Horizon: Zero Dawn

[Executor]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Now on to the final battle.

The lead up to it... epic.

(Made me wonder how that lead up would have looked like if I did not complete any or only a very few side quests along the way.)

[IHateDuke32]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

TLoU Part is definitely my favorite PS4 game. After that, it’s either Horizon or Days Gone. I told my wife our next dog would be a female named Aloy. She didn’t buy it, but I won’t give up the fight!

I downloaded this to my PS5 a week ago and badly want to replay it before Forbidden West comes out. I started a New Game + and didn’t play too long. As much as I absolutely love this game...I’m praying for a 60fps update lol. Maybe I’m just spoiled with the new consoles but it’s so hard to go back to 30fps.

[Executor]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

More than one month now since I finished the game.

The final battle was more grind than epic, really pushed me to the limit, especially health-wise, but surprisingly I only died twice during that.

The final cinematics were great as usual.

Overall I spent about 113 hours on this game. Finished all but two quests (one being the Frozen Wilds expansion), cleared 3 out of 4 cauldrons, found all Banuk figures and ancient vessels and all but one vintage point. Missed on many hidden documents or datapoints, though. The only thing I did not do was Hunting Grounds (finished 1 of 5) because they were too much for my stick skills.

Definitely a masterpiece from start to finish. The story is epic, and while the battles with machines and sometimes humans are cool, uncovering the story and what Zero Dawn actually is, is where the game truly shines. Gave me creeps way more than once, too.

Graphics are awesome, especially in mountain areas. Characters / NPCs were mostly ok, with some memorable ones (Erend, for example).

Quests were fun, even the small ones, and though they may have a feel of rinse-and-repeat, an overwhelming majority of those were well thought out, with interesting, and sometimes funny, plots.

Gameplay and controls were also great, especially once I learned what I am actually doing.

Spoiler

Just about the only thing I did not like was that once I finished the main story, and the credits stopped rolling, the game put me back in the game before the final battle (timeline-wise), while I expected to just be able to roam free wherever and however long I want, doing whatever I have left on the map (final cauldron, Frozen Wilds etc.) without the shadow of the battle looming over me again. I do not know if that's how open world games generally work, but I definitely did not expect that and it was a significant immersion killer.

I have yet to play Frozen Wilds and decided to walk away from the game for now and come back shortly before I get PS5 and Horizon Forbidden West, whenever that might be.

Overall, though... AMAZING. Hope they don't overthink it and kill Forbidden West with some unnecessary bull***t because this might be the series for the ages.

9.2/10

[KSUowls]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

I held off on getting the PC port originally after all the announced problems with it.

It's $30 right now on Steam though, and there have been several patches to clean things up. I've been playing for a couple of hours today, and I haven't noticed any crashes or abnormalities. This is the same experience that I had from when I first played this game a few years ago on ps4.

[georgiafan]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

PS5 60FPS patch is out now

[illwill10]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

I'm seeing reports of a potential remake/remaster of Horizon Zero Dawn. I don't think that's necessary. This game came out 5 years ago and sequel came out 7 months ago. Similarly to the Last of Us, but least that the remaster was very early in the PS4 cycle and also a way to promote the new TV series lol.

Even though there are a few games I would love to see a remake/remaster, I do wonder when they phase of remakes/remasters will die down. Yeah, I would love a Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4 remake. But in general, this overall focus on remasters and remakes does need to die down a little. I don't think games from Ps4 generation really need a remake. Most of those games hold well enough that even a remaster isn't really necessary other than another way to profit off the game

[KSUowls]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Completely agree.

I love HZD, but this industry norm of just remastering everything needs to stop.


If you really want to remaster something, find an old SNES game and remake it with modern graphics. HZD already had some of the most amazing graphics for a console game. It's really not necessary.

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[illwill10]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Completely agree.

I love HZD, but this industry norm of just remastering everything needs to stop.


If you really want to remaster something, find an old SNES game and remake it with modern graphics. HZD already had some of the most amazing graphics for a console game. It's really not necessary.

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Almost feels like how Disney is trying to make all the classics into live action movies, it isn't all necessary lol.

Like I said, most PS4/XB1 games don't really need a remake or remaster. I swore I heard before the Last of Us remake they were debating whether to remake Uncharted instead, but chose Last of Us. Even Uncharted would've been unnecessary because the Nate Drake Collection was a remaster of the first 3 games. While Last of US remake definitely looked great, most probably felt it looked like Last of Us Part 2. That's what most will feel like HZD would probably look like HFW.

That industry norm definitely needs to die down. If they really want too, then at least go back to the PS3 era and prior. Go for a classic game that isn't easily accessible unless you have original consoles. Like Metal Gear Solid. Or go for games that would really benefit with next gen consoles in mind.

[IHateDuke32]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Yea I don’t get this at all. Didn’t they patch ZD to run at 60fps on PS5 already? Sony has been giving me really weird vibes this gen as opposed to PS4 which I loved the entire time. Granted we’re still barely approaching year 2 of the new generation, but this whole need to remaster or remake games that don’t necessarily need it is just weird.

[JoshC1977]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

I'm seeing reports of a potential remake/remaster of Horizon Zero Dawn. I don't think that's necessary. This game came out 5 years ago and sequel came out 7 months ago. Similarly to the Last of Us, but least that the remaster was very early in the PS4 cycle and also a way to promote the new TV series lol.

Even though there are a few games I would love to see a remake/remaster, I do wonder when they phase of remakes/remasters will die down. Yeah, I would love a Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4 remake. But in general, this overall focus on remasters and remakes does need to die down a little. I don't think games from Ps4 generation really need a remake. Most of those games hold well enough that even a remaster isn't really necessary other than another way to profit off the game

Focusing on HZD to start. I literally played through the whole game back in Jan/Feb (first time I completed it). It was beautiful and ran wonderfully. Then we go into HFW - definitely a visual upgrade, definitely improved upon the feel of conversations and the physical acting/screen angles. Digital foundry touched on this in one of their vids:

https://youtu.be/AtTLrfdchoo?t=1373

Does HZD NEED a remaster? No. Are there elements of the game that are somewhat dated outside of visuals, I would argue yes. If they could bring the same degree of improved character interactions and so on, it would add a lot of life to the game (I honestly found myself nearly nodding off during many conversations in HZD; but in HFW, they kept me a lot more engaged). But, if the remaster is nothing more than an up-scaling of graphics...I'm not sure it is worth it.

Looking more broadly, I don't mind remasters at a high level - but this whole concept of remastering of one-generation old games...it's a bit much. As a strict playstation guy - I would really like to see stuff brought forward to PS5 that was never brought forward to the PS4 (cough...FFXIII...cough) instead of this re-hashing of PS3 games that got PS4 remasters and then PS5 remasters.

But as long as we gamers continue to buy them, they will continue to be a thing...

[illwill10]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Yea I don’t get this at all. Didn’t they patch ZD to run at 60fps on PS5 already? Sony has been giving me really weird vibes this gen as opposed to PS4 which I loved the entire time. Granted we’re still barely approaching year 2 of the new generation, but this whole need to remaster or remake games that don’t necessarily need it is just weird.

I'm just waiting on the end of the cross gen period. Yeah, it sucks for those who want a new console but can't find one. But, I want to see more next gen only games that are fully designed for next gen consoles. I want to see next gen gameplay and design. High visuals games are great, but we had that in the last generation. I played Uncharted 4 last year and it still looked visually stunning to the point where I don't see a reason to play the remastered version. Especially when you see games that already got a next gen patch, there isn't much of a reason to do a remaster.

At this rate, we'll get a God of War remaster/remake a year or two after Ragnarok comes out lol

[georgiafan]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Between all the cross gen games plus all the remakes it’s been a slow start to the ps5 life cycle.


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[illwill10]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Between all the cross gen games plus all the remakes it’s been a slow start to the ps5 life cycle.


Sent from my iPhone using Operation Sports

If it wasn't for the initial(still) scarcity of consoles, I would have been okay waiting until this holiday to get a Ps5. Anything I played so far was cross gen and could have waited to play

[IHateDuke32]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

If it wasn't for the initial(still) scarcity of consoles, I would have been okay waiting until this holiday to get a Ps5. Anything I played so far was cross gen and could have waited to play

Based on recent quotes from Hermen Hulst, it doesn’t sound like cross gen games are going away anytime soon. Which on one end is hard to be upset about for those that can’t get a PS5, economically speaking. But on the other end it just makes it hard, 2 years in, to know what the PS5 is truly capable of. The dual sense is pretty awesome, fast ssd with very minimal loading is awesome, 60fps in most games is awesome…am I missing anything else to this point? I’ve really enjoyed my time with my PS5 and Series X, but if you can take a step back and think about it for a second, there’s still no problem/shame in still playing on PS4 almost 2 years since the PS5 launch. Again there’s many factors that go into that, but I definitely wouldn’t have guessed things would be like this. But at the end of the day, we play games because we enjoy them. I don’t care where you play or on what console, as long as you’re enjoying the games you’re able to play wherever you’re able to play them, that’s what should matter at the end of the day.

[illwill10]

Re: Horizon: Zero Dawn

Based on recent quotes from Hermen Hulst, it doesn’t sound like cross gen games are going away anytime soon. Which on one end is hard to be upset about for those that can’t get a PS5, economically speaking. But on the other end it just makes it hard, 2 years in, to know what the PS5 is truly capable of. The dual sense is pretty awesome, fast ssd with very minimal loading is awesome, 60fps in most games is awesome…am I missing anything else to this point? I’ve really enjoyed my time with my PS5 and Series X, but if you can take a step back and think about it for a second, there’s still no problem/shame in still playing on PS4 almost 2 years since the PS5 launch. Again there’s many factors that go into that, but I definitely wouldn’t have guessed things would be like this. But at the end of the day, we play games because we enjoy them. I don’t care where you play or on what console, as long as you’re enjoying the games you’re able to play wherever you’re able to play them, that’s what should matter at the end of the day.

Also Ray Tracing and 3D Audio. It's hard not to imagine what God of War Ragnarok could potentially been if it was developed solely for the Ps5. Especially since they said it's the last one of that story. I can understand Multi-player and Live Service games I can understand being cross gen. But as far as Blockbuster AAA games, I was hoping God of War Ragnarok was the last cross gen game.

So far, you can say Returnal and Ratchet and Clank are a couple games the potential of the PS5. But so far its been mostly cross gen games where the PS5 version has better visuals and select few exclusive features and remakes/remasters. Sports games have been mediocre for me. If I knew what I did now, I would have waited. But, I do feel like towards the middle to end of 2023, we'll start seeing more next gen only games. I say middle, because there's a ton of delayed games coming early 2023.