Poll
Horizon Zero Dawn vs Mass Effect: Andromeda - Which game was better? (511 votes)
Horizon Zero Dawn 95%
Mass Effect: Andromeda 5%
I have hyped both of these titles ever since they were both announced at E3 2015. Having finally played through both games, I would like to express which one I enjoyed more, and to see what you guys think of both games.
As a Mass Effect fan, you might be surprised to hear my answer: I liked Horizon better. Andromeda's writing was mediocre at best, and launched with a slew of issues. While I like SOME of it's characters like Drack and Vetra, there's also a few that I wasn't fond off, biggest example being Liam. Gameplay was fine, but the story is where Mass Effect is supposed to shine, and BioWare failed to deliver. It was still an enjoyable experience, but in the end I was let down by the game.
Horizon on the other hand was an amazing title from start to finish. The world looked beautiful, the gameplay didn't bore me and I wasn't expecting Aloy to be the great protagonist that she was. The main story did lack depth, but the various activities still led me to invest 50 hours into it. A must-own for PS4 owners, no doubt about that.
So, what do you guys think? Mass Effect or Horizon?
Uhm.. Are there really anyone out there who liked Andromeda better? I'm a huge ME fan as well but Andromeda bored me so much that I jumped off of it after the second planet. Incredibly mediocre. Horizon on the other hand I found had a lot of great things going for it, amazing visuals, neat protagonist, interesting story that explains itself well, and i also liked the gameplay a lot. No contest for me.
I enjoyed my time with both, but I'd easily put horizon over andromeda. The former has tons of polish, tight gameplay and is probably one of the best looking games I've ever seen, while the latter is well known for being a disappointment.
Edit: Oh (small tangent here), regardless of the execution of it, I'm getting seriously tired of the open world design. I knew Horizon was that kind of game from the beginning, but when I watched the ME quick look I got very bummed to see it leaked in their as well. When it comes down to it it's just a big empty space with small areas of interest and trigger points for the next narrative area. My time is straight up wasted when I have to spend 5 minutes driving/running through nothing to finally get where I'm going. I had my Skyrim moment 6 years ago, I don't need every game trying to recreate that constantly. Persona 5 is a godsend right now.
@flashflood_29: It's just that I thought both games were being hyped as much as I was hyping them. In the end, one game was great, the other was sadly mediocre.
@benoski: Gotcha. Yeah, hype was big pre-release for both. Not sure how you avoided all the ME hate post-release. Some people were getting legit getting annoyed because of the amount of unavoidable backlash against ME.
I'd say horizon is a better game, but I enjoyed mass effect more because the game itself interests me more. They're both open world games, and I'm not feeling very into that genre lately. Mass effect has the benefit of being a mass effect game which made me want to play it. Horizon is just an open world game. Granted a very well done one, and I might play and enjoy it at a later time when I'm not burned out on that specific style. If anyone were to ask me for a recommendation though I would recommend horizon simply because its the better game for the average player.
Well objectively Horizon is better made in just about every way.
I didn't like Horizon, it was just another one of those open world games in a post Far Cry 3 world. It got more of my attention than Andromeda every will though.
@benoski: Personally I think Horizon isn't as great as a lot of people make it out to be. It's an amazing debut thats for sure, but there are a lot of rough edges to it. Andromeda does something a lot worse - instead of swinging for the fences and missing but showing potential for greatness, it's this weirdly mediocre sequel that is plagued by a lot of technical issues. Opinions will vary but I think it's probably better to go for it and fail along the way than play it safe and release something that doesn't stir up strong feelings one way or another. Of course from a business side of things it's probably a lot better to get a "safe" product out there that will make back it's production costs than a massive failure which will look bad to stockholders but it is what it is.
I enjoyed Mass Effect Andromeda more than the majority, but this is still not even close. Horizon is a GOTY contender as far as I'm concerned, and an exciting new IP I can't wait to see more of (via both DLC and sequels). Even though I enjoyed Andromeda, it's still the weakest game in the series by far, and currently fourth on my current GOTY list (of the 4 new games I've played this year) behind Horizon, Zelda, and Persona.
Horizon is so good a friend put a lot of effort to stream it for me personally. It is bloody fantastic and a lot of people did not expect it to be that good, myself included.
On the other hand I already forgot about Andromeda. From what I've remember it's not that of a bad game but a very unnecessary addition to the franchise.
Oh, Horizon all the way. Look, I'll admit it... I learned to like Andromeda by the end. Well, like it in a sado-masochistic way. The writing is terrible, the majority of characters are dull, the story is rubbish, the Kett are a poor man's Yuuzhan Vong (and those were just a poor man's organic Borg), the setting is surprisingly empty feeling in a whole host of ways literal and metaphorical, the game is still filled with a litany of embarrassingly common bugs (though now they're mostly cosmetic, like invisible booze cups and characters hovering above the world / enemies falling from the sky to their places), the world maps are stunningly empty of actual quest content, and most of the content you do have is poorly made checklist side-quest fluff on big, lifeless planets that you're forced to traverse with the game's equivalent of the Mako (though now it at least handles like the Batmobile from Arkham Knight). This game is such a dud in so many ways...
... but then, if you're lucky, something clicks and you realize you're in a Mystery Science Theatre 3000 episode with surprisingly competent combat. You're wandering around a city of mannequins that bob their heads like they're talking, but you hear nothing but a barely perceptible audio file of two people murmuring that is somehow supposed to represent the bustle of an ENTIRE CITY OF PEOPLE. Then you see the same patrol guard walk the same route past you that he always does, only to warp back to the start and repeat his patrol because I guess he really enjoys this part of his day. As this all happens, you realize that this place has no music playing whatsoever. None, just like your ship and so many other locations in the game. It's so sloppy, so unpolished, and somehow so hilarious. You get an email and decide to check it out, so of course you have to run all the way back to your ship, take off into orbit, and then can look at your email. Emails don't work on planetary surfaces. Everyone knows this.
I'll never forget Mass Effect: Andromeda, and I mean that with some degree of hostility-laced affection. There's something emotionally compelling about seeing every other alien race and Initiative operative flying space vessels around a planet while I, the great and almighty Pathfinder, have to drive a $&##ing dune buggy. Emotionally compelling in a grating, obnoxious way that made me laugh. There's also something amazing about realizing that all the Remnant, Kett, and Initiative buildings spread out on these open worlds to provide content are the same prefabricated structures repeated forever. This is a No Man's Sky level of building variety... in a 40 million dollar, five year development game. It's something, man.
Oh, and gems like this: they apparently altered the terrain on Eos to create a pathway for the Nomad to drive up. They apparently never went back to see if the alteration would wind up looking stupid, though.
Ramble ramble ramble. Point is, I learned to like Mass Effect: Andromeda once I severely lowered my standards and accepted that I'd be laughing at it and not with it. Meanwhile, I loved Horizon: Zero Dawn from the start and still do. It's a technically sound, beautiful, incredibly well-written, finely polished gem with a stellar combat system. Aloy has a name equally as dumb as Ruff Ryder the Pathfinder, but she's a personable outsider whose equal opportunity snark is rather endearing (I enjoyed her questioning a Sun-Priest's patriarchal society in one conversation, and then subverting my expectations in a conversation with a Nora All-Mother Priestess by poking fun at the Nora matriarchy for basing governance qualifications on number of offspring. Aloy seemingly understands that both are asinine positions, and both elders treat her like she's a bumpkin from the hills and dismiss her commentary in gloriously off-handed fashions. It's great). I admittedly have less stories to tell about Horizon: Zero Dawn than Mass Effect: Andromeda, but they're all positive stories about how awesome that game is. My prolific tales about Mass Effect: Andromeda are very different indeed (an Asari asked me to help scan dead bodies. I agreed to help, and the game vomited five more "drive over here and scan this" icons on my map. Riveting content, this. Since these icons were the same basic concept as the minerals, plants, and alien tech icons already on there... I decided that Mass Effect: Andromeda had equated murder victim corpses with rocks and turnips and chuckled in exasperation).
I've not played Horizon but I am enjoying Andromeda. 46 hours and counting. It is not as good as I had hoped mostly because they made a different kind of game. They made an open world game instead of a linear one. It is however not at all as bad as people say. I have not played a game as much since Withcer 3.
I think the real vs. match should be between either Nioh or Persona 5.
Personally I was incredibly disappointed with both Horizon and Andromeda. I'm a huge fan of the Original Trilogy and seeing what Andromeda ended up being was heartbreaking.
As for Horizon Zero dawn; it is without a doubt one of the most beautiful games from an artistic and technical level I've ever played. Lots of attention to detail. But the story, game play and repetitive open world formula wore me out pretty quick and I walked away pretty soon after racing around the whole map. I think it does the best it can with the open world shtick... but after years of those games I just cant do it anymore.
@junkerman: i havent spoiled myself, but jeff seemed to hint horizon's story goes places and is a good sci fi yarn; it seemed to be the part that impressed him most. probably not worth it still if you dislike most everything else.
Unnecessary comparison of two games. Rather, Horizon should almost be a lesson on how to make open world games interesting and do them right while Andromeda is an example of what not to do.
Horizon but I will say I'm not as in love with it as others are. I'm pretty bored with it at the moment as it's really boiler plate open world design with B+ combat. There are a lot of little negative quirks around the game, but it works as intended--I'm even playing on the hard difficulty as it was said that would make the combat more exciting.
Well for me ME because the combat in Horizon is just shooting at bulletsponges and apart from that and the superior graphics the games are very similar with a horde of generic junk quests with bad dialogue and face anmimation.
If Horizon carried on like it opened however it would probably have been the best game ever.
Well for me ME because the combat in Horizon is just shooting at bulletsponges and apart from that and the superior graphics the games are very similar with a horde of generic junk quests with bad dialogue and face anmimation.
"Horizon is just shooting at bulletsponges" - way false. There are a ton of options at any given time, and decisions you have to make in combat, especially midway thru the game, that I haven't experienced in other open-world games.
"Games are very similar" - As far as open-world games, well sure.
"Horde of generic junk quests" - Wellll...Horizon makes way more of an effort here.
"Bad dialogue" - Again, way more effort on Horizon's part. Conversations are more natural. the writing is a lot less cringe-worthy, and the character's role in the world is better understood and better utilized.
"Bad face animation" - Horizon is miles beyond ME:A here.
As for the combat the only descisions i made was avoiding combat as much as possible because its a pain to grind back your hp if you get stuck and hit by some glitchy attack. If you are fighting one of the bullet sponge enemies you have to farm back your ammo aswell. Andromedas combat aint much better but at least you dont have that problem.
The last thing i did in Horizon before abandoning it was fighting a huge bird and loading arrows into it for 10min until it got stuck under ground and i wasnt able to reach it anymore.
@rethla: Fair enough. I won't say the combat in Horizon isn't glitchy. Once you get to override everything you can kind of bypass a lot of the combat which I was definitely sick of 20 hours in...I just think it gives you a lot of options even before that, to mitigate the "bulletspongyness". I still agree with Jeff's review, It's a 5-star game that has a lot of imperfections, and requires way more combat than it should (like most long games!)
As for the combat the only descisions i made was avoiding combat as much as possible because its a pain to grind back your hp if you get stuck and hit by some glitchy attack. If you are fighting one of the bullet sponge enemies you have to farm back your ammo aswell. Andromedas combat aint much better but at least you dont have that problem.
The last thing i did in Horizon before abandoning it was fighting a huge bird and loading arrows into it for 10min until it got stuck under ground and i wasnt able to reach it anymore.
Did you even try to engage with the combat mechanics? Horizon's combat is about precision and preparation. Knock out the enemy's best weapons and target their weak points with the appropriate arrow type. Lay down traps or tie them down.
You talk about bullet sponges but this actually applies way more to Mass Effect enemies. From all the videos on this site I've seen the combat just looks like a complete unfocused clusterfuck of boring dudes in loose arenas where you can't dig into any depth or think of any strategy. Just shoot and trigger you powers in this loose mess and you win I guess. Seems like a huge step back from ME2-3.
@pyrodactyl: There is no enemy that takes 10min+ to kill in Andromeda. I engaged with pretty much all the combat mechanics.
Precision and preparation is fun the first 10 times but when you have to fight the same enemy 100 times when traveling between two areas its not rewarding going through all that, Then you find out the bigger enemies doesnt require any different tactics or approach they just have more hp, alot more... then you get a quest to kill 5 more of those...
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