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Horizon: Forbidden West | Gameplay Reveal Trailer

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
I don't know man, with every new Far Cry game that i see, i can't help but notice that Ubisoft makes them worse and worse with each new game. I mean, the wacky nature of action becomes wackier with every game in the franchise which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it looks like Ubisoft has ran out of ideas and are simply throwing stuff in there at random just to have something new in there to show even though it looks more of the same, like Far Cry New Dawn same, but less colorful. I'll wait and see more of the game before I pass any more judgement on it, but I'm not holding my breath.
Far Cry 3 was one of my favorite games of the PS360 gen, and I completely agree. FC4 was boring and derivative. FC5 felt even more tedious.

This does look fun in a crazy mindless shooter kind of way. I can get behind it. But this franchise had so much potential and i hate how they have turned it into a joke.
 

leizzra

Member
Did anyone notice this - look at Erands round armor plate. RT or other kind of reflection (AO capsules used like in The Order)?

 
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So, like I said, it's a grappling hook, a glider, and slightly-less-than-dogshit melee. None of that screams "way better" or "vastly improved" to me yet, but each to their own. I liked the combat in Horizon plenty, I just don't think this looks much better than what I did in that game.
By your standard, what is excellent melee combat? Because in my book what hzd has is top notch at all levels (except for the fact that it's open world, I hate the check list nature of these games amd how the objectives present themselves... Points in a map, a list of missions on a menu, but this is all open world games).

Anyway, the game itself looks very nice and it's the best "next gen" I have seen so far.

Those celebrating because Sony has a winner, I would expect the new hellblade game to match this, but it will be darker and probably the environment will not be as lush... One won't cancel the other for sure.
 

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
By your standard, what is excellent melee combat?

Not HZD. HZD melee was borderline pointless it was so bad, there's nothing to it, it's a light and heavy spear attack. Even Breath of the Wild had better melee combat and that wasn't exactly great either. This looks marginally better but still like something you have to do to weaken certain enemies before you hit them with a bow.
 
Yep, it's Horizon 2. Not hating, I'll platinum it like I did the first, but nothing wowed me, just looks like an enjoyable sequel so far and that's fine.

They didn't even touch on the release because I'll reiterate, you'll be lucky to get it this year.
Same, was cool i guess. But im not excited.

Wasnt amazed with the first one, bought it...but became repetitive for me, and lacked soul, albeit good mechanics.

But i do like the grappling hook, and ability to climb anything. I just dont think they'll fix what i didnt like...the repetition, guerella isnt creative like that imo.
 
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Far Cry 3 was one of my favorite games of the PS360 gen, and I completely agree. FC4 was boring and derivative. FC5 felt even more tedious.

This does look fun in a crazy mindless shooter kind of way. I can get behind it. But this franchise had so much potential and i hate how they have turned it into a joke.
Same here man. I feel like the Third game was the pinnacle of the franchise and a big upgrade to the second except in things like player physics interactions with vegetation and Fire physics (the way fire spread). Everything afterwards felt like Ubisoft were just tossing features back and forth haphazardly, deciding to instead omit the features that made farcry what it was. I'm still a fan of the series, but just not as much as i was when the franchise was at its absolute high with the release of FarCry 3, 9 years ago. It's just not as exciting as it used to be anymore.
 
Anyone else think they might be using RT for global illumination? I mean, the character's skin lights up from bounce lighting off of the beach sand. It looks like GI to me. What do you think?
 
i don't want to make a new thread so i will ask here. I want to play horizon zero down 1 but im not sure if it's better to play on my pretty old pc (970gtx+2500k and some old 1080p monitor so medium details 40-60 fps at best) or on base ps 4 but on LG CX tv ?
 
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Not HZD. HZD melee was borderline pointless it was so bad, there's nothing to it, it's a light and heavy spear attack. Even Breath of the Wild had better melee combat and that wasn't exactly great either. This looks marginally better but still like something you have to do to weaken certain enemies before you hit them with a bow.
So what's great melee then? I want a positive example instead of some problematizing non sense.
 
It would be reasonable if anyone could specify the reasons why the PS4 would hold it back. I could say that switching to a vegan diet would hold me back as an athlete, but it's meaningless without citing the reasons why. It's a pretty empty statement to make, because a lot of the reasons that have been expressed so far have been easily debunked. After all, no one claims that consoles held Cyberpunk back on the PC. That was just sloppy development.

As it's a fairly transitional game in terms of mechanics, the limitations are asset creation, and engine optimization. The former is largely budget-limited. The latter is impossible to quantify.
The obvious constraint is that Guerilla needs to make things fit inside the PS4 instead of the drastically more powerful PS5. They can't add as many things to the game compared to if they were to make it PS5 exclusive. Things such as assets, code, textures, animations, lighting info, etc. If you like using analogies, I might be able to give you one you'd understand.

Imagine going to the grocery store with a big sturdy bag VS 1 tiny torn up bag with holes in it. You'll be able to fuel your body a lot more if you bring a big sturdy bag to carry what you need, because it's a lot bigger and a lot more reliable.

Now for the less obvious reasons of why the PS4 holds back this game. The SSD of the PS5 doesn't just make things load faster. I mean it does, but not just the typical normal loading screens that we as players get to see. It actually changes the way the developers can develop the game.

Playstation gave the example that on the PS4 they couldn't make Spider-Man zip through New York super fast. Because in order for you to be able to zip through with amazing speed, they would need to make assets load in fast enough so you don't see super bad pop-in.

Other examples would be long elevator rides, long tunnels to walk through, squeezing the character through cracks in rocky areas, slow camera movement, uncontrollable cut-scenes, etc etc. All these things are used to hide loading times.

Last but not least, every developer would have brilliant ideas they want to try out. However they often only come to know it's not possible midway, because they have to deal with the PS4 also. They either try their best and eventually succeed on implementing the ideas, but having to take away loads of time and resources from other stuff to compromise. Or they would have to scrap it entirely and still would've wasted time and resources regardless.

In short, if the game were to be a PS5 exclusive, the devs would not only be able to make it more graphically beautiful but also design better worlds, add more assets and NPC's to make it more lively, add more code for better AI, add more animations for more fluidity, add entirely new additional gameplay features, AND waste no time on looking for workarounds for the PS4. These are just the things that came off the top of my head, in reality, there's tons more things the devs would need to deal with.
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Not HZD. HZD melee was borderline pointless it was so bad, there's nothing to it, it's a light and heavy spear attack. Even Breath of the Wild had better melee combat and that wasn't exactly great either. This looks marginally better but still like something you have to do to weaken certain enemies before you hit them with a bow.
I really dont understand the melee complaints with Horizon. Dont understand the comparisons to Breath of the Wild either. BoTW is a melee combat game. Horizon is a shooter. Just because its using bow and arrows doesnt mean its not a shooter. How many shooters have great melee combat? Does CoD have as good a melee combat as BoTW? Does Destiny? Does Gears? Horizon is basically on par with TLOU and Uncharted when it comes to melee. It's a quick attack when people get too close to you. or some stealth takedowns. It's not trying to be God of War. It's a third person shooter. Every shooter has just one melee attack button and one or two moves. That's it. They dont need more.

What's next? Should we start comparing BoTW's bow combat to Horizon's bow and arrow combat? It's entirely different genres. I have never really seen this with other games. There is something about Horizon that makes people think its not a shooter.
 

HTK

Banned
I tried to get into the first game just couldn't do it. This looks fantastic, but I'm afraid it's just not my cup of tea.
 
I could say that switching to a vegan diet would hold me back as an athlete, but it's meaningless without citing the reasons why.
Eh? Have you not seen game changers or seen how well Chris Paul has played this season now he's a vegan?

A vegan diet holds nothing back, quite the opposite actually. Have you seen a gorilla? They are vegan.
 

James Sawyer Ford

Gold Member
I really dont understand the melee complaints with Horizon. Dont understand the comparisons to Breath of the Wild either. BoTW is a melee combat game. Horizon is a shooter. Just because its using bow and arrows doesnt mean its not a shooter. How many shooters have great melee combat? Does CoD have as good a melee combat as BoTW? Does Destiny? Does Gears? Horizon is basically on par with TLOU and Uncharted when it comes to melee. It's a quick attack when people get too close to you. or some stealth takedowns. It's not trying to be God of War. It's a third person shooter. Every shooter has just one melee attack button and one or two moves. That's it. They dont need more.

What's next? Should we start comparing BoTW's bow combat to Horizon's bow and arrow combat? It's entirely different genres. I have never really seen this with other games. There is something about Horizon that makes people think its not a shooter.

it seems to me like horizon is getting way too unfairly judged for every little thing

it’s a sandbox combat game against humans and dinos. You have a huge arsenal of options at your disposal

melee is just a fun way to mix things up. It looks great now. Is it god of war? No. But it was never intended to be

seems like a silly thing to be so critical of
 

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
So what's great melee then? I want a positive example instead of some problematizing non sense.

Any From Software game? Platinum games? Batman games and by extension every game that copied them, etc, etc? Horizon is literally light attack or heavy attack, that's it. See my next reply about how Horizon isn't a melee-centric game but you're all missing my point

I really dont understand the melee complaints with Horizon. Dont understand the comparisons to Breath of the Wild either. BoTW is a melee combat game. Horizon is a shooter. Just because its using bow and arrows doesnt mean its not a shooter. How many shooters have great melee combat? Does CoD have as good a melee combat as BoTW? Does Destiny? Does Gears? Horizon is basically on par with TLOU and Uncharted when it comes to melee. It's a quick attack when people get too close to you. or some stealth takedowns. It's not trying to be God of War. It's a third person shooter. Every shooter has just one melee attack button and one or two moves. That's it. They dont need more.

What's next? Should we start comparing BoTW's bow combat to Horizon's bow and arrow combat? It's entirely different genres. I have never really seen this with other games. There is something about Horizon that makes people think its not a shooter.

Horizon is not a "shooter" just because you're shooting a bow. It shares zero DNA with games like COD, it's a third person action adventure game that happens to focus on ranged attacks, but it still has melee, melee stealth, and traps. It's like arguing that COD is an RPG because you're "playing the role of a guy". I used a lot of stealth/traps in HZD, I used my bow plenty in BOTW, I used a lot of gadgets in games like Batman, not just my fists. It's entirely possible for a game like that to do a mix of everything well. HZD does not and 2 doesn't look much better in that regard.

Again though, I am really not saying I need Dark Souls level melee combat in a game like Horizon, I just think it's something that sucked in the first game that they could have drastically improved here, but from what I've seen so far, they haven't. It doesn't ruin the game for me, it just seems like a huge wasted opportunity, but maybe we'll find out later that they've added a bunch more melee stuff we haven't seen yet. The funny thing is that you use TLOU as an example of what Horizon is on par with, and I agree with you, but some people on this board genuinely believe TLOU2's melee was brilliant.
 
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sainraja

Member
I never argued it's not been improved, my issue is with people saying it's "way better" or "significantly improved" - where? In what way? I just don't consider what I've seen in the trailer either of those things. Yes, the melee combat has improved, because before it was awful and now it's slightly less awful. The human enemies still stand still while

And that's fine, I've no problem with a game that does more of the same thing it did well the first time around (minus melee), I just don't agree with the "much better" statements whatsoever. Looks fine.
That's fine but I am kinda interested in discussing what you think would take it where you feel like it's not? If that makes sense?

That's more of a real answer to my question, thanks. I still don't consider the additional of a grappling hook and glider being a "big improvement" to the gameplay, I think that's gonna be down to personal taste. I really don't think the human stuff looked much better either, she still hid in the waist-high red grass, into an instant stealth kill, got a huge run-up on the other guy who proceeded to stare at her while she charged an arrow for 3 seconds. Big guy didn't look impervious to arrows, she just weakened him with what basically seemed like the new R2 button and then finished him off with an arrow. But, if they're slightly better than before, okay.

But some of the smaller stuff you pointed out I didn't really notice and/or remember from the first game. If there's now a quick-use on some stuff that wasn't there before, that's good. Maybe I need to revisit what was actually possible in the first game, because honestly nothing that I saw here stood out that much, but maybe I'm giving the first game more credit than it deserves if some of this stuff was missing.
See that is what I am trying to ask you. What do you think would have been a big improvement to the gameplay?
 

Croatoan

They/Them A-10 Warthog
Looks cool! My only two nitpicks.

1. Alloys "head voice" is exactly same as her speaking voice. This was really jarring when she was "thinking" underwater. Immediately took me out of the sequence. Her underwater grunts not sounding muffled was also really bad sound design. Head voices should always be muted, or have reverb, or something to designate when a character is thinking vs speaking.

2. The hologram that allows her to float is fucking stupid and made me roll my eyes. You don't have to take everything from BOTW Guerilla.
 
I haven't played Horizon Dawn 1, Uncharted 4, Last of US Part 1 and Part 2, Ghost of Tsushima but...

It looks like it borrows parts from Uncharted 4 and a lot of from Last of Us Part 2 in terms of gameplay mechanics and cinematic motion..

This game is not cross gen for PS4 and PS4Pro right?
 
i don't want to make a new thread so i will ask here. I want to play horizon zero down 1 but im not sure if it's better to play on my pretty old pc (970gtx+2500k and some old 1080p monitor so medium details 40-60 fps at best) or on base ps 4 but on LG CX tv ?
You can get ps4 pro like (or above) performance on that old PC.

Have you tried to lower the details?

That old ass PC as you say is pretty good compared to last gen consoles.
 

James Sawyer Ford

Gold Member
Any From Software game? Platinum games? Batman games and by extension every game that copied them, etc, etc? Horizon is literally light attack or heavy attack, that's it. See my next reply about how Horizon isn't a melee-centric game but you're all missing my point



Horizon is not a "shooter" just because you're shooting a bow. It shares zero DNA with games like COD, it's a third person action adventure game that happens to focus on ranged attacks, but it still has melee, melee stealth, and traps. It's like arguing that COD is an RPG because you're "playing the role of a guy". I used a lot of stealth/traps in HZD, I used my bow plenty in BOTW, I used a lot of gadgets in games like Batman, not just my fists. It's entirely possible for a game like that to do a mix of everything well. HZD does not and 2 doesn't look much better in that regard.

Again though, I am really not saying I need Dark Souls level melee combat in a game like Horizon, I just think it's something that sucked in the first game that they could have drastically improved here, but from what I've seen so far, they haven't. It doesn't ruin the game for me, it just seems like a huge wasted opportunity, but maybe we'll find out later that they've added a bunch more melee stuff we haven't seen yet. The funny thing is that you use TLOU as an example of what Horizon is on par with, and I agree with you, but some people on this board genuinely believe TLOU2's melee was brilliant.

they talked about melee having combos, new valor attacks. Everything looked stylish and fluid and massively improved over the first. It’s something you would actually want to use now

what exactly is there to complain about? This game is not devil may cry
 

sainraja

Member
Any From Software game? Platinum games? Batman games and by extension every game that copied them, etc, etc? Horizon is literally light attack or heavy attack, that's it. See my next reply about how Horizon isn't a melee-centric game but you're all missing my point
There are people who criticize how Batman & now the new Spiderman game handles melee combat to my surprise because I think the way those games handle it is fantastic. Anyway, God of War basically has you using a heavy and light attack system similar to Horizon. But Horizon mixes that up with other things you can do in the game right?

Horizon is not a "shooter" just because you're shooting a bow. It shares zero DNA with games like COD, it's a third person action adventure game that happens to focus on ranged attacks, but it still has melee, melee stealth, and traps. It's like arguing that COD is an RPG because you're "playing the role of a guy". I used a lot of stealth/traps in HZD, I used my bow plenty in BOTW, I used a lot of gadgets in games like Batman, not just my fists. It's entirely possible for a game like that to do a mix of everything well. HZD does not and 2 doesn't look much better in that regard.
I haven't finished HZD yet and just getting into it but there are multiple ways you can handle a situation - we have our gadgets, we have our weaponry and we've got malee. I don't see how (from what I have played so far anyway) that you feel HZD does not? It does have a good mix of everything and so far I feel like it's a good balance.

Again though, I am really not saying I need Dark Souls level melee combat in a game like Horizon, I just think it's something that sucked in the first game that they could have drastically improved here, but from what I've seen so far, they haven't. It doesn't ruin the game for me, it just seems like a huge wasted opportunity, but maybe we'll find out later that they've added a bunch more melee stuff we haven't seen yet. The funny thing is that you use TLOU as an example of what Horizon is on par with, and I agree with you, but some people on this board genuinely believe TLOU2's melee was brilliant.
So what kind of melee combat are you expecting? I know you mentioned Batman/Spiderman but that kind of combat wouldn't really fit in for Horizon.
 

blastprocessor

The Amiga Brotherhood

LOD popping of the warrior's fur, the grass, dude riding the raptor, Aloy's clipping hair and her fur pop in is pretty rough, BUT these seem like things all but guaranteed to be fixed in future builds when they polish the game.
The hair clipping is a problem inherited from the first game they've yet to sort out. Can't believe it's still an issue.
 
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Vick

Member
Anyway, God of War basically has you using a heavy and light attack system similar to Horizon. But Horizon mixes that up with other things you can do in the game right?
118d874d322bac7c8178c72c75ccafb6.gif
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Any From Software game? Platinum games? Batman games and by extension every game that copied them, etc, etc? Horizon is literally light attack or heavy attack, that's it. See my next reply about how Horizon isn't a melee-centric game but you're all missing my point



Horizon is not a "shooter" just because you're shooting a bow. It shares zero DNA with games like COD, it's a third person action adventure game that happens to focus on ranged attacks, but it still has melee, melee stealth, and traps. It's like arguing that COD is an RPG because you're "playing the role of a guy". I used a lot of stealth/traps in HZD, I used my bow plenty in BOTW, I used a lot of gadgets in games like Batman, not just my fists. It's entirely possible for a game like that to do a mix of everything well. HZD does not and 2 doesn't look much better in that regard.

Again though, I am really not saying I need Dark Souls level melee combat in a game like Horizon, I just think it's something that sucked in the first game that they could have drastically improved here, but from what I've seen so far, they haven't. It doesn't ruin the game for me, it just seems like a huge wasted opportunity, but maybe we'll find out later that they've added a bunch more melee stuff we haven't seen yet. The funny thing is that you use TLOU as an example of what Horizon is on par with, and I agree with you, but some people on this board genuinely believe TLOU2's melee was brilliant.
I just cant agree. Horizon is a shooter. There is no two ways about it. You literally have guns in the DLC. Every weapon is a gun archetype. You have quickfire bows like semi-auto handguns. You have precision bows that are sniper archetype. You have a slingshot that works as a grenade launcher. Enemies drop literal machine guns for you to pick up and destroy. There is even a shotgun type bow in the DLC.

It's just very unique because no one has made an entire AAA game around bow and arrow combat before but people tend to forget that when they write it off as just another Sony cinematic game. It has more in common with Fallout 5 and Mass Effect than Skyrim and Witcher 3. Thats just the reality of it. I have never ever seen complaints about melee combat in ME and Fallout or pretty much any WRPG with shooting.

And I also cant agree that they havent improved the melee. Maybe we saw different trailers but I saw at least two new moves. It was clear to me that they were trying to show off their melee improvements with those sections.
 
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mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Just watched it on my OLED. It's a great looking cross-gen game. Especially beautiful underwater, fits the art style perfectly. Gameplay also looked dope, not sure how much of that elephant fight was scripted though.

I don't think it was scripted at all. It's just a dev that REALLY knows how to play the game. Real gamers do things like that all the time.
 
I haven't played Horizon Dawn 1, Uncharted 4, Last of US Part 1 and Part 2, Ghost of Tsushima but...

It looks like it borrows parts from Uncharted 4 and a lot of from Last of Us Part 2 in terms of gameplay mechanics and cinematic motion..

This game is not cross gen for PS4 and PS4Pro right?
It's coming out on PS4 and PS5.
 

Fafalada

Fafracer forever
I was referring to the several render passes that are used in deferred rendering to compute lighting equations. I should have been more clear about that.
Still not sure I follow-though, number of render-passes is an implementation specific detail not inherently a property of deferred rendering in general. And it applies to forward variants as well?
Are you specifically suggesting that deferred causes problems with lights influencing everything on screen as opposed to just localized areas? I mean costs rise proportionally with number of pixels a light hits - but that again, applies to all methods, just that in some cases you are stuck with worst-case scenario and don't get the culling benefits, but you're not saving at the top-end.

And that character light source is indeed out of the scene. It's being placed over her head where the sun's direction is opposite.
Yep - that was my point though, cinematic language in general uses 'fake'-light sources all over in real cinema, before and after CG became a thing. To go with true realism you basically have to abandon established film techniques, ie. go away from cinematic visuals, which runs contrary to every big-budget production (or those that aspire to mimic big budgets) out there.
 

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
That's fine but I am kinda interested in discussing what you think would take it where you feel like it's not? If that makes sense?

See that is what I am trying to ask you. What do you think would have been a big improvement to the gameplay?

Based on what we've seen in this video: a much bigger improvement to melee would have been a start, it still looks like something where you press a button and it locks you into a set of cool looking animations, but doesn't really add anything to the playing experience. The human segment looked largely the same, braindead AI that doesn't react to having a bow drawn in front of it. Perhaps a demonstration of a new interesting stealth mechanic or gadget rather than just wait in grass, stab guy. Aside from that I saw bows and slings - was there a totally new ranged weapon I missed somewhere?

I'll reply quickly to your other points here because the replies are getting out of hand and I'm running out of ways to say "I think it looks fine but didn't wow me" - again, it doesn't have to feel like Batman, I'm just providing an example of a game that had what I personally consider great melee combat. There is such a colossal chasm between the quality of the two that I believe there has to be SOMEWHERE in between and I feel like this entire discussion will become redundant when Horizon 3 launches with better melee than 2 and people act as though they couldn't have possibly done it for this game.

they talked about melee having combos, new valor attacks. Everything looked stylish and fluid and massively improved over the first. It’s something you would actually want to use now

what exactly is there to complain about? This game is not devil may cry

See the part of my post where I say I don't expect Dark Souls, if you all believe that this is as good as Horizon's melee combat could possibly be, that's fine, I don't agree. The animation for an attack != the attack, people on this board told me TLOU2's melee combat was mastercrafted and I didn't get it then either. I'll see how the melee combos feel, I didn't see anything in that video that looked like player agency beyond walking up to the enemy and hitting it personally.

I just cant agree. Horizon is a shooter. There is no two ways about it. You literally have guns in the DLC. Every weapon is a gun archetype. You have quickfire bows like semi-auto handguns. You have precision bows that are sniper archetype. You have a slingshot that works as a grenade launcher. Enemies drop literal machine guns for you to pick up and destroy. There is even a shotgun type bow in the DLC.

It's just very unique because no one has made an entire AAA game around bow and arrow combat before but people tend to forget that when they write it off as just another Sony cinematic game. It has more in common with Fallout 5 and Mass Effect than Skyrim and Witcher 3. Thats just the reality of it. I have never ever seen complaints about melee combat in ME and Fallout or pretty much any WRPG with shooting.

And I also cant agree that they havent improved the melee. Maybe we saw different trailers but I saw at least two new moves. It was clear to me that they were trying to show off their melee improvements with those sections.

Ehh, fine if you wanna think that, I could call MGS2 a shooter given that it "has guns" and you could blast your way noisily through the game, but I wouldn't because MGS2 isn't a shooter, it's a stealth game that happens to have guns in it. HZD is an action adventure game where your primary weapon happens to be a bow; I think you're missing the core point of my argument which is that just because the first game had almost no focus on melee doesn't mean the sequel has to follow suite, I'm just a little disappointed they haven't. It's not like I want a new system that had nothing to do with the first game, the first game had melee, it just sucked and it still kinda sucks.

Anyway, this discussion is tiring when there's so many on the other side of it, don't take it personally if I don't reply to y'all it's just a lot of time for me.
 
I haven't played Horizon Dawn 1, Uncharted 4, Last of US Part 1 and Part 2, Ghost of Tsushima but...

It looks like it borrows parts from Uncharted 4 and a lot of from Last of Us Part 2 in terms of gameplay mechanics and cinematic motion..

This game is not cross gen for PS4 and PS4Pro right?
Yup, but no 60fps patch for the ps5.
 

GermanZepp

Member
The one thing i did't like and i'm nitpicking here, was that the music was too prevalent, almost invasive. I think i heard some synth sound in some lines, those were great.
 

Blond

Banned
This was their gameplay debut. It's a big deal.

They think the best way to showcase their game is with linear, hand holdy level design. That doesn't strike me as a vote of confidence for impressive open world design.

Hopefully I'm proven wrong, but I'm skeptical.
i hate the laugh react so much because it’s just a way of saying “I don’t know how to argue with your points so let me do this.”

I’m excited to play it but you aren’t wrong. It would’ve been more impressive if it was an arena type of encounter where all these options were available and we got to see them chose how they wanted to handle the encounters vs being led on an Uncharted style of directed “go here, do this!” action sequence.

Again, we could be wrong but usually games that give people options when they’re shown off they take a crafted approach to showing you all the options available.
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
it seems to me like horizon is getting way too unfairly judged for every little thing

it’s a sandbox combat game against humans and dinos. You have a huge arsenal of options at your disposal

melee is just a fun way to mix things up. It looks great now. Is it god of war? No. But it was never intended to be

seems like a silly thing to be so critical of
I have noticed that too. There is just so many of them

- Aloy talks too much.
- Aloy's face has peach fuzz
- Aloy's character model has halo lighting around her
- Game is linear, no longer open world
- Melee hasnt been improved
- Traversal still isnt like zelda.
- It plays exactly like the first game.

Like wtf are you expecting? A complete reboot after the first game like God Of War? A perspective change to first person like GoW switching to over the shoulder cam? New genre? It's literally the sequel. It's supposed to be bigger and better with fancy new next gen visuals and features and its delivered here.

Aloy talking too much was a complaint that was everywhere back when it was first revealed, and it was barely even an issue in the game. She almost never spoke during combat. hell, Deacon in Days Gone was far more expressive and I liked that about him. But this is clearly just for demo purposes like the first game's demo. Anyone who has played the first game should know this.

We are now criticizing a game for making the character model look too good. Thats what the lighting complaints are all about. She looks too good they say. Hair looks too good. more detail on faces = bad.

And while I think the zelda climbing shouldve been in this game, my son is playing through botw and he HATES the rain in that game. he HATES having to pick stamina upgrades over heart upgrades. He just hates climbing in that game. So yeah, when I see fucking grappling hook and no stamina bar, I am like good. I dont need to climb shit. This is a good thing.

Lastly, this isnt open world? Really? I am so fucking done with clowns on this board. No one uses common sense. We clearly have a story mission that had to have devs carefully manage your progression through a level so you can track your friend and then rescue him. It's by design. I prefer this over walking 10 miles and ending up at an enemy site to take a bunch of enemies without any fanfare. This is something they added in the DLC story missions to give story missions more impact, more character development moments and feel in line with other AAA single player campaigns. Of course, there is going to be an open world to explore. Did no one watch the trailer last year?

This is all so fucking stupid.
 
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DForce

NaughtyDog Defense Force
Any From Software game? Platinum games? Batman games and by extension every game that copied them, etc, etc? Horizon is literally light attack or heavy attack, that's it. See my next reply about how Horizon isn't a melee-centric game but you're all missing my point



Horizon is not a "shooter" just because you're shooting a bow. It shares zero DNA with games like COD, it's a third person action adventure game that happens to focus on ranged attacks, but it still has melee, melee stealth, and traps. It's like arguing that COD is an RPG because you're "playing the role of a guy". I used a lot of stealth/traps in HZD, I used my bow plenty in BOTW, I used a lot of gadgets in games like Batman, not just my fists. It's entirely possible for a game like that to do a mix of everything well. HZD does not and 2 doesn't look much better in that regard.

Again though, I am really not saying I need Dark Souls level melee combat in a game like Horizon, I just think it's something that sucked in the first game that they could have drastically improved here, but from what I've seen so far, they haven't. It doesn't ruin the game for me, it just seems like a huge wasted opportunity, but maybe we'll find out later that they've added a bunch more melee stuff we haven't seen yet. The funny thing is that you use TLOU as an example of what Horizon is on par with, and I agree with you, but some people on this board genuinely believe TLOU2's melee was brilliant.

Your argument seems that it's awful or less awful because the melee combat doesn't have the same depth as From Software game, batman games etc.

I think that's just a bad argument. It would be like saying Resident Evil 2 shooting mechanics are awful because it doesn't have the same mechanics as Uncharted 4 or The Last of Us Part II.

The Melee combat in Dark Souls aren't deep. There are different weapons that bring forth a different sets of animations, and the weight of those weapons can impact how fast or how slow you attack your enemy. What you're mostly doing in these games are just slashing and dodging. Those slashing attacks are basically 3 swings of animation which you can cancel to dodge on coming attacks. Now we can't forget that you can guard and parry, too.

It's odd that you think Dark Souls has "great" mechanics when it's mostly heavy and light attack combos.
 

GymWolf

Gold Member
The soundtrack is so good in this. Especially at the end when she takes out the Elephant. It just builds up and up. Just wow.

Really like the destruction at the end too. It seems all those half standing structures at the end can be broken.

The trees were only broken in scripted cutscenes, but I am guessing if they can do this in realtime they should be able to do trees as well.

LibaLgI.gif

You can already break rocks, some walls and trees in horizon 1.

Not sure if the game being crossgen can permit far more destruction than that onestly.
 

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
Your argument seems that it's awful or less awful because the melee combat doesn't have the same depth as From Software game, batman games etc.

I think that's just a bad argument. It would be like saying Resident Evil 2 shooting mechanics are awful because it doesn't have the same mechanics as Uncharted 4 or The Last of Us Part II.

The Melee combat in Dark Souls aren't deep. There are different weapons that bring forth a different sets of animations, and the weight of those weapons can impact how fast or how slow you attack your enemy. What you're mostly doing in these games are just slashing and dodging. Those slashing attacks are basically 3 swings of animation which you can cancel to dodge on coming attacks. Now we can't forget that you can guard and parry, too.

It's odd that you think Dark Souls has "great" mechanics when it's mostly heavy and light attack combos.

No, again, read the parts of my post where I say it doesn't have to match up to games like Batman or Souls, it's just so far removed from the quality of those games that there has to be somewhere in between that they could reach towards. I feel like a broken record at this point but nobody seems to be listening to that part, if you all really believe the melee combat in Horizon could not possibly get any better whatsoever, that's fine. I don't. Your RE2 example doesn't work because RE2 has good shooting mechanics; bit just because it has gunplay doesn't mean it should feel like Call of Duty, it does what it does well regardless.

And no, Souls combat isn't "deep", but it's satisfying as fuck. If it wasn't, we probably wouldn't have played those games for so many hours on end. There is absolutely nothing satisfying about the melee in Horizon, but once more, I'm not saying it has to match up to Dark Souls - use your RE2 example above again, was the shooting satisfying for a RE2 remake? Yes, even if the shooting was not as satisfying as COD. It's not black and white, there is a very large grey area, I'm not asking for Horizon to become a brawler, I would just have liked to see them turn melee into something better than the pile of nothing it was in the original, and it doesn't look like that's changed from what I can see.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Ehh, fine if you wanna think that, I could call MGS2 a shooter given that it "has guns" and you could blast your way noisily through the game, but I wouldn't because MGS2 isn't a shooter, it's a stealth game that happens to have guns in it. HZD is an action adventure game where your primary weapon happens to be a bow; I think you're missing the core point of my argument which is that just because the first game had almost no focus on melee doesn't mean the sequel has to follow suite, I'm just a little disappointed they haven't. It's not like I want a new system that had nothing to do with the first game, the first game had melee, it just sucked and it still kinda sucks.

Anyway, this discussion is tiring when there's so many on the other side of it, don't take it personally if I don't reply to y'all it's just a lot of time for me.
MGS2 is a shooter. It's not a shooter like Halo, Perfect Dark or Operation Winback back then, but it's a stealth action game based around shooting.
MGSV is pretty much the best third person shooter of last gen. It's also a stealth game but clearly Kojima treated this franchise as a shooter instead of a melee action franchise like Devil May Cry.

I am not missing your point at all. I also think that melee along with shooter and other game design elements should be improved in a standard sequel, let alone a next gen one like this one and I feel that it has been.

I am willing to agree to disagree on whether or not it is enough. I am known to trigger many posters here with my high expectations, so I am ok with you expecting more from the melee.
 
By your standard, what is excellent melee combat? Because in my book what hzd has is top notch at all levels (except for the fact that it's open world, I hate the check list nature of these games amd how the objectives present themselves... Points in a map, a list of missions on a menu, but this is all open world games).

Anyway, the game itself looks very nice and it's the best "next gen" I have seen so far.

Those celebrating because Sony has a winner, I would expect the new hellblade game to match this, but it will be darker and probably the environment will not be as lush... One won't cancel the other for sure.

I would certainly hope that both Fable and Hellblade II surpass Horizon. Guerilla is yet to produce a next-gen exclusive.
 

mortal

Gold Member
The hype is off the charts for this one. Hopefully we get a release date trailer at Sony's not-E3 show.
I have doubts Sony are even going to hold their own not-E3 sort of showcase.
Otherwise I assume they would've announced something by now seeing as how June is next week and E3 in a couple weeks from now.

They seem keen on continuing these 1 or 2 title focused SoP streams. They tend to cause a buzz and sweep up mindshare for most of them.
 
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