special birds and be taken on a tour of the world, instead of dragging them down with his weight. Some players went further, experimenting with glitches in emulated versions of the game to find a finished dam hidden in the northeast segment of the map.

Here's hoping Fumito Ueda's next game, The Last Guardian, has just as many secrets to uncover.