The right side of its face, its wide tail and the edges of its wings were covered in magma. Its feet had two toes on the front and one toe on the back, with ridges which looked climbable. Its legs and sides of its chest were covered in fur and were likely where Wander would first climb onto the colossus. Screenshots depict Phoenix as having only one eye. The left side of its face is made of stone reliefs, including an eye, while the right side of its face appears smashed-in with magma seeping from the cracks.
Textures
Below is a list of textures found in the colossus' texture segment from the PS3 Data Sheets. Textures that are unknown (not available in any public builds) will not have images and their names will not be bolded.
In all released screenshots of Phoenix, Wander is seen riding Agro, so it can be assumed she was vital to this battle. The player would have to avoid the colossus' gusts of wind until they are able to reach it[2]. As Phoenix's body isn't fully on fire and its legs had fur on them, Wander would have to jump from Agro to one of them and climb it from there. It's likely that, somehow, the player would have to drop it into a lake as they're flying. The boss is also on the ground in every screenshot, suggesting it spent the majority of its time grounded.
Due to the wind_list sheet in the E3 demo still containing data for "phoenix_flutter" it is known the wind would have been of type 2, lasted for 5 seconds and had a speed of 25.
Location
Phoenix was going to be battled in the quadrant I4, on the arena known as 'Crater'. It was initially speculated to be located at D3 due to the trees in the screenshots matching the trees seen at the 9th colossus' arena, but it was disproven when those trees were discovered to being labelled as "I4_tree" and "crater_branch" in the PSU Preview version. The tree texture listed in the Crater's sheets also matches perfectly with a tree seen in a Phoenix screenshot.[3]
The cliff and floor textures seen in Phoenix's screenshots and the sheet data of the Crater matches with the ones in the J4 beta mountains. The sheets also list a water texture called "ud_wave", which suggests that Crater had water. Its presence can be linked to Phoenix's lake, as it needed to be plunged into it in its battle.
Unlike all other bosses, Phoenix has two start scripts listed in the files. This may suggest that Crater had two entrances similar to the 3rd colossus' arena, and a different introduction cutscene would play depending on which entrance was used.
Development History
This colossus was created at the start of the game's development in early 2003, and it used to be tested in Stage 8 before being placed on the world map.
Phoenix was originally created using the archetype of 'Bird' (the 5th colossus). It was differentiated from it by being placed in an area that was mostly ground instead of water, with it being able to walk on the ground, as well as fly freely.
Screenshot of the earlier design of Phoenix.
Its original test stage was more volcanic in nature, with all textures of it being referred to as such. The colossus' design was bigger, had a longer neck, and fur all over its body. The screenshot of this design shows that the fire on its left wing had been extinguished, while the right wing was still on fire.
Screenshot of the later design of Phoenix.
At some point in early 2004, its arena, Crater, was completely changed and placed in quadrant I4, where it stayed in until it was cut. Phoenix's design was also changed to be smaller and have less fur.
The volume control showing 21 colossi.
Phoenix most likely survived production until near the end of 2004, together with Sirius, Devil, Roc, and Yamori A, as all of them had AdpcmVolControl sheets, as indicated by the data sheets. Phoenix's texture segment also had a fair amount of textures, including textures for the electricity seen in the sigils from late beta screenshots of Snake and Knight; Crater' texseg also seems to imply the arena was very detailed. Another evidence that Phoenix survived such a long time is that it had a unique idol statue in the Shrine of Worship, also indicated by the data sheets.
After the world map was reduced at the end of 2004, Phoenix was cut from the game. The only remnant of the arena is quadrant J4, left floating in the void due to I4 being deleted. Fumito Ueda stated in a French interview that he discarded Phoenix's concept because Wander would lose way too much health every time he was ejected from the colossus and that they needed to create a really large environment for it.[2]
Trivia
The theory that Phoenix lived at I4 was originally from SpaceOmega5000 (formerly known as WWWArea). Later evidence from the data sheets helped solidify it.
Glimpse at a battle plan of Phoenix posted on Nanako Ohmura's twitter.
On July 15th 2016, Nanako Ohmura, the field designer for the earlier incarnation of Crater, posted on her twitter an image with "several nostalgic things" according to her. Among these things, a glimpse of a battle plan for Phoenix can be noticed. Most of it is hidden, but some text can be visible, such as one that mention that the boss does three flaps while airborne.
The unused theme "Voice of the Earth" is likely to have been the intro song for reaching Phoenix's arena due to the song's name in the debug menu of the game, which is titled "volcano".
Several parameters for Phoenix still exist in the game's code[4]. They are:
SCRPhoenixStart
SCRPhoenixStartB
SCRPhoenixDeath
SCRPhoenixLandingReady
SCRPhoenixLanding
SCRPhoenixFlap
SCRPhoenixThreat
phoenixSightXZ
phoenixSightYZ
phoenixTurnAngle
phoenixThreatLife
phoenixLost
phoenixFlyDist
phoenixFlyTime
These corroborate Ueda's statement of the colossus producing bursts of wind from its wings like Colossus V and being a flying colossus.
Tiny glimpse at another image of Phoenix that was not printed in the artbook. This glimpse can be seen in the interview section of it.
In the interview section of the artbook, a few photos of papers with the images of the unused colossi can be seen. One of those appears to be for Phoenix, but only a tiny glimpse showing Agro can be observed as most of it is cut-off. When compared to the other images, none matched with this one, seemingly being an image that was not printed for the artbook.
In an interview from the December 2nd, 2005 edition of Famitsu, Ueda talks about how the "Bird colossus almost completed" while referring to an image of Phoenix. This same interview is also in the artbook, but lacks the pictures linked to it in the Famitsu version, and including "Spider" in that sentence, even though it originally wasn't. The "Bird" actually referred to Phoenix, instead of the 5th colossus or even Roc like it was originally speculated.
Gallery
A screenshot of Phoenix.
Another screenshot of Phoenix.
Screenshot from the Chronic'art French magazine.
Chronic'art French interview with Fumito Ueda (translated).
The famitsu interview showing the Bird (Phoenix) and Spider colossi. This would later be reused for the artbook, albeit without the images.
