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Does Horizon Zero Dawn get any better?

F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
*Incoming rant. I realize that this game isn’t as bad as i’m making it out to be, but I just started playing this game this week and it is by far one of the worst experiences in gaming that I have had this year, if not ever. And I am struggling to find a reason to continue. No one is forcing me to play this game, but I know it is a good game, I am very interested in the story, but I just hate this game so much right now*

My goodness this might have to be one of the worst gaming experiences I’ve ever had. I think I actually hate this game. First of all, its like need for speed, you’re out there having fun but don’t have too much fun because the cops start chasing you for no reason.

Jesus Christ. I cant take two steps in this stupid game without watchers looking at me and telling all their friends. Sometimes these assholes are directly by save points (fireplaces). Like seriously? By a fucking save point? Can I not enjoy this game for two seconds without having to turn my back and make sure everything is safe?

Then the stupid “travel pack” system? I have to have a fucking travel pack to fast travel in this stupid game with its enormous map. I have to journey from one point to another in this enormous map, all while crouching and making sure that i’m not being seen during my 20 mile journey to my next quest. Is there no other way to travel in this stupid fucking game’s initial hours? Seriously? A travel pack? Lemme guess, I can buy more with real currency huh?

Like who has fun playing this crap? What is this game? My goodness. Thank God I only payed $5 for this game thanks to GCU and a $10 certificate for buying Mario Odyssey.

I know the game isn’t as bad as i’m making it out to be, but this has to be one of the worst games i’ve played in years. And I’ve only played it for 2.5 hours. I can’t have any fun with this game. I cant even enjoy the damn scenery because i’m walking around looking for watchers all the time.

Plus the stupid UI. Why doesn’t this game have a fucking map on my screen of all times. With all the bullshit icons and other shit that I don’t need, why not give me a damn map that doesn’t require me to hit the pause button to open?

If I didn’t know any better I would think this was made by Ubisoft. But its made by Guerilla, which produced another one of my worst gaming experiences ever with their latest killzone game and its horrendous level design.

Are my issues with this game legitimate or just exclusive to me? Does anyone else share my complaints with this game? Did it ever get any better for you?
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
Krakn3Dfx said:
Yeah, sounds like maybe HZD isn't for you.
Click to expand...

It seems so and it’s so unfortunate. I was really looking forward to this game. It’s gorgeous, it looked fun. Playing it? Not so much fun. I’m extremely frustrated with this game and I do not play games to get me frustrated, I play them to relax and have fun. The story looks amazing, the game is beautiful, I like a lot of mechanics, but this seems like a game that I should just enjoy on Twitch or YT soi don’t have to suffer through what I consider horrible mechanics.

I really want to like this game. I need a reason to power through :(
 
C

Comrade Crunch

Member
None of your problems seem big enough to actually warrant the outrage you're displaying, but that's just my opinion.

You should probably give it up, it's not for you.
 
Peroroncino

Peroroncino

Member
Well the whole 'everything is hostile' aspect certainly won't get any better, if anything, it's gonna get worse as you progress and unlock areas with more powerful enemies that's for sure.
 
Skyfox

Skyfox

Member
If you dont like this game after 20 minutes, its not for you.

Edit - To clarify, I personally think this is a great game.
 
ByWatterson

ByWatterson

Member
FirmBizBws said:
Plus the stupid UI. Why doesn’t this game have a fucking map on my screen of all times. With all the bullshit icons and other shit that I don’t need, why not give me a damn map that doesn’t require me to hit the pause button to open?
Click to expand...

NeoGAF, new and improved.

Good Lord.
 
SRTtoZ

SRTtoZ

Member
I've had the complete opposite experience and I'm maybe 3-4 hours in? Are you killing stuff while traveling? I was killing all sorts of animals because I knew i'd need their components for crafting satchels and all the fat you loot from them along with the tons of wood you loot are made to create the fast travel packs, plus you get them from the random boxes you pickup or get after quests. By the time I acutally wanted to fast travel out of the starter area I had 20 of them and finally started using them, and also created 10 more just to have as extras. Again, it doesn't seem like you're actually playing the game but rushing through it? Watchers are probably the easiest enemy to kill with stealth or 1 bow shot to the eye, also make sure you use your melee. At this point I actually show myself to them because stealth killing them is so damn easy, especially if you get the lure talent. I mean yea theres no mini map but it does have the compass at the top like Skyrim and thats good enough, plus you press the touch pad and are brought to the giant map INSTANTLY. Again, no idea what you're complaining about. Putting a mini map on top of all that seems redundant to me especially with all the damn waypoints pointing you to quests. Honestly it just seems like you want a different type of game which is fine, quit while you're ahead and sell it IMO.

Also I can't believe you're complaining about the UI. The UI seems brilliant with the adaptive UI setting where most of the stuff disappears unless you press a button or gently touch the touchpad. Love it.
 
IISANDERII

IISANDERII

Member
I recently began playing too and I'm finding it superb. I even jacked up the difficulty because it's too easy for me.

My only complaint early on is that they throw too many different types of weapons at you like Tripcasters, Rope shooters, multiple types of bows and slingshots and many ammo types. But since there's never any shortage of resources, I'm free to experiment and discovering more and more effective things is really enjoyable and satisfying.
 
S

Sepultura

Member
Finished this game not long ago I can relate to your frustration. Might just be the prettiest boring world in a game. Fighting a new kind of machine is exhilarating but that feeling wears off very quick. Also did not help that I found the story and characters to be yawn inducing so there wasn’t any motivation to continue. Sunken cost bias led me to finishing the main quest line and it was a massive disappointment. Borrowing so much from other games yet somehow making nearly everything feel like a chore.
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
SRTtoZ said:
I've had the complete opposite experience and I'm maybe 3-4 hours in? Are you killing stuff while traveling? I was killing all sorts of animals because I knew i'd need their components for crafting satchels and all the fat you loot from them along with the tons of wood you loot are made to create the fast travel packs, plus you get them from the random boxes you pickup or get after quests. By the time I acutally wanted to fast travel out of the starter area I had 20 of them and finally started using them, and also created 10 more just to have as extras. Again, it doesn't seem like you're actually playing the game but rushing through it? Watchers are probably the easiest enemy to kill with stealth or 1 bow shot to the eye, also make sure you use your melee. At this point I actually show myself to them because stealth killing them is so damn easy, especially if you get the lure talent. I mean yea theres no mini map but it does have the compass at the top like Skyrim and thats good enough, plus you press the touch pad and are brought to the giant map INSTANTLY. Again, no idea what you're complaining about. Putting a mini map on top of all that seems redundant to me especially with all the damn waypoints pointing you to quests. Honestly it just seems like you want a different type of game which is fine, quit while you're ahead and sell it IMO.
Click to expand...

I’ve been taking my time, collecting components, going back to the merchant, making ammo. But I’m not going to spend the next 20 hours of this game couching everywhere and constantly looking around for watchers. Watchers being easy to kill isn’t the problem, the problem is that there’s like 1000s of them between where you are and where you want to go, and at some point, unless you’re trying to spend 10 real life minutes traveling from one point to the other, you’re going to want to run to make things faster. I want to actually play the game, which involves doing quests, so a lot of the time I run when there’s no one around. When I notice enemies I crouch, but I’m not going to sit and pick off 6 watchers just to get past one tiny area that’s 1/4th of my journey to the next area or wherever it is that I’m going.
 
Q

quest

Not Banned from OT
I thought those things were good and liked them except no map. My issue was it was a twitch shooter not a rpg it looked like on videos. That and steep steps in difficulty out of the blue.
 
N

nan0

Member
If you want to give it a go again:

FirmBizBws said:
Jesus Christ. I cant take two steps in this stupid game without watchers looking at me and telling all their friends. Sometimes these assholes are directly by save points (fireplaces). Like seriously? By a fucking save point? Can I not enjoy this game for two seconds without having to turn my back and make sure everything is safe?
Click to expand...

You are either supposed to sneak by them, or run away, or take them out with your bow from a distance. I'm not sure how far you are, but once you get precision arrows you can basically oneshot Watchers with a critical hit to their head/face (the red/blue light). Not all Machines aggro on sight and there is more than enough space to go around them.


Then the stupid ”travel pack" system? I have to have a fucking travel pack to fast travel in this stupid game with its enormous map. I have to journey from one point to another in this enormous map, all while crouching and making sure that i'm not being seen during my 20 mile journey to my next quest. Is there no other way to travel in this stupid fucking game's initial hours? Seriously? A travel pack? Lemme guess, I can buy more with real currency huh?
Click to expand...

This is really a non issue. You get sooo many of them and they're very cheap. Don't forget to open the containers in your inventory, and there is also
an endless fast travel pack
which you can buy from early on from every(?) merchant.

Plus the stupid UI. Why doesn't this game have a fucking map on my screen of all times. With all the bullshit icons and other shit that I don't need, why not give me a damn map that doesn't require me to hit the pause button to open?
Click to expand...

You can customize the UI in the options, but there is no permanent map. You're either freely exploring, follow quest markers, or set your own waypoints on the map.
 
Z

ZServ

Member
There's a simple reason that you don't like Horizon.

It's not a fucking RPG, fam. Horizon is a shooter, through-and-through. The dialogue trees are moderately mediocre at best, awful at worst. The cutscene animations for anything that isn't a pivotal moment is somewhere between "what drunk fucking monkey did this" and "Andromeda looks better," the sidequests are few and far between, and in the 20 hours I've played I've seen exactly two areas. Meridian, and the starting place. Unless the last third of the map is hiding some other grand locales, the game is properly mediocre if you're expecting an RPG. I couldn't tell you how many times I expected to find a random cave, and instead found a wall.

Don't view it as an RPG, but instead a weird third person shooter with RPG elements (not unlike Watch Dogs, but without.. cars, and cops?), and you'll probably get a lot more out of the experience. Once I did that, I started really enjoying it.

Edit: Enormous map? Did we play the same game? I feel like GTA:SA had a bigger map than this
 
C

Crzy1

Member
Eh, not really. I only did the main mission, story payoff wasn't that great. Not a bad game, just not really my cup of tea. Can understand why people like it, though.
 
P

Paterson

Banned
The story is OK but the actually gameplay is a complete bore. The best part of the game is watching Sony fanboys try to claim it's on the same level as Breath of the Wild. lol
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
ZServ said:
There's a simple reason that you don't like Horizon.

It's not a fucking RPG, fam. Horizon is a shooter, through-and-through. The dialogue trees are moderately mediocre at best, awful at worst. The cutscene animations for anything that isn't a pivotal moment is somewhere between "what drunk fucking monkey did this" and "Andromeda looks better," the sidequests are few and far between, and in the 20 hours I've played I've seen exactly two areas. Meridian, and the starting place. Unless the last third of the map is hiding some other grand locales, the game is properly mediocre if you're expecting an RPG. I couldn't tell you how many times I expected to find a random cave, and instead found a wall.

Don't view it as an RPG, but instead a weird third person shooter with RPG elements (not unlike Watch Dogs, but without.. cars, and cops?), and you'll probably get a lot more out of the experience. Once I did that, I started really enjoying it.

Edit: Enormous map? Did we play the same game? I feel like GTA:SA had a bigger map than this
Click to expand...

This is another issue. What the heck is there to do in this game? Half the side quests are "hey you just got this cool new weapon, here’s a quest to make more ammo". It feels sort of like the crappy side quests from dragon age inquisition where you had to collect shards for whatever unknown reason. These shouldn’t be quests or "errands" as the game likes to call them.

The other side quests I do enjoy because of the little stories, like the girl with the father and the spear. I liked the story for that.

What I mean by enormous map is "wow look at all the mountains that I can see but can’t actually climb because there’s an invisible wall there,so I have to walk around it in order to get to the next objective".
 
P

Papo Swing

Member
I think people having issues with the game sometimes approach it wrong.

You are a hunter so you can't just rush in. I had issues until I changed the mindset and used my traps.
 
R

RefigeKru

Banned
If you've played for two and a half hours

1) You're nowhere near the point where Travel packs should even remotely be considered an issues - I never ran out of them once throughout playing

2) Maybe you should stealth or I dunno, run away if Watchers are giving you trouble lol?


Can we see you play? One thing I really hate about these sorts of threads nowadays is that we can easily upload footage and it would illustrate your point about the watchers well. And yes, you have to work for that save point boi.
 
Typhares

Typhares

Member
I felt completely bored by HZD too, I gave it a good 5-6 hours before giving up.
To be fair I am in general not attracted to open world games that just feel like a bloated waste of time to me.
But I liked the universe and story enough so I watched the game's 'movie' on youtube. that actually was a good time.
 
GribbleGrunger

GribbleGrunger

Dreams in Digital
I'm sorry but your description of gameplay is so far from my experience of playing and the dozens of let's plays I've seen I'm going to have to say you're lying.
 
SRTtoZ

SRTtoZ

Member
Paterson said:
The story is OK but the actually gameplay is a complete bore. The best part of the game is watching Sony fanboys try to claim it's on the same level as Breath of the Wild. lol
Click to expand...

You were making a decent point until you said Sony fanboys. I wonder what that makes you? Also Horizon does some things better than Botw and Botw does some things better than Horizon. You're the only person in here bringing up fanboy wars.
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
GribbleGrunger said:
I'm sorry but your description of gameplay is so far from my experience of playing and the dozens of let's plays I've seen I'm going to have to say you're lying.
Click to expand...

Lol my gameplay experience is totally different from your YT friends who get paid to play video games? You don’t say.
 
V

Verilligo

Member
If you're getting annoyed by Watchers, then just run past them. They're surprisingly not that fast. Sure, they tell their buddies, but their buddies aren't actually all that fast, either. Most things in the game won't even track you all that far and you can also grab a mount if the need arises. As you progress in the game, you can also snag some of the stealth boosting armor and skill up so that you draw a lot less attention even at full bore running. I personally found the game a lot more fun by investing early on in stealthier skills, rather than combat ones. I did grab standard slow-mo, stealth kill, and critical strike fairly early, but with those unlocked the rest was placed more into stealth movement.
 
S

StewboaT_

Member
The combat is by far the best part of the game. If you hate it then it's time to throw in the towel, because everything else pales in comparison.
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
StewboaT_ said:
The combat is by far the best part of the game. If you hate it then it's time to throw in the towel, because everything else pales in comparison.
Click to expand...

I don’t have a problem per se with the combat in this game, it’s just that I shouldn’t have to constantly be in combat. Let me enjoy the scenery. Gather some materials, go back and forth to the merchant in peace.

I thought this was an rpg, I didn’t know it was dishonored or splinter cell where everything I do has to involve stealth or me killing something. In those games I understand the slow traversal from point to point and needing to take things slow, pick off enemies one at a time. This was supposed to be an rpg, right?

The combat itself is alright, I love all the options they give you. But I only beat the first boss so far, so I don’t have a full experience of the games combat besides the watchers and the striders (?).

I’m 3 hours in now, trying to push through. On a stupid side quest that just has me following footsteps everywhere. I didn’t mind tracking footsteps in the Witcher 3, because they actually led to something, instead of more footsteps, like the quest im doing searching for that girl’s brother who was banished but now his punishment is over and she can’t find him.
 
K

KingV

Member
Typhares said:
I felt completely bored by HZD too, I gave it a good 5-6 hours before giving up.
To be fair I am in general not attracted to open world games that just feel like a bloated waste of time to me.
But I liked the universe and story enough so I watched the game's 'movie' on youtube. that actually was a good time.
Click to expand...

That’s one of my issues with modern games and this game in particular.

There’s a lot of element added in that feel like busy work, but aren’t really enjoyable on their own.

Shadow of war has a lot of the same elements. Like the towers, or going after the memories or whatever. They’re not fun to do, but they take time.
 
F

FirmBizBws

Becomes baffled, curling up into a ball when confronted with three controller options.
KingV said:
That’s one of my issues with modern games and this game in particular.

There’s a lot of element added in that feel like busy work, but aren’t really enjoyable on their own.

Shadow of war has a lot of the same elements. Like the towers, or going after the memories or whatever. They’re not fun to do, but they take time.
Click to expand...

Smh I just picked that game up yesterday, sounds like I won’t be enjoying that either.

I played the first one for about 4 hours and liked it but never finished.
 
LordOfChaos

LordOfChaos

Member
I'm not big on open world games that need some stealth, sounds like you aren't either. I did want to check this out though.
 
A

Anarion07

Member
FirmBizBws said:
I don’t have a problem per se with the combat in this game, it’s just that I shouldn’t have to constantly be in combat. Let me enjoy the scenery. Gather some materials, go back and forth to the merchant in peace.

I thought this was an rpg, I didn’t know it was dishonored or splinter cell where everything I do has to involve stealth or me killing something. In those games I understand the slow traversal from point to point and needing to take things slow, pick off enemies one at a time. This was supposed to be an rpg, right?

The combat itself is alright, I love all the options they give you. But I only beat the first boss so far, so I don’t have a full experience of the games combat besides the watchers and the striders (?).

I’m 3 hours in now, trying to push through. On a stupid side quest that just has me following footsteps everywhere. I didn’t mind tracking footsteps in the Witcher 3, because they actually led to something, instead of more footsteps, like the quest im doing searching for that girl’s brother who was banished but now his punishment is over and she can’t find him.
Click to expand...

I mean the game literally teaches you in the tutorial how to get past watchers.
And the amount of watchers is nowhere even close to what you're implying here.
There's plenty of room to walk/run past the packs, too, if you see them. And they're easy to spot because of their lights.

And no, you can not buy travel packs with real money. Good try though.
 
H

humansarehorses

Member
Paterson said:
The story is OK but the actually gameplay is a complete bore. The best part of the game is watching Sony fanboys try to claim it's on the same level as Breath of the Wild. lol
Click to expand...

If it's worse than BotW, I should probably cancel my pre-order of the complete edition. All you do in BotW is chores to make many frustrating design choices less frustrating while you're stuck with other mind boggling design choices for the whole game as well as mediocre traversal and combat mechanics.

I really don't want to waste money on a game that's more boring than BotW.

But at least in Horizon the combat looks fun.
 
P

Paterson

Banned
SRTtoZ said:
You were making a decent point until you said Sony fanboys. I wonder what that makes you? Also Horizon does some things better than Botw and Botw does some things better than Horizon. You're the only person in here bringing up fanboy wars.
Click to expand...

Caught one.
 
autoduelist

autoduelist

Member
Watchers are so easily killed or avoided I feel like op just isn’t giving the game a chance. That plus other comments shows far more bias against the game than insight.
 
W

Wiped89

Member
I don't think it is as bad as you think
I felt similarly about Zelda BOTW at times with its crazy difficulty spikes when you only have like 3 hearts.

Horizon is all right. Having said that I did stop playing and never returned. Need to get back to it at some point.
 
Danjin44

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
My biggest issue is the open world part of it feels so artificial. Sure it looks pretty it boring and there is nothing to do or nothing to find. I recently playing BotW and god damn the open world is sooooo much better. It actually rewards for exploring and weather codition actually matters. I just found one of the
dragons
in BotW. I didn't even know there such a thing, i came cross it by a chance and it felt fantastic.

That to me is biggest issue with Horizon. The gives you everything, doesn't really trust you find anything on your own. Developers use that budget and all that tech to make the game look as pretty as possible but without intresting mechanics. This game truly felt like I was playing third person Far Cry game.
 
MaKTaiL

MaKTaiL

Member
They literally added a "Story Mode" difficulty on a recent patch. Sounds like that was made with people like you in mind. Why don't you try it out?
 
C

Carn82

Member
I didn't use a travelpack until I reached Meridian. I still walk most stuff that's less than 500 whatever metric the game uses.
 
T

the_lizard

Member
Your complaints can be considered positives in my opinion. Yeah, it's stressful that there are killer robots out there hunting you but, like, that's the whole point of the game. That's literally the concept of it. It's fun having to watch your back and tread lightly--adds to the role-playing. And fast travel is lame; I think it kinda ruins games if implemented poorly. You spend more time navigating menus and maps than navigating the world itself. That said, it's a non-issue in HZD. Those packs are (a) easy to get and plentiful and (b) become obsolete maybe a third of the way into the game, when you gain the ability to purchase a reusable pack. And no, you don't purchase it with real money.

All that said, if you don't like it, you don't like it. It's definitely not a horrible game though. It's fantastic. As the first post said, maybe it's just not for you.
 
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