Horizon Horizon Forbidden West

It's because the lead character is a woman who is not their idea of a submissive and incapable woman so they review bomb it to salve their ego.

 

Speaking of Aloy's face, the facial animations in this game are phenomenal. I swear to god, the blacksmith in the first town you visit seems more realistic and lifelike than some protagonists from other games haha

 

Alloy's thinking face and enthusiasm when she was vibing with the Oseram about the breathing apparatus is probably my favorite moment so far. Its like 3 seconds but in those 3 seconds Alloy completely let's her guard down and clicks with the other person. Its also one of the few times when Alloy isn't at all skeptical of someone or something.

Its such a nerd moment for her and I love it.

 

Stop covering for these strange bearded women. But seriously, it's crazy that 'have you ever actually seen a woman?' is now a legitimate question to ask of these people.

 

I've gotten past the prologue and opening credits and into the game proper, though barely. Running into a few familar faces is nice although I don't quite remember everyone.

So far it's been a slight re-learning curve on how to fight the machines but it's come back to me. And I have had no problems with climbing either. A few of the grabs are not as obvious but it hasn't slowed me down any. And I have had no problems with Aloy or anyone else's face looking too hairy that should not already be hairy.

 

They've released two patches and I think it must have smoothed out the climbing issues. Its still not great, but its not nearly as bad as it was the first few hours after release.

The hair on alloy is peach fuzz on her cheek at her ear, and its only visible in photomode from certain angles with the sun behind her. A total nonissue.

 

That might be why the climbing issue is no longer an issue then. Being slightly late to the party turned out to be a good thing since I did not have to go through that.

I rarely use photomode either and a bit of fuzz around her cheek near the ear is laughably nothing.

 

If anything, noticeable peach fuzz in photo mode is a pretty incredible to be included at all.

 

I am currently playing Zero Dawn, but have seen some footage from this game. Does anyone else think that Aloy sounds Really different in Forbidden West?

 

Remember in Zero Dawn the world's items had interactive markers above them that were always visible? They changed that in FW so that the markers are only visible for some seconds when you ping your focus. That results in a lot of pinging and some missed items. Here is how you switch it back to the way it was in Zero Dawn.

Settings > General > Hud Visibility Custom > Custom Hud Settings > Player Misc > Interaction Markers Always On

Hope that helps some of yall.

 

This game has been one big allegory of what happened when Europeans arrived in the Americas. There's genocide, epidemics, culture and technology clashes, primitives facing the literal end of their world, and a looming dread that even if the heroes succeed now, the doom will just return in some other form down the road. This **** is way more depressing than I expected it to be.

 

I ****ing hate what they did with Thebes.

Spoiler

I've been looking forward to finding out the fate of Ted and finding his pyramid since it was first mentioned in Zero Dawn.

Everything about the experience was a disappointment. The pyramid turning out to be a skyscraper. The leader of the Quen expedition, who is a Ted Fanboy and called the Ceo, tagging along and barking orders and making the dumbest assumptions about things in Thebes. Lack of good exploration and only a few data points. It seemed it might at least be leading to a cool boss fight when it was revealed that Ted had mutated into a monster because of life extending experiments and had tied his body into a powerplant so he could live forever and "greet" Liz's children. But we dont even get that. Instead we just get to hear his beastly guttural grunts and then the Ceo orders everything destroyed to hide the truth about Ted and Alloy has to escape the pyramid. We dont even get to kill the Ceo. His death is literally played as slapstick. Its all rushed and bad.

Wtf were they thinking?

 

I don't think this problem is isolated to Horizon Forbidden west for story-driven, narrative games. Like sometimes I think really good games just kind of crap out in the final act.

I feel this way about Arkham Knight for example.

Even in The Witcher 3, parts about the final act feel very rushed and kind of WTF. I overlook it mostly because the rest of the game is so damn good, and it's more about the experience of playing through the world than some of the lesser story elements.

 

I think I get what you mean about Witcher 3 but my main impression when I first played it was that it dragged out the final part a lot longer than I thought as I had expected the battle of Kaer Morhen to be part of the climax (probably because of how games often do rush the ending, and the game had included so much story before that), but it's pretty far off the ending.

 

The Battle of Kaer Morhen was perfect for me and my favorite part of the game, especially when Geralt says, "And we'll be waiting for them with swords in hand."

But here are my main issues:

Spoiler

* The White Frost turning out to be this otherworldly, alien force that Ciri has to leave to defeat. The White Frost isn't like The Nothing from Neverending Story, it's basically a naturally occurring entropy. It's not a "villain." Ithlinne's Prophecy also wasn't about Ciri saving the world from the White Frost either.

* Avallach's sudden turn and then turn back. You can't trust him but you sorta can? Ciri is pissed about him after meeting Avallach's girlfriend. They never went anywhere with that.

* They kind of gloss over Nilfgaard's invasion of the other parts of the continent in the epilogue. Everything is kind of hand-waved away and resolved a bit too simply for my tastes.

Now for Horizon, are idiots still complaining about Alloy's face? JFC. Go back to original Tomb Raider. People really need to get a grip. Plus, I think a lot of moaning is just about isolated screenshots.



Behold, ORIGINAL LARA CROFT!

 

70 hours of playing later... thank god.

 

Just completed the main story. On a technical level the game is great, and some parts the story they were telling were good, but I wasn't satisfied with it the way I was the first game. The Zenith stuff was undercooked and poorly integrated with everything else, and the climax mostly fell flat for me. Alloy's friends were set dressing for most of the game, unfortunately. I didn't care for the new weapon stamina or how certain actions were tied into it, and the power moves seemed to only be available randomly. Frankly I couldn't be bothered to figure out why, and didn't really need any of those powers. I didn't like how ruins were handled in this game either. The data points weren't as interesting either. This game needed a strong central mystery to unravel like Zero Dawn's mystery in the first game. The story of the Zenith's could have been that central mystery driving the plot, but like I said, they were mostly left off stage and forgotten until the climax.

I'll have more thoughts later, and I'm sure I'll replay it at some point. Right now, overall, I'd give it a 7.5/10.

 

I am still around midpoint main story, I think. I haven't looked up any guides or walkthroughs except for what quest to start for the underwater mask and that's it.

So far I have not had many complaints. The new stamina meter thing and some of the new weapons types are a bit annoying to use but otherwise managable.Gear and weapon progression are a little sluggish IMO too. But there is plenty to do and a lot of places to do it in fortunately so I'm in no rush.

 

One and a half playthroughs in (got my hands on a PS5 as I was wrapping up the main campaign, figured I'd just start over and take it slower), I find this to be a massive improvement on the first game. The first game is a very good starting point anchored by two of my favourite characters in games, but it really struggles when it comes to writing about the present day and so many of the characters I would consider dull and forgettable. This game feels like a concentrated effort is made to correct most of the errors of the first game, whether that be mechanical like better melee combat or the massively improved supporting characters. Where most side quests felt like a chore in the first game, I want to do every one I come across here as they've all been far more interesting, more in line with the improved Frozen Wilds DLC but with animation that brings so much more to the table. It's been fun going through it again and doing side quests I had put off until completing parts of the main story as you do get a sense of the world reacting to your choices (such as one side quest character appearing in a main story location later now, and I'm sure more examples like this). They even managed to make me like characters from the first game I found pretty weak, while adding some new ones I really like.

It's not without flaws, while effort is made to correct problems from the first game, one writing one still remains and that's villains. I think this is less of an issue here as this game maps out a pretty tapestry of characters and dynamics between them that makes it interesting compared to Helix's stuff in the first game, but at the same time I wouldn't call any of the antagonists particularly memorable on their own. There are a lot of supporting characters I found myself really loving, but I did find one of the few I thought was memorable from the first game got handed a side quest that was very disappointing for them. There's one plot revelation I waffle on being better left with the ambiguity the narrative gives it or something they should have been more explicit with.

Overall, it's such a rich game to play with a world that feels like there's always something new to explore just around the corner. There's a remarkable sense of wonder that comes with exploring the open world. Even with its massive size, it feels dense. It doesn't have as strong of a main throughline as the first game, but the execution of the story is far better as I find the first falters a lot until you reach Maker's End and then has a not terribly interesting final boss section. I can tell I'm going to be spending a lot more time in this one than I have already and I very much look forward to it. This feels like a far more refined version of much of what was appealing in the first game. Even after I get through the main story again, the amount of side quests to do, gorgeous outfits to upgrade, and beautiful vistas to explore in photo mode will keep me very busy until New Game+ comes around.

 

I think Sony released this and Gran Turismo 7 at the wrong times. Everyone is talking about Elden Ring and I rest think that hurt the sales of these games

 

Got the platinum today, absolutely incredible game. Really hope we get some DLC for this, I didn't want it to end.

 

Congrats! How long did that take altogether?

 

Probably about 70 hours, it's actually a very easy platinum, I was kind of surprised by how many things weren't required to get platinum, just remember to scan at least one specter and the final boss, since those are only found in the story missions.

 

Nice, well done.

I’m also hoping they do a fair few DLCs for this.