Wow this one sets a great impression right from the start. It's beautiful, it controls great, the story is interesting right from the get go. It has all the polish you would expect from a naughty dog game, I am shocked I care about the characters and world so much already.
I'm going to talk about some gameplay systems from the first few hours.
I finally got loose in the first part of the world and there are a bunch of plants to get which can serve as healing items or stuff to make potions. Basically crafting seems very in depth, and if you ever need a resource you can create a custom side mission and the game will direct you to where you can find it. Really neat and it helped guide me to robots to get shards to make arrows, which I quickly ran out when I tried to take on a semi big robot. So weapon parts and mods you find on robots, healing stuff you find in plants. You don't have to get overwhelmed by it, there seems to be enough to get what you need quick and move on.
I got a few side quests, there are random quests to find as you roam around, standard open world stuff. Haven't really completed one yet I have been distracted by just hunting which I love. The robots feel like animals in packs, there is this natural feel to it all how they react and interact with each other. Sneaking by them is thrilling, getting caught creates all sorts of chaos as you either escape or engage. I have fought three types so far, one is a more difficult one with a surprising attack. I managed to kill one only to have another come from behind and totally wreck me. I have had to run away before I can get resources for a kill only to see another robot go to the dead body and gather the resources for itself. So it's all really cool and dynamic.
Combat is nice and fluid and feels kind of like new TR. you can unlock specific skills that slow down time, get stealth kills, gather more resources; standard skill tree stuff but a lot of these skills seem super useful. Your melee attacks work great when being charged, dodging is fast and fluid. I still don't have traps, should get there soon. I am playing on very hard so I am being cautious, so I focused more on stealth and it seems a bit too easy. All three of the types I have met so far can be insta killed by stealth which is as easy as hiding in a patch of tall grass, throwing a rock to lure them close then just stealth kill them. I assume that strategy won't be viable for long, but it has helped me to stock up on arrows. If you want better resources you need to shoot components off the robots so there is a little strategy there.
Graphically it's gorgeous on a normal ps4. I don't see any performance issues at all, no slow down, nothing. The music so far is really great and dynamic as it shits from quiet to action quickly. The animations are ok but not uncharted tier but the art design of the world is as good as anything I have seen.
Ok going to play more hopefully I can have some more impressions on how good the content the game offers is as so far I have just been messing around on my own.
