• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

LTTP: Horizon Zero Dawn, AKA Bore-izon Zero Charm

Grinchy

Banned
Update on 8/20/2020 - I changed my mind a little bit

Let's get some of the good aspects out of the way first. The game looks great. With HDR on a nice 4K TV, this game is quite the looker. It also plays well. I'm a fan of the gameplay itself. Sneaking around and setting up traps to take out hordes of animal machines is satisfying. Hacking them to ride them is satisfying. Leveling up to upgrade skills and all the standard game mechanics are done well.

But, the game is boring as fucking AF. The story is just so bad so far. I'm about 8 hours in or so. The beginning of it where you're being brought up by Rost is done pretty well. Their relationship is interesting and keeps you invested in the early story. Once you break off from him and re-join the rest of the civilization that has shunned you your whole life, it all plummets.

Every person you talk to has nothing but boring shit to say. The lore of the "all-mother" and everything surrounding it with the matriarchs is just devoid of anything interesting. The actors read off the lines in a monotone way that makes the already boring dialog even worse. I've already gotten to the point where I just skip all the dialog and just go around killing things. While this isn't a huge problem, it's just become a pretty Ubisoft map checklist game and that isn't too appealing.

How many times am I realistically going to want to stop on the road to find someone who has a family member that went missing, only to scan the ground for a purple GPS route to slowly walk me across the map to find them? It's the same setup every time.
 
Last edited:

Verdanth

Member
Bought a selection of Playstation Hit games recently (GOW, Detroit and Horizon) and this is the only one that I still haven't played.

Played the other two and saved this one for last, maybe because something tells me it is the worst of the bunch narrative wise.

Also some friends who have similar tastes to mine told me the story indeed sucks balls.

So, not sure when I'm going to play this tbh.
 
Last edited:
I rated it an 8 out of 10 at the time. Not sure if that would now. I probably like Days Gone more and I have it an 8 too.

I think HZD is a good game overall and I was very engrossed in the story. I didn’t have many complaints back when I was playing it.
I thought it was a slow burner, but after a while it really clicked. Amazing graphics, cool story and engrossing combat.
Thunderjaw in a Cauldron? Damn.

EDIT I put a spoiler on that.
 
Last edited:
The story, in the end, makes sense. It's nothing that will blow your mind, but its reasonably good, nontheless.

The machines AI is great as well as the gameplay, which makes combat fun. I cannot say the same about fighting humans, which sucks very badly. The water being like mercury is also an oddity in such a good looking game.

And I specially disliked that the game gives you dialogue options but the personality of Aloy doesn't change at all so it's pointless, exactly the same as in Assassins Creed Odissey.

I would give it 8.5


What I want for a sequel:

- Boss machines

- More variety in scenaries

- Some good plot twist
 
Also, as for the graphics, this was the first game I played on my Pro that I felt really “popped” on my 4K/HDR display. Still looks amazing, imo
 
Last edited:
D

Deleted member 471617

Unconfirmed Member
Personally, Horizon Zero Dawn was an excellent 9.5/10 and my 2017 game of the year. Story starts slow but it ends up being real good and sets up the eventual sequel. Horizon is the only game that I have completed this generation in which I rated the gameplay category a perfect 10/10. So fluid, responsive and an absolute blast to play with so many varying options. Melee combat, bows and arrows, stealth, bombs and traps.

If there was one game in 2017 that was boring with a non-existent story and same old 30 year premise, it was Zelda: BOTW which I quit after 22 hours.
 

Gamernyc78

Banned
Let's get some of the good aspects out of the way first. The game looks great. With HDR on a nice 4K TV, this game is quite the looker. It also plays well. I'm a fan of the gameplay itself. Sneaking around and setting up traps to take out hordes of animal machines is satisfying. Hacking them to ride them is satisfying. Leveling up to upgrade skills and all the standard game mechanics are done well.

But, the game is boring as fucking AF. The story is just so bad so far. I'm about 8 hours in or so. The beginning of it where you're being brought up by Rost is done pretty well. Their relationship is interesting and keeps you invested in the early story. Once you break off from him and re-join the rest of the civilization that has shunned you your whole life, it all plummets.

Every person you talk to has nothing but boring shit to say. The lore of the "all-mother" and everything surrounding it with the matriarchs is just devoid of anything interesting. The actors read off the lines in a monotone way that makes the already boring dialog even worse. I've already gotten to the point where I just skip all the dialog and just go around killing things. While this isn't a huge problem, it's just become a pretty Ubisoft map checklist game and that isn't too appealing.

How many times am I realistically going to want to stop on the road to find someone who has a family member that went missing, only to scan the ground for a purple GPS route to slowly walk me across the map to find them? It's the same setup every time.

It's crazy how ppl are so different. I am glad I am not you as this is my favorite and most fun open world game by far this gen and never got bored. I loved the atmosphere, graphics, the story, combat in general (yes I know the human combat gets talked about bad). The npc convos really didn't bother me and mind you I'm a person tht hated Witcher 3 for all the dialouge. I especially enjoyed finding the archives and hologram recordings of the back story, loved that alot.

I thought the story was great. The "mother" talk was a bit blah though.
 
Last edited:

ZeroGravity

Member
Exploring the ruins of the previous world and discovering the truth of what happened to it was really the only interesting thing going on in that story. Everything else that has to do with the current day tribal society was pretty dull, yeah. The characters and politics of that world were thoroughly uninteresting, and almost every person in the game fell into a handful of archetypes and never really broke out of them.
 

danielberg

Neophyte
One of the only open world games that managed pull off a good and high quality main quest in a open world.
If you are dicking around with the typical side quests you are doing it wrong the main quest is where its at.
 
Last edited:

Hendrick's

If only my penis was as big as my GamerScore!
I hated this game. I appreciated it for the first few hours, but then was quickly bored out of my damn mind. The combat and AI was so much crap.
 
Last edited:

ROMhack

Member
I heard nothing but good things but then I watched some gameplay and it seemed, I dunno, a bit too much like a TV show in the way the cutscenes played out. Didn't seem appealing.

I'll probably get round to it eventually and change my mind.
 
Last edited:

jadefire66

Member
Could never get into this game. Stopped playing 2 hours in and traded it for something else. It was super slow (I'm used to paying fast paced games), boring, obnoxious protagonist and it looked like a generic Ubisoft clone (open world, rpg elements such as skills and crafting etc).
 

Werewolf Jones

Gold Member
Motion capture is amazing and the opening was really good I thought, playing it though makes me hate open world shit. Hate how you get hit once and lose a shit load of health as well.
 

Bolivar687

Banned
I was a huge Guerrilla fan and was similarly let down. It convinced me that voice acting, on a whole, is not good for RPGs, because it slows down information gathering in towns and can be unbearable if you dont like the actor(s). The combat really shows its weaknesses against humans.
 
OP is correct about NPCs. Many of them are god awful and soil the experience. Fortunately the game allows you to hard click through all of them and skip everything.

Otherwise I can’t say I agree with the criticisms, but that’s just me. I still prefer my time with it over BotW.
 

Pallas

Member
I have the digital complete version with the dlc. I haven’t gotten around to playing it but I’ve heard mixed results, it’s one of those you’ll either love it or hate it kind of games I think.

So edgy. Time for console warriors and trolls to flock to the title...

How is it edgy? It’s just OP’s opinion on a game.
 

xviper

Member
The game is simply a Far Cry rip-off done right, i enjoyed it a lot, i think it's Sony's best new IP of the generation.
 

Iced Arcade

Member
This actually reminds me to go back to this game. Stopped playing around the 7 hour mark when spider-man came out.

Thanks op
 

Zannegan

Member
That's a bit harsh. It may be a little paint-by-numbers and squander some of the potential of its interesting setting by being too restrictive/linear (an open-world game where there's only one way to go from A to B? Yuck), but the combat is interesting and the moment-to-moment gameplay is enjoyable. A little less of that Uncharted auto-platforming in the sequel and at least a mode where your arrows drop over distance, will have me down for a sequel. The creature designs were fantastic too.

Somewhat off-topic: I'd like to see a de-make that turns this into a turn-based party RPG. The same weak point/RPS bonus damage mechanics would work well in that context, and the world is certainly suited.
 
Last edited:

Fbh

Member
I really liked it.
It's a fairly standard modern open world as far as structure goes but I really liked the world, from the mech animals to the ruins of the old world and the whole deal with the tribes, I thought it was a really unique and fun setting

Combat was above average for a game like this, it was fun, had pretty good weapon variety and some tense and fun battles against the larger creatures.

And while the story isn't some amazing masterpiece I enjoyed it. I had fun finding about the past and what happened and the game did a good job at giving a decent explanation for it all which is more than you get in a ton of fantasy/sci fi games and TV shows

And it still looks absolutely amazing.

It wasn't a 10/10 must play masterpiece but I'd say a solid 8.5
 
Last edited:
I bought it but haven't played it yet.

I just wanted to pop in and say that Days Gone is fantastic. You explore the gorgeous forests of washington state, with acres of tall pine trees, frequent rain, all plant life blowing in the wind the whole time. The main character is interesting and likable. The gameplay emphasizes stealth and survival style item management.

It is more of the same open world dime a dozen quest design, but I am thoroughly enjoying it and want a sequel. The reviews were wrong. Rock solid 8 out of 10.
 

Pidull

Member
The game looked gorgeous, it played pretty well when fighting enemies, but I'm with you it is bore-fest. You describe the banality of the gameplay well, right down to the awful character voicing. Maybe my issue is that the quests pale in comparison to The Witcher 3's quests, yet I'm doing the same damn thing (following highlighted points on my map to a destination).

I couldn't quite pinpoint why the game didn't do anything for me other than "it was boring." Now I have a better understanding of why.
 
Top Bottom