Building comparison
head to head
Shadow of the ColossusvsSuper Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Neither is meaningfully harder - they pose close to the same test. The widest gap is reads, and it is a single point.
Shadow of the Colossus
Optimization · Practiced Mastery
A minimalist action adventure about toppling sixteen colossal puzzle-bosses.
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Execution · Practiced Mastery
A pastel platformer where Yoshi carries Baby Mario and perfect scores demand finding everything.
Shadow of the Colossus leans Optimization (Practiced Mastery); Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island leans Execution (Practiced Mastery).
Shadow of the ColossusSuper Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Axis by axis
Execution6 vs 6
Same score on execution - which means the number cannot separate them. The difference is in what each one asks of you.
Shadow of the Colossus
Climbing, grip management, and sword timing on moving giants.
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Egg-aiming and flutter jumps for 100 percent scores
Reads1 vs 0
Shadow of the Colossus leans a little harder on reads, though the gap is small.
Shadow of the Colossus
Colossi follow fixed behavior patterns.
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
All enemies are scripted
Variance1 vs 1
Same score on variance - which means the number cannot separate them. The difference is in what each one asks of you.
Shadow of the Colossus
Encounters play out nearly identically each attempt.
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Collectibles hidden only until found
Optimization7 vs 6
Shadow of the Colossus leans a little harder on optimization, though the gap is small.
Shadow of the Colossus
Each colossus is a solvable climbing puzzle.
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Perfect-score runs demand full collectible routing
A matching score does not mean a matching test. Two games can both sit at 10 on execution and demand completely different things of you - which is why the reasoning above matters more than the number beside it.
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