After beating the Final Fantasy XII HD remaster in the first week of September I decided I'd take my sweet time and savor the next game I played. The grinding and fast-forwarding was pleasant and nostalgic but after so many hours I was ready for the open world action RPG gameplay that Horizon: Zero Dawn had been promising for months. Not too long after finishing the tutorial aka "The Proving" Horizon sets you off on a vague adventure to rid the world of its problems. Without cranking up the difficulty beyond Normal I quickly realized that the games difficulty was more or less artificial once you'd acquired all weapon types and had a little practice with each type of machine. Your 'Focus' and spear give such an upper hand against human opponents it becomes comical. But I'm honestly not here to review the game, or giggle about how easy it can be... My experience with Horizon was easygoing, casual, and the thrill of exploration never wore off across 50+ hours because the game is ceaselessly beautiful. So, here are some pictures and thoughts on how I spent my September evenings, chillfully scrambling and rolling my way through this robot-manufacted post-Earth terrarium. Was playing on a PS4 Pro so the images are in 4K but won't necessarily reflect the HDR settings I had applied when taking the screenshots. Spoilers everywhere.
This was my first adventure in photo mode, I believe after liberating my first camp. The adorable hearts were hard to say no to. I typically chose expressive levitation for Aloy's poses because it conveyed her 'truth' in a world of lies. Being that is was night-time I felt this photo pointed towards the dark journey that Aloy would soon be encountering. From countless murders, to robotic overlord powers, to Hades himself, darker days are to come.Here we are atop a peak overlooking what I think was the first area after leaving Nora territory. I thought I had done a photo-mode thingy atop the highest peak in the game but since that one was lost, this will have to do. Much like Far Cry 4 the boundaries of your questing are mountainous, so below a certain altitude you are free to roam. This was probably the point when I realized not only how big the game was but how Guerrilla had nailed the scope and the scale of the game. It never feels empty or 'safe' beyond the Nora hunting grounds and the challenge of enemies and traversal really peaks around your discovery of Meridian and the deeper corners of the map. Also: I did a lot of the weapon tutorials, which while it might have seemed pointless, I became a lot more proficient with each weapon type and elemental effects in doing so. Knowing when to use Ice, Bolt or Fire can make the bigger machines much easier to take down. In one quest on the far West end of the map you're asked to figure out who was stealing fruit and why. As I was trailing discarded fruits with my handy Focus I came across this cob of corn. You see, corn being labeled as a fruit seemed like a hilarious thing until I did some hardcore fuckin' corn research and learned that corn is technically a fruit, a vegetable and a grain depending on what part of the life cycle you're in. It best meets criteria for a fruit. This was probably the most earth-shattering revelation of 2017 for me besides: The slow destruction of the world around me by reckless controlling billionaires intent on chaos and mayhem. Meridian is one of my favorite locales in a video game in recent memory. It is so overly designed and ornate that it perfectly expresses the 'science fiction tribalism' that Horizon is going for beyond the other cities within the worlds boundaries. It was somewhat of a shame that the plot only barely thickens within the city while big revelations are left to cavern and facility exploration and audio logs. It is a necessary thing but I had hoped for more people to help within the city itself. I felt like the bent palm and the corkscrew tower in the background offered a contrast in both geometrics and life vs. machine conflicts. Also there is another bent palm in the distance if you look to the group of palms at the bottom right of the base of the screw-lookin' tower. I didn't really take the time to re-listen to these audio-visual logs that were set at lookout points but it appeared to be folks documenting the world's end as well as the machine's maker lamenting his world ending actions. These were completely under-used as collectibles in the game and I loved seeing pre-apocalypse Colorado and comparing it its post-apocalyptic future. It sucks that in 2017 I'm still playing open world games that rely on found recordings to convey complex plots. I see the necessity of it in Horizon because the past had literally been deleted by the guy who created the machines that would end humanity... but it still feels like audio logs have stayed around longer than other terrible trends like QTEs and 3D Sonic the Hedgehog games.I'm wearing my magical future/post-future/past armor that deflects all damage and I'm levitating in front of Meridian after completing the game. I'm basking in the glow of Summer's end while I'm floating. I was trying to be minimalistic in my photo-mode tampering this time as to fully capture the simply joy that came from completing the main story. I still had a lot of hunting grounds challenges and all that to do, but I'm completely comfortable with not getting the platinum trophy for this game. Exploration is more fun than combat in Horizon, by far. It felt a lot like Tomb Raider's reboots but with better traversal and weapons options, superior enemy types, and Far Cry 3's world/skill tree. The other 13% of the game seems to be hunting challenges, perhaps a few side quests, hidden activities, and item acquisition. I think across my time with the game I milked it for all the good times I could get and the hunting challenges are quite frustrating timed affairs that reward you with weapons and gear that are largely pointless considering that beating the game is a small challenge. You're tasked with defeating two Deathbringers, who appear in staggered timing while a few groups of enemies show up including two Corruptors. It is easy if you've learned to use all of the traps, tripwires, and arrow types you've found up to this point. Tear and fire arrows are incredibly helpful.
And that's it. 53 hours later I'm done with this game. The story was perhaps better than comparable games like Tomb Raider/Rise of the Tomb Raider and Far Cry 3 but Aloy was robotic, asexual, and purely interested in justice above all else. She is the anti-Geralt and perhaps too wooden to warrant another starring role, though when I was able to choose her heart over her head in dialogue options she came across like a fully decent human being. The game is incredibly beautiful, too. Anyhow, I'll likely fully review the game this coming week even though I think a quick little photo safari is all the game needs to sell its value.
Next up is Dishonored: Definitive Edition for PS4, a game I never finished on PS3 but am quickly discovering great love for and of.
