SotC isn't a sequel per se. But the storyline may be related. No one is sure at this point. There's a third game in the works by Team Ico which might answer some questions. I wish it would come out already
Paco, I felt the same way playing SotC. Th case could be made that the lulls between the battles contributed to the game's sense of loneliness and melancholy. Still, I couldn't help but think a mixture of the gameplay between Ico and SotC might be nice. I wished there were environmental puzzles or challenges on the way to the next colossus. I don't think it would've detracted from the feel of the game. I think the player's sense of satisfaction would be much greater upon reaching the next colossus, having had to earn one's passage to it.
Things I had in mind:
Climbing up a giant cliff face.
Hitching a ride on a bird (which you could actually do in he game) to reach an otherwise inaccessible area.
Hopping in a boat and following the coast or sailing out to an island to, again, reach an otherwise inaccessible area.
Swimming against the current (by hitching a ride on a big fish) of a river, perhaps having to dive down and navigate through a channel to emerge in a system of underground caves.
Utilizing your horse, Agro, to perhaps outrun some predators.
Navigate your way through a dense forest.
etc, etc. You get the idea.
There really wasn't enough to do in the game. You could collect fruit and kill spotted salamanders to increase your stats, but this gets tedious after awhile. I wish you had the opportunity to interact more with the environment. Or interact with your horse for that matter. I didn't feel the same emotional attachment to Agro in this game as I did to Yorda in Ico.
Ideas for the horse:
Should be able to pet the horse.
Should be able to rub the horse's nose.
How about if you could take out some brushes and groom the horse?
Should be able to feed the horse an apple (or whatever the fruit is in the game) from your hand.
Would be funny if the horse had to stop and piss or poop occasionally.
What if you had to feed the horse (and yourself) to maintain its health?
What if, like the special spotted salamanders, there were special fruit? You could feed one to the horse, the horse would poop it out eventually, and if you came back later to the spot where the horse pooped, there'd be a flower growing there, a flower which magical properties. You could use the flower as an ingredient to make a health potion or to enhance you strength or something.
Anyway, stuff like that.
Of course it's easy to say things like this. But there are time and budgetary constraints to any enterprise of course.
People think "queue" is just "q" followed by 4 silent letters.
But those letters are not silent.
They're just waiting their turn.