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[Chuckie]

I am doing another play and I noticed something little but cool. I finished a bandit camp (two teeth) and Aloy was standing there (I was getting a drink) and I heard a female NPC saying (I am paraphrasing) "Redmaw isn't that great, I could take him on"

Such a funny small detail, especially because you haven't even heard of Redmaw at that point in the game.

 

[Darth Smurf X]

Finished the story yesterday. Wow. What a game! I absolutely loved how the story came together at the end, the combat is pretty much perfect, the robot creatures ARE perfect and it's by far the best looking game I've ever seen. I need some DLC now to keep me occupied while we wait for a sequel.

Oh, and I have to Platinum it first though. The Hunter's Lodge trophies are going to be my downfall.

 

[Yopis]

Finished this yesterday. Had a blast. After credits scene made me laugh.

 

[MegaSackman]

I guess it was obvious but now that I'm replaying the game I'm finding dialogues that I haven't seen before and understading things better, I was just named a seeker and fought the corruptor, the override you get is from the PSI cauldron, the one raided by the Shadow Carja. I suppose they got the override there and gave it to the corruptors. I guess they later managed to improved the override device, probably because of Hades since they manage to corrupt other machines later in the game.

 

[Kuldar]

I guess it was obvious but now that I'm replaying the game I'm finding dialogues that I haven't seen before and understading things better, I was just named a seeker and fought the corruptor, the override you get is from the PSI cauldron, the one raided by the Shadow Carja. I suppose they got the override there and gave it to the corruptors. I guess they later managed to improved the override device, probably because of Hades since they manage to corrupt other machines later in the game.

The override is part of the vanilla FAS-ACA3 Scarab knowned as corruptor, it was designed by Faro Industry as capable to take control of other machines. It's explained in the hologram data point about the corruptor in the Faro Industry building.

 

[Version 3.0]

I finished the game last night. Amazing game. And great story! Coming from me, that's something, because I'm very much down on video game stories in general. I find them shallow, stilted, and just consistently inferior to other mediums.

This one was intriguing. I always wanted to know more, just like Aloy and Silens. That's not to say I didn't have issues with it, or its presentation. The three (?) "congratulations, you lose!" moments, for example, were as dumb as ever. Video game staple, that.

But one point really stuck. It's quite clever, really, to put in a moment of such frustration that an observer can't help but grind their teeth in impotent rage, right along with the characters from both time periods in the game.

That's when Ted overrides the program, deletes Apollo, and kills the Alphas.

I mean, this guy is directly responsible for wiping out life on Earth. But because he's super rich, he not only is not held accountable in any way, not only is he chosen to be one of a handful of survivors, not only is he given special treatment in even that circumstance...but he's given full control of the whole thing via the master override!

He's committed the worst crime possible, and they literally hand him the key to do it again. And he does.

What a striking, and sad, commentary on how our world works. Just a tad hyperbolic, maybe.

 

[Thretau]

Finished the game yesterday and I liked it a lot. I think it's a really solid 9/10 in my books. All aspects of the game are very polished.

I'm curious where the possible sequels will go.

I'm just a little disappointed by the story. Maybe I expected too much when I saw people hyping it up to being one of the greatest in years. I liked the backstory and the world more than the actual journey Aloy goes through. I was more intrigued what happened to the world and Aloy was kinda just there. It's all subjective of course and I understand if some of you really loved the overall story.

Just for the record two of my favorite stories in recent years have been The Last of Us and Bioshock: Infinite (I get the criticism the game gets but the story really hooked me and I cared for Elizabeth).

 

[AyraSutoraifu]

The three (?) "congratulations, you lose!" moments, for example, were as dumb as ever. Video game staple, that.

I also finished it yesterday… but what do you mean by above?

 

[Subtervotion]

Finished the game yesterday and I liked it a lot. I think it's a really solid 9/10 in my books. All aspects of the game are very polished.

I'm curious where the possible sequels will go.

I'm just a little disappointed by the story. Maybe I expected too much when I saw people hyping it up to being one of the greatest in years. I liked the backstory and the world more than the actual journey Aloy goes through. I was more intrigued what happened to the world and Aloy was kinda just there. It's all subjective of course and I understand if some of you really loved the overall story.

Just for the record two of my favorite stories in recent years have been The Last of Us and Bioshock: Infinite (I get the criticism the game gets but the story really hooked me and I cared for Elizabeth).

I personally think strong characters or strong plot points can carry a story to greatness. TLoU has amazing characters that feel real and you care about. That's what really sets it apart imo. Horizon goes to the other side of the spectrum. I think the plot points are all really well done and the set ups and pay offs all hit their marks.

Infinite was fine but doesn't have stellar characters or plot points, just better than average.

I have played through TLoU like 12 times or more, so I can't completely say if I like HZD more than it yet. I need to play through HZD more, but it's hard to find the time right now. Either way, I'd put HZD near the top. Certainly the best new IP in recent times.

 

[Admodieus]

I finished the game last night. Amazing game. And great story! Coming from me, that's something, because I'm very much down on video game stories in general. I find them shallow, stilted, and just consistently inferior to other mediums.

This one was intriguing. I always wanted to know more, just like Aloy and Silens. That's not to say I didn't have issues with it, or its presentation. The three (?) "congratulations, you lose!" moments, for example, were as dumb as ever. Video game staple, that.

But one point really stuck. It's quite clever, really, to put in a moment of such frustration that an observer can't help but grind their teeth in impotent rage, right along with the characters from both time periods in the game.

That's when Ted overrides the program, deletes Apollo, and kills the Alphas.

I mean, this guy is directly responsible for wiping out life on Earth. But because he's super rich, he not only is not held accountable in any way, not only is he chosen to be one of a handful of survivors, not only is he given special treatment in even that circumstance...but he's given full control of the whole thing via the master override!

He's committed the worst crime possible, and they literally hand him the key to do it again. And he does.

What a striking, and sad, commentary on how our world works. Just a tad hyperbolic, maybe.

Yeah, this killed me. Genius storytelling on their part. Everybody hates him now.

That log isn't a first hand account, though - Elisabet is just communicating what she was told by Far Zenith. Thing is, FZ is super sketchy, with the thing of having a whole host of unknown investors and everything else. Chekhov's gun and all that. I don't think the writers would make so many mentions to the Odyssey, that it had an APOLLO copy and everything else if they didn't intended for it to become important at some point.

Yeah, the first thing I thought of when Ted deleted Apollo was the copy on Odyssey. Wonder if that will be the end goal of the series, or perhaps it will fall into the wrong hands.

 

[MegaSackman]

The override is part of the vanilla FAS-ACA3 Scarab knowned as corruptor, it was designed by Faro Industry as capable to take control of other machines. It's explained in the hologram data point about the corruptor in the Faro Industry building.

I get that but I find it interesting that when you get the override device from the corruptor, it list the XI Cauldron Machines, the one taken by the Shadow Carja. The corruptors may have the "protocol" to take control of other machines but maybe the Shadow Carja get some tech from XI to make the machines "behave" in their favor?

Edit: It's PSI not XI, my bad, theory debunked.

 

[Rei_Toei]

Time to catch up with this thread, finally finished the game. Still a lot of story to process and stuff to find, I only really wrapped up the Vantage Points because of the solid storytelling and the nice glimpses they offer into how the world used to look.

I really liked how the story developed ever after visiting the Faro facility. Was motivated to keep pushing on. I was sorta expecting to stumble upon more optional bunkers aside from the first bunker you fall into and the armory. But I guess the Cauldrons functioned more as the optional dungeons. The bandit camps felt a little out of place, felt a bit ripped from Witcher 3 but without the context or background. The game is already top-tier, but if they want to take it to eleven, there's still room for improvement with regards to the in-game economy, towns, villages.. I don't want to constantly compare to the Witcher, but they really set the bar with regards to how the civilized parts of their world intertwine with the wilderness, how monsters and bandits are sometimes part of daily life, sometimes not. The optional missions were more hit then miss for me mostly, though. I think they might do more in the vein of Redmaw in a next game or DLC.

Rost's background seemed a bit.. Vague? By ignoring tribal laws but also going on an heroic quest to get revenge for the tribe, he put the Matriarchs in a tough spot so I get that part of the deal was keeping his mouth shut about his special treatment, but I don't see why Teerza wasn't willing to tell Aloy this right after he died. There wasn't really any pay-off by the time you get to know his story and his passing feels like such a long time ago. I did like the fact that you can visit his grave at various points in the game and Aloy every time speaks about the most recent developments. I visited the grave, for example, right before I headed towards the Bitter Climb and GAIA's facilities.

For sequels, Guerilla has a lot of options. The fate of those outer space missions is one (though they state it failed), there's mention of mining operations on the moon, the after-credits scene with Sylens.. Plenty to go with. I wouldn't mind Aloy heading towards the pacific ocean - sailing and surfing and swimming through tropical atolls, all the marine wildlife that could be inspiration for new robots (whales! doplphins! turtles! Aloy getting her Moana groove on! - I could see them tackle it . But there's so many interesting options to go from here. Tribes who ride machines or use them for construction, transport or warfare, etc. Oseram didn't interest me that much (bulky pyro-Vikings), but the Banuk were definitely interesting. More lush forest, jungles, mountains and lakes I hope, less desert, was my least favourite region of the game.

 

[Version 3.0]

I also finished it yesterday... but what do you mean by above?

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

 

[MegaSackman]

You want Aloy or characters in video games stories to never lose? or at least not when you play with them?

Weird...

 

[Ordinaryundone]

You want Aloy or characters in video games stories to never lose? or at least not when you play with them?

Weird...

It's possible to integrate it better than forcing these things to happen in cutscenes. He's right that it is a weird tonal shift, especially in a game that empowers the player so much like Horizon, where we are expected to believe that Aloy can take a smack from a Thunderjaw on the chin and yet gets knocked out by a grenade going off near her on the other side of a wall. It's not an issue unique to Horizon; lots of storytelling often has trouble resolving the disparity between outlandishly capable heroes and the need for tension. But the traditional way of diffusing it, either via camp or acknowledgement, just isn't present in Horizon which, for the most part, wants it's story to be taken seriously. Aloy even runs up against the issue herself in the arena, completely undermining Helis's narrative threat by correctly pointing out that if he fought her properly (within the game's rules) he'd get wrecked. This is the guy whose supposed to be THE big human threat and Aloy, and thus the player, don't even take him seriously past the halfway point. The game has good writing and does well to show emotional vulnerability but doesn't allow any sort of physical vulnerability in the slightest, having to rely instead on the game forcing Aloy to lose just so the story happens in a suitably dramatic manner.

 

[AtkO]

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

Yea, that was a huge frustration for me. Not because it happened, but because I saw it coming, especially when we defended the tower.

I was like, yea ok, let's shoot at waves of enemies until a cinematic is triggered that will still let them through somehow. I enjoyed the section cause killing Corruptors this easily felt good, but it really served no purpose besides what it was, killing machines, and for a story mission that's hella weak.

 

[EGM1966]

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

It's a narrative. Even James Bond gets captured when the script demands.

If you want the game to you not go of your actions then it can only have a very simple narrative. ZD ultimately has a pretty strong linear narrative hence control will be taken out your hands when narrative demands.

There's a reason the side quests allow more freedom and assume you're going to win every time vs the main narrative.

 

[Sequiel]

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

For me you are on point. I felt specially annoyed by those exact moments too. Game is great overall but they clearly forgot the "How is the player supposed to feel?" rule in those parts.

I'm really fed up with the "badass culture" and how it destroys storys that may otherwise be interesting, but those moments in HZD were smartly mixed all over with many other tones.

It would be great if GG would go deeper with RPG elements, dialog and character interaction options. Witcher 3 is a good ref for that.

 

[FirewalkR]

Some people were talking about Odyssey being important in the future...
Given this:
http://horizonzerodawn.wikia.com/wiki/Odyssey_Has_Failed ... am I missing something?

 

[hydruxo]

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

None of that bothered me at all. It's just part of the story. Aloy isn't untouchable, things happen to her.

 

[Lingitiz]

It's a narrative. Even James Bond gets captured when the script demands.

If you want the game to you not go of your actions then it can only have a very simple narrative. ZD ultimately has a pretty strong linear narrative hence control will be taken out your hands when narrative demands.

There's a reason the side quests allow more freedom and assume you're going to win every time vs the main narrative.

None of that bothered me at all. It's just part of the story. Aloy isn't untouchable, things happen to her.

I think you're both missing his point. GG could have done a better job of syncing up the gameplay moments with the story beat they were trying to hit. I.E: Aloy is about to be cornered by a bunch of Deathbringers in an impossible situation, don't make the gameplay sequence before that her taking out a whole bunch of them effortlessly, make it an unbeatable sequence where it does feel impossible to overcome it.

The problem isn't that those events happen, it's that you're doing something where you're kicking major ass beforehand, and then the rug gets pulled out during a cutscene. It leads to a disconnect where Aloy in-game is an unstoppable badass and Aloy in cutscenes isn't matching that.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

Some people were talking about Odyssey being important in the future...
Given this:
http://horizonzerodawn.wikia.com/wiki/Odyssey_Has_Failed ... am I missing something?

I'll quote myself:

That log isn't a first hand account, though - Elisabet is just communicating what she was told by Far Zenith. Thing is, FZ is super sketchy, with the thing of having a whole host of unknown investors and everything else. Chekhov's gun and all that. I don't think the writers would make so many mentions to the Odyssey, that it had an APOLLO copy and everything else if they didn't intended for it to become important at some point.

 

[FirewalkR]

I'll quote myself:

Hadn't read that... interesting!

Edit: Also, something that I'm sure more people have thought of... something tells me Ted Faro managed to survive. Cryo, life extension...

 

[HStallion]

I think you're both missing his point. GG could have done a better job of syncing up the gameplay moments with the story beat they were trying to hit. I.E: Aloy is about to be cornered by a bunch of Deathbringers in an impossible situation, don't make the gameplay sequence before that her taking out a whole bunch of them effortlessly, make it an unbeatable sequence where it does feel impossible to overcome it.

The problem isn't that those events happen, it's that you're doing something where you're kicking major ass beforehand, and then the rug gets pulled out during a cutscene. It leads to a disconnect where Aloy in-game is an unstoppable badass and Aloy in cutscenes isn't matching that.

The game needs to be a game at times and that often requires the story or internal logic of the game take a seat so things can happen. Sometimes this is you being forced into a cut scene so the setting can change to set up the next set piece, sometimes its your character getting knocked out so the next area can be lead into quickly. I won't say I like it but its nigh impossible to get around without basically making a game entirely a sandbox with no overt story telling like cut scenes and such.

There are ways to get around it and sometimes do it better but at times things just need to happen even if its a little awkward. Hell even things like seeing waist high walls and other things in an area can give away that there will be a battle ahead even if you had no reason to expect one beforehand. I won't necessarily fault developers for this kind of stuff especially in an open world game as polished in almost every other sense. I wouldn't call it nit picking but I feel in the scheme of things, it bothered me very little.

 

[Version 3.0]

I think you're both missing his point. GG could have done a better job of syncing up the gameplay moments with the story beat they were trying to hit. I.E: Aloy is about to be cornered by a bunch of Deathbringers in an impossible situation, don't make the gameplay sequence before that her taking out a whole bunch of them effortlessly, make it an unbeatable sequence where it does feel impossible to overcome it.

The problem isn't that those events happen, it's that you're doing something where you're kicking major ass beforehand, and then the rug gets pulled out during a cutscene. It leads to a disconnect where Aloy in-game is an unstoppable badass and Aloy in cutscenes isn't matching that.

Yes, precisely. It's not that Aloy is defeated or captured that bothers me. It's that these cutscenes contrast poorly with the gameplay preceding them. In all these cases, I'd literally just defeated numerous opponents.

These weren't quite as bad as the cliched ones in so many games, where, upon defeating a boss, the game plays a cutscene where that same boss says "I was taking it easy on you" or some other such drivel, and then captures your character. But they weren't all that much better, either.

The outcome the scenes depict could be arrived to more organically. It doesn't have to go straight from "Aloy just defeated an entire invading army" to "Oh, wait, no she didn't, she got taken out by a single rocket shot in a place 30 feet from where she was actually standing." In that particular example, all that scene was meant to accomplish is to end the battle in one location (Meridian), and make you go to the next location (the Spire). That could've been accomplished any number of ways. For example, a simple "they flanked us", or "a Stormbird carried Hades to the Spire", or even just Aloy saying "I've got to get to the Spire, that's the real target" - which she had pointed out earlier in the story, more than once.

Anyway, these are annoyances - the story overall was quite good, given a little (okay, a lot of) suspension of disbelief. I very much enjoyed the constant teasing - what is Zero Dawn? And the answer was quite satisfying.

 

[Vitten]

Something I've been wondering: would it really have made a lot of diference for the newly created humanity if Apollo hadn't been deleted ?

Ok, they would have come out of the vaults being a lot more educated so they'd probably wouldn't have devolved into the sun-worshipping primitive tribes we see in the game but then again they would have emerged in a world without any industrial infrastructure nor any controlling authority to keep everyone in check.

And without access to modern resources and without a governing body and police the results would have been the same: human nature takes over, the strong prey on the weak and people form groups/gangs and start fighting each other.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

Something I've been wondering: would it really have made a lot of diference for the newly created humanity if Apollo hadn't been deleted ?

Ok, they would have come out of the vaults being a lot more educated so they'd probably wouldn't have devolved into the sun-worshipping primitive tribes we see in the game but then again they would have emerged in a world without any industrial infrastructure nor any controlling authority to keep everyone in check.

If I'm not mistaken, it's kind of implied that, had the humans gone through the APOLLO system, they'd eventually be in control of the GAIA facilities (the whole "humans being the ones to reintroduce the other animal species" thing) , so rebuilding infrastructure wouldn't be much of a problem - the robots would do it.

What would happens next is anyone's guess. Maybe APOLLO would try to lead these first humans into organizing into some sort of system, probably egalitarian, with power distributed rather than centralized, some sort of direct democracy or something.

APOLLO was a curated version of our history, knowledge and culture, with safeties and checks. It's not beyond belief that it would try to lead the new humanity into creating some sort of utopic society. Whether that work - and for how long - that's... something we'll never know.

 

[LastMinuteHero]

I think a Rost dlc would be a good way to improve the human to human combat. Then again you would have to deal with creating multiple new locations

 

[Ordinaryundone]

Something I've been wondering: would it really have made a lot of diference for the newly created humanity if Apollo hadn't been deleted ?

Ok, they would have come out of the vaults being a lot more educated so they'd probably wouldn't have devolved into the sun-worshipping primitive tribes we see in the game but then again they would have emerged in a world without any industrial infrastructure nor any controlling authority to keep everyone in check.

And without access to modern resources and without a governing body and police the results would have been the same: human nature takes over, the strong prey on the weak and people form groups/gangs and start fighting each other.

If everything had gone according to plan there would have still been quite a bit of technology waiting for the new humans. Hell, even with everything fucked up there is still a lot of advanced tech just lying around; only problem is that nobody knows how to use it. With APOLLO they'd have the know-how and could pick up society again. Hell, in a much better position than the old humans because they get the fruits of centuries of technological growth AND an Earth that has rolled back most of the damage caused by that growth.

Plus, you know, they'd control the robots and GAIA facilities and stuff like that. Not to say human nature likely wouldn't assert itself again in some way but it's better than living like cavemen.

 

[EGM1966]

I think you're both missing his point. GG could have done a better job of syncing up the gameplay moments with the story beat they were trying to hit. I.E: Aloy is about to be cornered by a bunch of Deathbringers in an impossible situation, don't make the gameplay sequence before that her taking out a whole bunch of them effortlessly, make it an unbeatable sequence where it does feel impossible to overcome it.

The problem isn't that those events happen, it's that you're doing something where you're kicking major ass beforehand, and then the rug gets pulled out during a cutscene. It leads to a disconnect where Aloy in-game is an unstoppable badass and Aloy in cutscenes isn't matching that.

Funnily enough was thinking of editing my post to point out while I think the fail safe is fine they could have handled the transition to be less abrupt.

I felt two tropes they slightly overused in ZD were:

• someone dying just as you get there with some final info in their last gasp
• abrupt transition from winning to fail state

I can get find the second one annoying in particular (the former I suspect is more likely to elicit a chuckle). Just noting that fail states are inherent in most narrative arcs and in a game via cutscenes they're always going to come after some form of victory (which is why they're in the cut scene when control can be taken away).

But yeah I do think they could have tightened up the alignment of gameplay state prior to the cutscene to the cutscene itself. Perhaps show an alarming number of foes approaching during the turret sequence for example then when you're clearly getting swamped switch to the cutscene. Or have Aloy be told to make run for the antenna and abandon turret sequence as you've gained control there. Then as you run away take control and show her getting pasted by the falling debris.

 

[Subtervotion]

Something I've been wondering: would it really have made a lot of diference for the newly created humanity if Apollo hadn't been deleted ?

Ok, they would have come out of the vaults being a lot more educated so they'd probably wouldn't have devolved into the sun-worshipping primitive tribes we see in the game but then again they would have emerged in a world without any industrial infrastructure nor any controlling authority to keep everyone in check.

And without access to modern resources and without a governing body and police the results would have been the same: human nature takes over, the strong prey on the weak and people form groups/gangs and start fighting each other.

You're really underestimating the butterfly effect here. It would be a difference of night and day. Think about all the advanced knowledge the population would have compared to what they got. Sure, there would still be conflict, but it would be conducted entirely differently and with more knowledge about possible apocalyptic outcomes. Did Ted Faro consider the outcome of what would happen when humanity discovers nuclear weaponry for the second time? We as a species are lucky we didn't blow up our whole planet last century. Could humanity pass that test again? Just one example in a huge list of what APOLLO could have taught us.

 

[Vitten]

If I'm not mistaken, it's kind of implied that, had the humans gone through the APOLLO system, they'd eventually be in control of the GAIA facilities (the whole "humans being the ones to reintroduce the other animal species" thing) , so rebuilding infrastructure wouldn't be much of a problem - the robots would do it.

What would happens next is anyone's guess. Maybe APOLLO would try to lead these first humans into organizing into some sort of system, probably egalitarian, with power distributed rather than centralized, some sort of direct democracy or something.

APOLLO was a curated version of our history, knowledge and culture, with safeties and checks. It's not beyond belief that it would try to lead the new humanity into creating some sort of utopic society. Whether that work - and for how long - that's... something we'll never know.

I think it's naive to assume the new humans would have just simply happily banded together trying to recreate a perfect society with all the knowledge they gained from Apollo.
We're still very much controlled by primal urges and only thanks to the strict rules and laws of our society which evolved over millenia do we manage to live somewhat peacefully together.
Without such a tight framework I fear it would all fall apart quickly and violent power struggles would be inevitable. And with the knowledge of Apollo they would have been a lot more deadly than what the Sun Kings came up with.

 

[Subtervotion]

I think it's naive to assume the new humans would have just simply happily banded together trying to recreate a perfect society with all the knowledge they gained from Apollo.
We're still very much controlled by primal urges and only thanks to the strict rules and laws of our society which evolved over millenia do we manage to live somewhat peacefully together.
Without such a tight framework I fear it would all fall apart quickly and violent power struggles would be inevitable. And with the knowledge of Apollo they would have been a lot more deadly than what the Sun Kings came up with.

Alright, Ted Faro.

As if tribes who have no knowledge or understanding of each other are going to be more peaceful than well educated humans each with their own focus. How easy would it be to commit crime in that scenario? How easy for one leader to take power and commit genocide? These Apollo educated humans wouldnt be primitive. Like I said in an earlier post, a primitive humanity would inevitably discover nuclear weaponry again. Will they be bale to pass the test a second time?

Imo, the more educated a human is, the less they want to fight with each other, and the more they look at humanity as a whole and strive for its survival as a species.

 

[Chuckie]

Alright, Ted Faro.

This made me actually laugh out loud.

 

[Version 3.0]

I felt two tropes they slightly overused in ZD were:

• someone dying just as you get there with some final info in their last gasp
• abrupt transition from winning to fail state

Oh, yeah. The "last conversation before death" thing made me laugh, too. How many of those were there? And silly me, I still thought we'd save Ersa somehow. When she died, I was like "what the hell was I thinking?".

 

[Chuckie]

Oh, yeah. The "last conversation before death" thing made me laugh, too. How many of those were there? And silly me, I still thought we'd save Ersa somehow. When she died, I was like "what the hell was I thinking?".

Haha that did happen a lot. With Ersa I was thinking: She's gonna die like Shmi Skywalker isn't she....and yes she did.

 

[SolidusDave]

Finished the game today. Playing the game feels so good that I even got the Platinum trophy shortly afterwards, most of the side content was enjoyable and I wanted to max out my time with Horizon.
I missed out on a stretch of like 5 audio files though, i wonder where those are.


Story was great, especially the world building. It's basically the level of the Killzone lore finally being in their game itself haha

I guess I'm a bit LTTP but maybe reading this thread will quench my thirst to discuss the plot.


I think the only thing I didn't like is the flying AI orb after the credits. I mean, come on.
Curious for a sequel. Although a lot of the wonder in Horizon is about finding out how the world ended.


Do we know how many cradles there are? They are likely only located in the US considering large parts of the rest of the world has already fallen at that point. It's a nice geopolitical touch to show how the US supplies weapons and fights proxy wars all over the globe and is thus the last to get fucked up.

Kinda weird to have still races if the whole human population stems from a handful of humans breeding with each other for 700 years

Once HEPHAESTUS regained control over the Cauldrons, it started weaponizing some of the machines and designing new machines, like the Stalkers, Thunderjaw, Sawtooth, Stormbirds, to cull the human population that it had started seeing as detrimental to the terraforming efforts.

In my head canon HEPHAESTUS is also not evil (actually only Hades and Gaia are true AIs right? Actually even Hades might not be).
It's simply that the machines can't do their job of cleaning up the planet when they are killed often. So it implements routines to make them more efficient - which means making them more defensive to the human influence. Survival of the fittest, it would do the same thing to overcome natural disasters etc. HEPHAESTUS does not even know what humans are, basically. Before the purge, Gaia would provide the common sense of not producing something that is more lethal to humans.


I also liked that the normal machines are very hostile to corrupted (HADES) machines. You can lure out the machines from corrupted zones and everything that sees them will start to attack them.


btw, I think at the end everyone of my allies wanted to bone Aloy haha.
Petra was probably the most blatant about it.

 

[Aaronology]

In my head canon HEPHAESTUS is also not evil (actually only Hades and Gaia are true AIs right? Actually even Hades might not be).
It's simply that the machines can't do their job of cleaning up the planet when they are killed often. So it implements routines to make them more efficient - which means making them more defensive to the human influence. Survival of the fittest, it would do the same thing to overcome natural disasters etc. HEPHAESTUS does not even know what humans are, basically. Before the purge, Gaia would provide the common sense of not producing something that is more lethal to humans.

GAIA was originally the only true AI. The signal awakens all the subroutines, giving them sentience and agency.

I don't consider them evil, but they're definitely damaged in some way. Chaotic and out of control as GAIA describes them.

 

[NathanDiego]

I finished yesterday,what an amazing game,surpass my expectations.

 

[gatti-man]

The moments where, after you finish a section, the game plays a cutscene where you're defeated. I hate when games do that. In this game, those would be:

1. After the fight at the Proving. You kill everyone, and then...Helis?...strolls up and grabs you by the neck and you're helpless. Lame.

2. In the ruin where you finally find the master override, Bahavas rappells down and KOs Aloy with a grenade, so that they can have the Gladiator area fight. That one particularly irked me, because it looked to me like that grenade was closer to him than her.

3. At the end battle outside Meridian, after you've defended against a whole army with the handheld cannon things, they play a cutscene where Aloy is standing under an arch and it gets blown up and falls on her. I wasn't even standing there, stupid game. That queues up the end fight, because Hades waltzed on by while Aloy was down.

It really undermines that great feeling you get when you are doing well in a game, and the game just decides "you lose anyway". Especially late in the game, when your character has become a total badass. I mean, there were some awesome moments in the game to that effect.

Aloy, on one side quest, was attacked by a group of guys hired by someone who wants her spear. She says something like "You've seen what I can do. Why do you think this will end well for you?" Badass.

Another side quest - a Rock Eater shows up at a quarrry. The quarry master is like "oh shit, nobody can help with this thing". Aloy is like "It's my specialty. Hold my beer." Badass.

This is how stories are told. It's either that or have a lame unbeatable moment where a boss or enemies are just rediculous. I hate that even more because I spend all my consumeables trying to win.

 

[ChillWinston]

Finished yesterday. Enjoyed the game quite a bit, but a few things about the storytelling really frustrated me. I would assume it's quite a common complaint at this point but the way the game just dumps huge amounts of information on you in relatively short periods of time got quite annoying by the end. I found the auido logs and the written entries really well done, I just wish they had found a better way to dole them out. Too many times I found myself running around the environment in circles while I waited for the third audio log in a room to finish playing.

On a positive note, I loved the story told through the vantages. I would have loved there to be have been more content along those lines. Yeah we get tonnes of info about FARO and Elizabet and the super AI and all the rest of it, bur i would have liked to have seen more personal stories told as well. That said, I realise the story told through the vantages has a logical reason for being there, it relates to the project the guy was working on at FARO, it wouldn't make sense for every John and Jane Doe to be leaving stories all round the world for you to find I suppose.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

Do we know how many cradles there are? They are likely only located in the US considering large parts of the rest of the world has already fallen at that point. It's a nice geopolitical touch to show how the US supplies weapons and fights proxy wars all over the globe and is thus the last to get fucked up.

We know there are at least 9 of them - the Cradle facility we visit is called E9, probably ELEUTHIA-09 - and that they're actually scattered around the globe. ELEUTHIA-01 is in China (seemingly - the datalog that talks about it says there was a swarm in the Xinjiang region that could've detected it) and ELEUTHIA-02 is in Mozambique.

In my head canon HEPHAESTUS is also not evil (actually only Hades and Gaia are true AIs right? Actually even Hades might not be).
It's simply that the machines can't do their job of cleaning up the planet when they are killed often. So it implements routines to make them more efficient - which means making them more defensive to the human influence. Survival of the fittest, it would do the same thing to overcome natural disasters etc. HEPHAESTUS does not even know what humans are, basically. Before the purge, Gaia would provide the common sense of not producing something that is more lethal to humans.

As Aaronology said, only GAIA was a true AI at first, really. I do agree with you, they're not evil (not even HADES), just doing what they're programmed to do while completely unaware of the context, without GAIA.

Petra was probably the most blatant about it.

The thirst was real.

 

[Version 3.0]

This is how stories are told. It's either that or have a lame unbeatable moment where a boss or enemies are just rediculous. I hate that even more because I spend all my consumeables trying to win.

Oh, really? Those are the only two possibilities?

No, those are the two worst possibilities. I and others have posted several other ways to accomplish moving the narrative along. The ones in the game were so dumb, I'm almost inclined to think they were deliberate, a tongue-in-cheek nod to this old trope.

 

[Candeldandel]

I wanted to post these screenshots but both have story line peeps in 'em so I'ma put them here just to be safe

(I love this one)

Dem some abs

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

Dem some abs

Vanasha's abs are made of solid rock, masterfully chiseled obsidian.

 

[Ronzilla29]

I platted this like a month ago and haven't kept up on news lately, is there any word on any dlc coming or what the warm socks would be used for? I do still need to go and get the 1 death stranding piece I missed in the Grave Hoard since I can't believe I missed it. I didn't use any guides or read anything til after I was done though and it figures I had found the other 2 on my own just trying to be thorough but missed the one you can't go back to get once done with that part. Some new story dlc would be a great reason to start another playthrough from the start to go grab it. Another higher difficulty level would be great reason as well.

 

[HStallion]

I platted this like a month ago and haven't kept up on news lately, is there any word on any dlc coming or what the warm socks would be used for? I do still need to go and get the 1 death stranding piece I missed in the Grave Hoard since I can't believe I missed it. I didn't use any guides or read anything til after I was done though and it figures I had found the other 2 on my own just trying to be thorough but missed the one you can't go back to get once done with that part. Some new story dlc would be a great reason to start another playthrough from the start to go grab it. Another higher difficulty level would be great reason as well.

I'm guessing we'll hear about DLC at E3 of all places, if not then probably PSX.

 

[Ronzilla29]

I'm guessing we'll hear about DLC at E3 of all places, if not then probably PSX.

Thanks. The sooner the better, I'm Looking forward to it a great deal because I absolutely loved this game. Undoubtedly a masterpiece and one of my favorites of all time.

 

[Toth]

Just finished the game today. Wow, what an experience.

First of all, Aloy + Erend all the way. They work way too well together.

Second of all, I didn't want to bump the other thread but boy, Ted Faro is indeed truly one of the most despicable villains I have seen. When THAT scene happened in the Gaia Prime Core, I literally said, "You piece of s**t." He wanted to prevent future humanity from learning the truth about him, not about 'maintaining its innocence'. True garbage.

I hope we get to visit his Thebes bunker in DLC, find his corpse, and show it to everyone as the ultimate symbol of human greed and hubris.

 

[Miniature Kaiju]

I hope we get to visit his Thebes bunker in DLC, find his corpse, and show it to everyone as the ultimate symbol of human greed and hubris.

I kinda want to find him alive, somehow, so I can stab the motherfucker dead and then make beautiful things out of his guts. Ditto for the fuckers that killed Rost's family.