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Horizon Zero Dawn
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Steerpike
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March 21, 2017 - 12:40 pm
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Agreed -- and despite the criticisms I've leveled at the game, it's still important to reiterate that Horizon is probably the best of its "type." It is gorgeous, it runs well, the vast majority of its mechanics are great. These past five or six days I've been traveling so I'm still only at about 20%, but I want to give this game more time even though Andromeda is out now and Persona 5 arrives in a couple of weeks. I'd rather not drift away from Horizon before I give it its due, because while it's not perfect, it deserves appreciation.

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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Synonamess Botch
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March 26, 2017 - 11:20 am
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One thing which continues to amaze me is how good this game looks.  I'm not the kind of person who needs the latest graphics card in order to have a satisfying gaming experience, but I do think that graphics matter.  Or rather, I think that good art direction matters.  I'm also not a fan of game graphics which strive for realism.  Horizon strikes what I consider a perfect balance between stylized and realistic visuals.  Sometimes I just stand around and gape at how beautiful the scenery is, or I'll pause to watch the full moon rise over a distant hill to bathe a stark desert-scape in its pale light.

It's one thing to make a few nice areas, but this whole game is consistently gorgeous.  I know nothing of what it takes to create this much content, so if they're repeating geometries or terrain or whatever, they're doing an extremely good job of hiding it.

Graphics don't make a game, but when done poorly they can be a turn-off.  When done well they can elevate an already good game to something special, which is the case with Horizon.

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Steerpike
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March 27, 2017 - 5:14 pm
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Agreed, and the more I play Horizon the more I appreciate the art style. They were going for "lush" and "verdant" and other words that mean "lush" and "verdant," hoping (I assume) to capture the nature-taking-back-from-concrete feel. All of this worked, and the moments where it's obviously stylized rather than aggressively realistic work too.

Interestingly, I didn't like the human models in Horizon at first -- I'm not sure why, but something about them put me off. That went away after a few hours; like everything else the people fit into the overall art style. Guerrilla deserve a lot of credit, not just for what they created in game terms, but for the fact that everything about it seems to be a smaller part of a well-considered whole. There is no part of the visual experience of Horizon that doesn't make perfect sense in the context of the rest of the visual experience of Horizon.

I've fallen behind in my play on account of Mass Effect Andromeda, a game which has the opposite problem -- it's like a bunch of different graphics teams were working on different things and never communicated. It'd be interesting to contrast these two games, despite the obvious apples and oranges elements.

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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Synonamess Botch
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April 1, 2017 - 8:42 am
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I've heard a lot of the negative response to Andromeda's visuals, and from what I've seen it's not unwarranted.  On the one hand, I don't understand how they've managed to go backward in quality.  On the other hand, the visuals were one of the main things which turned me off on the original Mass Effect (The arms, for instance, always looked like they weren't properly connected to the torso or something; made the cut scenes disconcerting to watch).  I only played 1 & 2 and after that just lost interest.  Bioware doesn't make games I want to play anymore.  I'm not sure they ever really did, although I like KoTOR and consider it their apex.  Neverwinter Nights, upon reflection, was about as uninspired and by-the-numbers as it gets.  Maybe Baldur's Gate was good?  The entirety of the internet seems to think so.

Oh, Horizon.  Yeah I think you put your finger on it.  Whoever was in charge worked very hard to make all the pieces fit together.  I'm pretty far in now and starting to focus more on the main story, which is starting to get even more interesting.

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Steerpike
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April 3, 2017 - 11:24 am
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The strangest thing about Andromeda (aside from the fact that a surprising number of native Andromedans speak English) is that it's simultaneously one of the most impressive and most awful-looking games around today. You'll see stuff that's even more amazing than DA Inquisition at its best moments; you'll also see stuff that looks even more dated and sloppy than the first Mass Effect.

The jarring thing is that you often see both onscreen at the same time.

Anyway, I need to get back to Horizon, because SOMEONE SOMEHOW STOLE MY IDENTITY AND PRE-ORDERED PERSONA 5, having it sent to my address (presumably as an apology of sorts) and that game arrives... er... tomorrow.

What's really weird is the identity thief then apparently repented his/her wicked ways and my identity is now my own again. Kids these days!

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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xtal
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April 3, 2017 - 12:31 pm
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That's a very strange situation there, Steerpike. I'm glad you got your identity back from this Persona-obsessed monster.

I have owned Horizon now for a month, and haven't played any more than when I last reported. Which feels crazy. How have I not played more of this game? I know so many people are saying it, and so self-fulfilling prophecy blah blah blah, but 2017 really has been peppered with games that have been widely praised. And I've just been playing Resident Evil 7, Zelda, Mass Effect Andromeda, and that one hour of Horizon I squeaked in. And goddammit, I seriously want to try Nier: Automata, and Nioh, and the slew of 2016 games I missed.

Sigh. Is it weird to say I hope this isn't the new norm going forward? Like, slow down the fucking hits, guys. It feels like The Beatles releasing five albums in two months.

Anyway, Horizon. I'm weirdly scared to play it because there are TOO MANY GAMES THAT ARE GOOD THAT I AM PLAYING. And I don't know if I can go back and forth between it and Zelda. Because Zelda has that Dark Souls effect where everything else is just a little less. I might have to hunker down and focus on Horizon.

Hey Botch, how much time do you think you've spent with it? If I do a bit of side stuff but maybe not all of it, what am I looking at here? 30 hour game? 50 hours?

If being wrong's a crime I'm serving forever

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Synonamess Botch
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April 8, 2017 - 12:56 pm
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Whenever I see the average play time for a game, I'm pretty sure I can safely triple it to arrive at my personal number.  So keep that in mind when I say that my save file reports over 90 hours.  I tend to sneak around.  A lot.  And I take much more time to do stuff than is reasonable.  Also keep in mind that I've let the game sit idle for many hours while I do responsible adult junk.

I've played the game the same way that I've seen others do: I got through the initial area and major plot development, at which point you're given free reign to go anywhere, and did pretty much just that.  I spent a long time just exploring and doing "side quest" type stuff.  Now I'm focusing on the main story.

So if you avoid a lot of the non-essential content, you can presumably get through pretty quickly, although I don't really have a solid number of hours in mind.  However, the difficulty may be a problem.  I find the game rather easy, but perhaps it's because I spent so much time early on essentially over-leveling.  Honestly, I don't think it's a game to be rushed through.  Sorry I don't have a better answer.

I feel exactly the same way about the flood of great and seeming-great games out right now (the PS4 seems to be absolutely killing it).  I thought hard about picking up Nioh and Nier as well.  The only reason was because I missed the Amazon pre-order discount window.  I can't keep up in the best of times and I'm typically someone who doesn't play the latest releases.  That is changing.  Have mercy gaming people!  Right now P5 is sitting on my desk patiently waiting for Horizon to get out of the disk tray.

I did a double-take when I saw Steerpike online playing P5.  I thought you weren't a Persona guy?  Didn't this identity thief person know that?

I now know what "Zero Dawn" means.  All I'll say is that it is not a random combination of words.

Rule #2: Double-tap

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xtal
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Synonamess Botch said
I now know what "Zero Dawn" means. All I'll say is that it is not a random combination of words.  

The apologists are coming out of the woodwork!

I kid. I look forward to finding out why it makes any sense.

Thinking I'll have to go about Horizon in a similar way, that being at whatever pace feels natural. I think I'm okay with Zelda just being the game that is going to take all year (or a lot of it) to play; and so I'll return to it constantly.

Also been playing Resident Evil 7 "couch co-op" with friends, which makes a scary-alone game into a fun-creepy-weird-together game. I consider that a pretty polished series, after the first few games. They could be rigid, but always seemed polished. RE7 doesn't really feel polished, in a good way. It feels fucked up and like it wants you to mess with its weird systems. It's simple and smart in a lot of ways. I'm going to hopefully keep playing it together with friends, passing the controller, which turns out is a great way to play that game.

If being wrong's a crime I'm serving forever

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geggis
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April 10, 2017 - 4:17 am
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xtal said
Sigh. Is it weird to say I hope this isn't the new norm going forward? Like, slow down the fucking hits, guys.

I've felt like this for years now so for me it already is the norm!

Synonamess Botch said
Whenever I see the average play time for a game, I'm pretty sure I can safely triple it to arrive at my personal number.

Aye, enter me in for the 'Slowest Gamer' race too. Most of the time it's not even because I'm busy trying to complete everything, it's just because I like to drink in all the sights and sounds. I'm quite happy just standing there sometimes which... is not the best way to beat a game 🙂

This is a fun and handy site I found a while back: https://howlongtobeat.com/

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Synonamess Botch
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April 10, 2017 - 10:23 am
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I finished the game last night, and what a tremendously satisfying experience it was.  As I hoped, afterwards it drops you in a pre-endgame state so that you can wrap up all your unfinished business.  I didn't do all there was to do so this was nice.

While the credits rolled I just sat there, mouth hanging open in amazement at what Guerrilla had accomplished.  I've seen some criticisms of the story as boring or uninspired.  All I can say is that I thought they pulled it off very well.  It's not going to blow any minds but was simply very well executed.  I suppose the same could be said for the rest of the game.

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Steerpike
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April 10, 2017 - 11:27 am
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I'm something of a Persona guy. P3 is the only other one I played, but I liked it very much and after all the great press P5 was getting, my identity thief apparently decided to take matters into his/her own hands/paws/tentacles. I'm grateful, really. P5 is stylish and awesome and I spent most of the weekend playing it.

I am a mediocre student, it turns out.

ANYWAY

Botch and I have been messaging back and forth a little bit and I admire his ability to stick with a schedule. "It's waiting for me," he said of Persona 5, "But I have to finish Horizon first."

I also have to finish Horizon. Hopefully I'll still remember how to play when I get back to it; I also over-leveled so that should help a little as I shake the rust off. From what I hear, there's a lot of worth in finding the bits of scattered fiction that explain what happened to the earth, so my plan is to alternate lore-hunts and story quests. Horizon's already given me enough hours of fun that it was a worthy investment, but I'd like to see how it ends.

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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xtal
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April 10, 2017 - 12:47 pm
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Synonamess Botch said
I finished the game last night, and what a tremendously satisfying experience it was. As I hoped, afterwards it drops you in a pre-endgame state so that you can wrap up all your unfinished business. I didn't do all there was to do so this was nice.

While the credits rolled I just sat there, mouth hanging open in amazement at what Guerrilla had accomplished. I've seen some criticisms of the story as boring or uninspired. All I can say is that I thought they pulled it off very well. It's not going to blow any minds but was simply very well executed. I suppose the same could be said for the rest of the game.  

This bloody game had to come out three days apart from Zelda. Argh! We're so spoiled, truly. I haven't even given much thought to Horizon, and yet I'm almost positive it will appeal to me. Soon. Soon.

If being wrong's a crime I'm serving forever

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Steerpike
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April 10, 2017 - 1:38 pm
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It's like you guys were saying, this two-month (or so) period has been crazy for releases. First quarter isn't supposed to be like this! This is madness!

Congrats on finishing up, Botch. I'm in agreement with you -- Horizon may not be the "perfect" game, but Guerrilla did a great job with it, and showed themselves to be capable of much more than Killzone as well. I'm looking forward to more from them.

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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Synonamess Botch
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April 10, 2017 - 5:01 pm
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Steerpike you vastly overestimate my discipline.  It's just that for whatever reason, in this instance, I felt the need to give Horizon its time.

Sorry to pile on Xtal - yeah I don't remember a first quarter with this many compelling releases.  Granted I traditionally don't play games upon release but still.  And there's another thing - I seem to have moved in the direction of playing new games while they're still new.  I blame Dark Souls.  I am completely satisfied with my PS4 purchase.

Steerpike I didn't realize you liked Persona that much.  I do admit to firing up P5 just before my final Horizon session.  Oh man is it cool.  Shoji Meguro seems fully on point, as usual.  Persona games have always oozed style - their menus alone put other games to shame - but this one takes it to another level.  I am fully prepped and ready to dive in.

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Steerpike
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April 17, 2017 - 9:35 am
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Until this one I'd have called myself a "Persona Appreciator" more than anything else. This is only the second I've played and the first I've played obsessively, but part of the reason I missed the others was simply not knowing what I was missing. I'm pretty sure I'll be first in line for Persona 6, 7, 8, and 9.

I balanced the Horizon disc against my TV so Aloy is looking at me whenever I play Persona, to remind me that she still has stuff to do and metal dino-bots to defeat. I will not abandon you forever Aloy!

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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xtal
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April 17, 2017 - 1:23 pm
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I at long last ventured beyond the first hour of Horizon yesterday!

This game is similar in many ways to that series I loathe, Assassin's Creed, yet where Black Flag felt like a vast world I had no interest in exploring, Horizon is immediately enticing. I would say I've played 5 to 6 hours now-- I've just passed the Proving and went for maybe half an hour beyond that-- and boy oh boy. This has to be one of the best beginnings to a game I have ever played. When I compare Horizon's early hours in my mind to games it reminds me of-- Assassin's Creed (the first one) and Skyrim primarily so far-- it's just so good. The relatively brief intro section (young Aloy) was fucking awesome.

And, as I said to Botch in a PSN message last night, the "wow" moments keep on coming. I'm so eager to get out into the world and meet some of the other tribes/groups. I couldn't be more enthusiastic about the potential of the world and specifically the story behind it.

Speaking of Aloy... It's only been a few hours but I am really into her as a character. After growing up in isolation and learning from one guy I'm not exactly sure how she's become this cool, curious skeptic, but I'm willing to look past her unlikely coolness because I like her so much.

Also, combat is pretty fun. I've acted stealthy thus far, but it seems like that won't always be viable with some of the bigger machines. The combat straight up is challenging, which tells me that creativity and traps should be used often, which I'm good with. I think the game's depth is conveyed elegantly in the menu system too, so crafting those traps, or potions or whatever, doesn't seem to be a hassle.

My one minor complaint is holding triangle to search corpses instead of just tapping (this also permeated Mass Effect Andromeda) and then clicking it again to take all items. Looting is not fun anymore in 2017 -- it was also not fun anymore in 2005, when then-heroes Bioware recognized this problem plaguing RPGs, and made the excellent Jade Empire which has no looting -- I digress.

In summary: Fuck Destiny.

If being wrong's a crime I'm serving forever

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Steerpike
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April 17, 2017 - 3:49 pm
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Yeah, more and more we're seeing that "hold to accomplish something" thing -- wait for the circle to fill, then you do it. I don't mind for some actions, but to have it for everything seems excessive. After all, is there a reason when you wouldn't want to take everything from a loot hillock?

Horizon's "wow" moments change subtly over time. The first five hours' "wow" moments were gameplay and setpiece design (the Proving was a great scene; walking through Mother's Bosom or whatever for the first time was another, etc). Hours five to ten, the "wow" moments are tied to visuals. The sunrises are gorgeous. The ruined cities. Lots of stuff like that, where you find yourself positioning Aloy just right and taking a screenshot.

Hours 10+ go back to gameplay moments. Last I was playing, I was in the middle of a story quest that involved a lot of stealth and managing allied units that would get excited and run off on their own, usually necessitating some panicked plan-recalibration.

There is certainly a fair amount of Open World Crap in Horizon, the same stuff you see in all open world games to fill up the map with icons, but most of it is ignorable. Interestingly, for all the UI customization it does allow, there are some things you can't turn off that I wish you could; your view and compass are going to get a little cluttered no matter what. But that's a small complaint overall.

Aloy's a good character, and Ashly Burch plays her really well. I'm interested to see how she evolves over time. At least as far as I've made it, it's up to you how you play Aloy, though it's not clear whether your responses actually change the flow of the game.

Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.

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xtal
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April 20, 2017 - 1:39 pm
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I last left off two nights ago in a Cauldron.

The plot thickens.

MAJOR spoilers (for literally the first hour of the game). I encourage you not to read this unless you've played the game.

I went into Horizon very blind; I knew very little about it other than it looked beautiful, it had an intriguing story/world, and PlayStation enthusiasts I follow were expecting great things from it. That's all I really knew.

So some of the early "wow" moments for me were just Aloy learning about the history of the "metal world" of the old ones and such. I didn't know that was going to be a thing. At least not in exactly the way they presented. I figured there would be some uncovering of the past, but I had no idea what to expect. And just the surprise and wonder that Aloy was experiencing, I felt invested in that.

I want to find audio logs like I wanted to find them in BioShock.

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Synonamess Botch
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April 24, 2017 - 11:29 am
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All I'll say is that there is a payoff for all this mysterious set up, and it is good.

Glad to hear you're enjoying it Xtal.  I was wondering if I was just kidding myself about how good the game is, since I have no other experience with open-world titles.

I think stealth is a viable option throughout the game, although there are times when you're forced into more head-on confrontations.  But the options for combat are so flexible that you'll never get that "oh crap I optimized for stealth and now I suck at everything else" feeling.  Definitely use traps to their full potential.  Also, the tinker (I think it's called that) skill is very useful since it allows you to swap out weapon and armor upgrades.  I did this a lot since every situation calls for a different damage or protection type.  I also did not tire of doing this like I usually do in other games.

I actually like the mechanic of holding down to loot instead of just tapping, although I'm not sure I can articulate why.
Maybe because it kept me from doing stupid things many times.

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xtal
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Tinker is high on my to-get list. The first skill I picked was Silent Strike because that just seemed essential. I've spread my points pretty evenly so far. I think I'm level 12. It seems like all the skills will be attainable which is nice in a way; no brutal decisions. And it makes sense that Aloy should have no artificial limits.

I got through that first Cauldron. It was worth doing alone for the ability to take over a Sawtooth. Weird place. I'm so intrigued.

Oh, also found a "vantage point" ... another thing I wasn't expecting.

Botch, did you give much credence to the supposed "recommended level" or whatever it's supposed to be for each mission. Like that first Cauldron, it said Level 8 on it. I found it kinda tough and was level 11 I believe. And based on an object I found in the earliest ruins that can be entered, I think I'm being pointed to another set of ruins; but the recommended level is 25, which is way higher than anything else at the moment.

If being wrong's a crime I'm serving forever

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