interplay between the horse and the protagonist to focus his following game, The Last Guardian, on a similar relationship. Music The development of Shadow of the Colossus music started alongside that of the game itself. Ueda's core idea was to use a "dynamic and gallant" score in the game, akin to traditional Hollywood film music. The team's goal with the soundtrack of Shadow of the Colossus, as with Ico, was to differentiate it from conventional video game music, and to "express restraint with regards to emotional expression as much as possible". Inspired by the opening theme from Silent Hill, Ueda also intended the soundtrack to reflect a melancholic ambiance as well as the history of the game's setting, based on the narrative's elements of death and resurrection. His other objective was to provide the game with compositions that adopted an elevated and dignified tone to underline the grandiose nature of the colossi. The soundtrack was composed by Kow Otani, who had been previously responsible for the music to the 1990s-era Gamera films and a number of anime titles. Within the video game medium, his past work consisted of the soundtracks to the PlayStation 2 flight simulator Sky Odyssey and the PlayStation scrolling shooter Philosoma. In selecting the composer of the game, Ueda sought to deviate from the conceptual perspective of the score for Ico, written by Michiru Oshima. Unlike Ico, which Ueda saw as a game that equally attracted male and female audiences, he saw Shadow of the Colossus as a work that appealed more to male players. This led Ueda to hire a male composer for the game. The versatility of Otani's musical output and his understanding of folk instruments were further factors in his recruitment by Ueda. Otani began work on Shadow of the Colossus at the time of its inception as NICO, and Ueda characterized the soundtrack's development as difficult due to the protracted creation of its associated game. The development staff's enthusiasm in bringing the game to completion motivated Otani to deliver tracks with which he meant to convey a sense of wonder, and he drew inspiration from the portrayal of Wander's determination to revive Mono in the game. The team worked with Otani through many meetings to develop satisfactory musical themes for the game's individual colossi. According to Ueda, one of the challenges of the music's production was to incorporate compositions whose melody and structure