#teamico30daychallenge

[sparkylurkdragon]

Team ICO 30 Day Challenge Day 5: Which colossus is your favorite? And which one is your least favorite?

Colossus Thirteen (Phalanx) is 100% my favourite. It has the most dragon vibes of any of the final Colossi, but more than that, it’s just... big and beautiful and peaceful. It’s the only one that never attacks Wander - it’s just doing its thing, and the only way it can hurt him is in its attempts to escape. It’s a thrilling fight, too, high-speed and high in the sky, but of all the Colossi, Thirteen still makes me feel the worst for killing. Even Four (Phaedra) and its deer screams at least tries to attack you.

My least fave used to be Twelve (Pelagia) because it’s so tedious, especially when you don’t know about the ‘bonking its teeth to move it’ trick, like I didn’t when I first played. These days I can appreciate its weird design, though. (It appears to have lost the top part of its head. Those look like teeth jutting out of its ‘head’.) 

No, these days I think my least fave is Nine (Basaran). Those goddamn geysers!

[icology]

Team Ico 30 Day Challenge // day 17: Share a headcanon you have about the story of any of the games that's just too good not to be true. Go wild.

I don't really have any solid headcanons that I swear by, but I always found it funny that most people think of Wander as some sort of peasant or farmer, when there is absolutely no indication of it being true in the game. Quite the contrary, he wears a uniform similar to those of Emon's men, which makes me think of him as something more like a rookie or apprentice of whatever the heck his entire entourage is. Granted, he's not a very good swordsman, but he is a skilled archer and rider, in a way that would probably be a waste if he only used it to hunt or have fun. Emon is clearly an important person in his village, and to be familiar with him probably means Wander belongs in that circle.

Given that Mono was meant to be sacrificed, maybe she too was raised in the same circle, and that's how they met and grew closer. I think some people get a kick of those forbidden-love-stories-due-to-social-status like Jack and Rose but this doesn't feel like that type of story to me. If there was any divergence between them, I think it might have been that perhaps Mono took the prophecies more seriously and wanted to fulfill her fate, whereas Wander questioned his society's beliefs as he dared to challenge them for her.

And it is after typing all of this that I realize I do have a headcanon after all!

[icology]

Team Ico 30 Day Challenge // Day 12: Another popular theory: is Mono the queen?

I wouldn't say that it's exactly her, but rather a version of herself that got corrupted over the years and years she spent on the forbidden lands. So, in a way, I do think it's part of her that lives in that entity, but also some other forces that slowly overtook her too (maybe Dormin, maybe a little bit of greed and desire for an eternal life).

There might be a few things about this theory in general that don't make sense, and it's also a bit sad to think that Mono could have lost herself along the way instead of living up to be the good person we all think she is, but I also think this is a fun theory to explore since both stories connect, even if only in a distant future.

I remember once reading someone else's theory about how Wander probably remains a mortal and dies eventually, but Mono becomes immortal after being brought back to life, so she keeps on kidnapping the horned boys in hopes of meeting with her horned boy again someday, but it's never him, because he's long gone. I wish I could find that post again because it made a lot of sense and it was a really interesting theory. It really stuck with me but sadly I never saved it.

All in all, and though I would prefer it not to be her because everyone loves a good happy ending, I think it's a really interesting theory that makes some sense. We might never know, though!

[sparkylurkdragon]

Team ICO 30 Day Challenge Day 15: If you could play one of the unused Colossi, which one would you choose?

Probably Phoenix.

It has a unique look with the fire/lava, and the strategy of having to dunk it into some water to expose its vitals is completely unlike any of the final Colossi. All of the other unused Colossi that we know about seem to have had major parts of their puzzles absorbed by the game’s final sixteen: not Phoenix, though.

[sparkylurkdragon]

Team ICO 30 Day Challenge Day 13: What’s the relationship between Wander and Mono in your opinion?

They were fiancées and had been friends since childhood. Mono got sacrificed when she went to the local temple to get their union approved and start planning the marriage, and the local god smelled Dormin Destiny on her and freaked out. Wander spent most of the leadup to her death arguing passionately and increasingly desperately that there had to be a mistake until the local god manifested long enough to tell him to shut up.

[sparkylurkdragon]

Team ICO 30 Day Challenge Day 2: Who’s your favorite character?

Haha, Wander, again. A lot of it is from developing him in my personal Team ICO timeline, but even just thinking about him in Shadow of the Colossus, I wish I had half of this guy’s determination. You can definitely read part of Colossus’ point being deconstructing Heroic Resolve as a virtue, especially in videogames, but at the same time, for me, I can’t dislike Wander for it. Whatever you read Mono as being to him, he really must have loved her.

Plus, he’s a cute, clumsy dork. It’s endearing and humanising how he stumbles often and clearly doesn’t know the first thing about swordplay. His interactions with Agro are adorable (and sometimes hilarious, like the awkward way he mounts up from some angles).

And then we get to the whole Immortal Wander headcanon and my fanfics about it, where Wander’s essentially an immortal demigod with a chunk of Dormin’s soul still in him. He’s older, traumatised by some incredibly bad hands life has dealt him, and kind of prickly as a result, but still at his core someone who loves with his whole heart and who will do just about anything for the people he cares about.

I’m also fond of Dormin, incidentally. I’ve always had a weakness for (1) morally ambiguous characters and (2) Ancient Mystical Thingies, and Dormin hits both of those very nicely. In the Immortal Wander stories, they also get some character development towards being more mindful about mortal concerns. I platonically ship them and Wander, as well.

[icology]

Team Ico 30 Day Challenge // Day 13: What's the relationship between Wander and Mono in your opinion?

Such a boring answer but to me it's the obvious one, I really believe they're boyfriend and girlfriend canonically. Not only are there small hints here and there, but it's also a no-brainer that absolutely no one would subject themselves to that unless they really, really loved the other person, and that fact alone makes me surprised to see that there are still a few people who believe there was a possibility that they didn't really know each other.

I do fancy some other theories though! I always found the brother-sister dynamic some people theorize to be really endearing and unique, though I personally don't think it could be canon (they don't really resemble each other physically!). My personal favorite one, however, would be that they're really, really, really good friends. Like, childhood best friends who grew up together and were inseparable through thick and thin, because platonic relationships between boys and girls are just so underrated and the childhood friends trope is just the best. I mean, romance is cute. Adorable. Absolutely everything. But platonic soulmates defying the world together? It's GOLD.

In summary: I think they are a couple, but my personal favorite theory is that they're best friends

[sparkylurkdragon]

Team ICO 30 Day Challenge Day 6: Which game would you rather spend a day in if you were magically transported into its universe?

Well, if I only have to spend a day there... (I don’t think I’d want to actually live in any of them, to be honest! The Last Guardian’s setting wins by a hair if I had to move there, since on the surface at least it seems the least bad. Sure you might be kidnapped by a trico but at least that’s only a once-in-a-generation thing.)

Probably Dormin’s land from Shadow of the Colossus, since I know it so well from wandering around while playing and when researching for Enlightenments. In particular, I’d like to visit the ICO beach and the Shrine of Worship, and wouldn’t mind spending long enough there to see both.