Horizon Zero Dawn

[Mr Do 71]

EDGE 10 

[Stanley]

Really? 

[Mr Do 71]

1 minute ago, Stanley said:

Really? 

 

Of course not, I was taking the piss 

[Stanley]

[Vemsie]

Pretty meaty preview here:

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/01/four-hours-of-horizon-zero-dawn-made-me-crazy-with-anticipation-for-more/

Gamespot has a video preview (might be too spoilery for some):

http://www.gamespot.com/videos/horizon-zero-dawn-how-it-feels-to-slay-robots-in-t/2300-6436878/

https://blog.eu.playstation.com/2017/01/30/19-new-things-we-discovered-from-playing-horizon-zero-dawn/

Eurogamer:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-01-30-can-horizon-zero-dawn-really-be-a-aaa-game-without-cynicism

 

Quote

During my hands-on session, I played the first three main missions of the campaign, with a few side quests thrown in, before skipping ahead in the story (apparently to avoid spoilers) and being let loose on the open world to explore some of the Nora homelands. It's never an ideal way to get a feel for the rhythm of an open-world RPG, but it was just enough to get an idea of the story that Guerilla is trying to tell with Aloy - a story that is surprisingly compelling, despite the fact that many fans feel they've already got the main narrative beats pegged a mile off.

It's difficult to get a sense of how deep the various systems go - and, in the end, the execution of these is what a game like this lives or dies on. Early impressions are encouraging, however. There's something innately satisfying about trawling the wilderness, tools in hand, and surviving, and then thriving. There's nothing hugely new here; fragments of games like Mass Effect, the rebooted Tomb Raider, Assassin's Creed, The Witcher 3 and Far Cry Primal spring to mind. But Horizon does seem to deliver them in a voice that is uniquely its own. Plus, robot dinosaurs are just cool, aren't they?

It's a gorgeous game and the world and combat look quite fun, but I'll probably stick to Nioh before the Switch hits. If it's less Far Cry than I fear, I might bite later.

Also, Decima seems one hell of an engine. Bodes well for Death Stranding.

[Wiper]

2 hours ago, Majora said:

I'll just leave this here:

 

 

 

Oh dear. And not just the voice acting that's the problem there, either.

[Talk Show Host]

The game looks great and the premise sounds interesting. But what is up with the hud? It takes too much space and it is too close to the centre of the screen. How do professional developers miss these things? I hope there is a setting to move it closer to the screen edges.

Edit: just saw another video and the hud looks normal, so there is a setting. [emoji14]

[boybrown]

just watched a few "lets play" type vids from various outlets. Looks very good. I'm either getting this, Mass Effect & Nier Automata in March or a Switch with Zelda.

Keep on flip flopping 

[Yewone]

Not feeling the love for this at all. Watched the EZA preview and it really does just look like another generic open world action game.

As feared the structure seems to just scream Ubisoft, with a map filled with collectibles, camps and towers. 

 

No doubt about it, visually it looks stunning. But I do think that once you've tamed your first couple of robodino's and climbed the first few vantage points the repetition will soon set in.

 

Obviously hope I'm wrong but just feels like this gaming formula has been done to death, with this title not really bringing anything new to the table.

[Opinionated Ham Scarecrow]

It looks exactly like a Far Cry game with future cave people. Messy map janitor simulator 7.

 

I'll love it.

[Gorf King]

13 minutes ago, U-1 said:

Not feeling the love for this at all. Watched the EZA preview and it really does just look like another generic open world action game.

As feared the structure seems to just scream Ubisoft, with a map filled with collectibles, camps and towers. 

 

No doubt about it, visually it looks stunning. But I do think that once you've tamed your first couple of robodino's and climbed the first few vantage points the repetition will soon set in.

 

Obviously hope I'm wrong but just feels like this gaming formula has been done to death, with this title not really bringing anything new to the table.

 

Yup, I watched one gameplay video and it gave me that feeling of Far Cry Primal so strongly it put me off the title altogether. Not that FCP was a bad game - it wasn't - but it all felt done to death. Taming and riding a sabretooth and chucking spears at stuff is great fun the first few times, but it wears thin after a while even if you reskin the ride and weapons so they're a bit more futuristic. The HUD and mass of icons swimming in front of your eyes look like Ubisoft turned up to 11 too. Just way too fussy and cluttered.

 

I wish someone would use one of these swish new graphics engines to make a game that's actually new for a change. Or just one that's best in class. Impressions of this so far scream mediocrity to me.

[macosx]

Same here, I watched the EZA preview and it just looks like Far Cry Primal through another lens. Enthusiasm dampened, especially with that excruciatingly bad voice work.

Beautiful art direction though.

[Vemsie]

36 minutes ago, Gorf King said:

 

Yup, I watched one gameplay video and it gave me that feeling of Far Cry Primal so strongly it put me off the title altogether. Not that FCP was a bad game - it wasn't - but it all felt done to death. Taming and riding a sabretooth and chucking spears at stuff is great fun the first few times, but it wears thin after a while even if you reskin the ride and weapons so they're a bit more futuristic. The HUD and mass of icons swimming in front of your eyes look like Ubisoft turned up to 11 too. Just way too fussy and cluttered.

 

I wish someone would use one of these swish new graphics engines to make a game that's actually new for a change. Or just one that's best in class. Impressions of this so far scream mediocrity to me.

Death Stranding uses this engine, so there's that.

As for the HUD, it's customizable.
 

 

[Vemsie]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/31/horizon-zero-dawn-the-feminist-action-game-weve-been-waiting-for

[JoeK]

29 minutes ago, Vemsie said:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/31/horizon-zero-dawn-the-feminist-action-game-weve-been-waiting-for

 

Well, that makes me more interested again

[HarryBizzle]

On 30/01/2017 at 17:16, Majora said:

I'll just leave this here:

 

 

 

 

I'm dying with laughter, here. What the hell is this?

[Mr Do 71]

1 minute ago, HarryBizzle said:

 

 

I'm dying with laughter, here. What the hell is this?

 

New series coming soon to CBS Action!!!!!11

[Majora]

It kind of blows my mind that anyone involved with the game would think that performance was acceptable. The 'can't you see I need time to think' delivery in particular is laughable. 

 

Dodgy voice acting and script aside, I'd have to agree that I'm not particularly enthused by what I've seen from the game. The environments do look great and the combat looks slick but the whole package doesn't look that exciting. 

 

I'm seeing a lot of comparisons being drawn between this and Zelda on Neogaf, and I can see some similarities, but even speaking as a bit of a Zelda fanboy it looks far more interesting to me. While you can see a lot of influences from Western open world games in Breath of the Wild, the emphasis on environmental interaction and the way you can climb anything in the world and then glide across huge chunks of the landscape really makes that look fresh in a way that this doesn't. 

 

I'm still vaguely interested but I'm expecting something solid and competent at best rather than a must play title. 

[HarryBizzle]

Aloy is also possibly the worst name ever dreamt up and it just gets stupider the more you think about it.

[Harrisown]

I dunno. I've watched a few things of it now and I can't get even slightly excited.

i'll give this one a miss.

Metacritic - 83

 

roll on Mass Effect.

[Harsin]

Guerrilla have yet to make a game that's above average (in my opinion) so I'm firmly in the wait and see camp.

[mdn2]

Yeah, it seems incredibly generic to me. Incredibly pretty, but dull as dishwasher. In fact, I could see this being similar with people's opinions to The Order: 1886 when it's released. 

Zelda, Nioh and Nier are all released around the same time and are far more interesting to me. 

[Opinionated Ham Scarecrow]

8 hours ago, HarryBizzle said:

Aloy is also possibly the worst name ever dreamt up and it just gets stupider the more you think about it.

 

The title of the game is up there too.

[Broker]

It looks like all Guerilla's other games, interesting enough and very pretty but even in their trailers designed to show it off it looks boring to play. Their games consistently feel like huge missed opportunities.

[Opinionated Ham Scarecrow]

I'm still willing to give it the benefit of the doubt until word of mouth and reviews hit, because I love open worlds and post-apocalypse stuff. If you can tone down the HUD and map clutter then I still think there's a game I could enjoy a lot here.

 

That title though. It's like they couldn't pick one, so went with both.

[Broker]

10 hours ago, Vemsie said:

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/31/horizon-zero-dawn-the-feminist-action-game-weve-been-waiting-for

 

That is a really exciting preview.

[gooner4life]

I'm day 1 for this

[Pob]

If the story, characters and script are being hailed as the best things about this then, judging by the trailers I've seen, it needs to be given a wide berth.

[macosx]

go read the first part of the Guardian puff piece.

 

then watch the gif 

 

lol

[Vemsie]

50 minutes ago, macosx said:

go read the first part of the Guardian puff piece.

 

then watch the gif 

 

lol

To be fair, they played 4-5 hours. That gif of the scene with the mentally ill guy seems to be taken out of context to fit a narrative.
It's not just The Guardian either. EG had this to say:
 

Quote

 It's never an ideal way to get a feel for the rhythm of an open-world RPG, but it was just enough to get an idea of the story that Guerilla is trying to tell with Aloy - a story that is surprisingly compelling, despite the fact that many fans feel they've already got the main narrative beats pegged a mile off.

Sad as it is, non-sexualized female leads (as well as the black characters the game also has) are still a rarity in gaming, so I agree with The Guardian that it's something to be applauded, especially if it also touches upon things like LGBT in this era of Breitbart, Gamergate and Trump. Whether they pull it off is another thing, but at least they're trying. Something that you probably can't say about Zelda. And it's a new IP too, which is nice in an industry dominated by sequels. Also, stuff like this:
 

Quote

There’s a moment here where the concept of the game clicks into place. Aloy discovers what can only be described as a wearable smartphone from the future, which eventually becomes one of the many aspects that sets her apart from the other characters of Horizon. With some trepidation, she fixes it on her ear and is presented with a holographic video recording of a man wishing his son a remote happy birthday. Aloy mimics his words, clearly feeling an urgent need to be part of a family. It’s a very moving and emotionally complicated moment.

Later you watch her experiment with the newfound tech, scrolling through screens that mean nothing to her, but that players themselves will recognise as settings menus and volume controls. It’s just one of many touching human moments that litter the game.

sounds pretty interesting and seems to be one of the big differentiators when compared to Ubi games like Far Cry. Instead of pointless collectibles, there seems to be lore that fleshes out the world and characters. In that respect it's more Witcher 3 than Far Cry Primal. 

I get the comparisons to Zelda; they're both open world, they both have a pretty dynamic approach to combat (an aspect of Horizon that gets a fair bit of praise and distinguishes itself from the often poor combat in western RPGs), they both have dungeons (called Cauldrons in Horizon) and they both have Ubi towers. The main difference seems to be that Zelda has deeper systems with more environmental interaction, whereas Horizon is more focused on story, characters and world bulding. The latter is more of an RPG basically.

I'm not really high on open world games (I much prefer the Soulsborne approach to level design, combat and lore), so if I had to choose, I'd probably pick Zelda as its systems seem more appealing to me, but I think Horizon will be quite a bit better than people on here seem to think. We'll see.