Released: 5th December 2017
Developer: Guerrilla Games
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Certificate: 16
Formats: PS4
After over a decade developing Sony’s flagship shooter franchise Killzone, Guerrilla Games was ready to try something new and so they set off with a new IP that seemed very risky on the initial pitch. With Horizon Zero Dawn, Guerrilla has proven that given the right time, resources and focus, taking a chance in the gaming industry can result in enormous success.
Centuries into the future, Earth has been reclaimed by nature; humanity still exists but has reverted to small tribes with their own territories and spiritual beliefs. Towering above them are colossal robotic dinosaurs that patrol the natural ruins; amidst this backdrop, an outcast child named Aloy is born, being raised and trained by her adoptive father Rost (Voiced by JB Blanc). Shunned by her fellow tribesmen, Aloy (Played by Ashley Burch) embarks on a quest to discover the secrets of a long-forgotten world and learn about her place in it. The plot starts off very well, getting you invested into Aloy’s perspective as she grows up with a stoic determination to unravel the mysteries of her past and once you get past the tutorial sections, the entire world is open to explore. Every event unfolds entirely from her perspective as she explores the vast landscapes and eventually, the ancient technology used by humans that came before. All the ingredients are there for an enthralling adventure and the cast all do a great job with the material, but it falls somewhat short of its goal. Two issues stuck out for me; a lack of interplay between factions and some underdeveloped side characters. While Aloy meets several tribes along her journey, the details surrounding their past conflicts and disputes are left to the background. This could have provided more twists and turns in the narrative to vary up the pace and provide a more emotive challenge for the protagonist to face. When it comes to characters, the individuals Aloy meets along the way do show hints of likeability but we don’t learn much about them on a personal level. One character who appears later to play a key role in the story is especially weak, opting to chat to Aloy over radio transmission rather than show his face personally. For a sequel, Horizon needs to layer these characters more fluidly throughout the story while also giving them time to develop.
Horizon’s sprawling natural environment stretches on for miles and you’re open to explore most aspects of it from the offset. A typical gameplay loop involves discovery, item collecting, picking up quests and of course, combat. Yet despite all its tropes being typical of the genre, Horizon makes some tweaks that refine the freedom of movement you’ve come to expect. Those Ubisoft-style towers that you climb to reveal the map? They take the form of lumbering tallneck machines that not only look amazing when you stumble across them but also offer different platforming challenges. How about fast travel? You can use it, but only after crafting a pack from items in the world; a worthy compromise that encourages exploration and hunting animals. These smart changes set Horizon apart from other open worlds and it’s a joy to wander the lands, hunting and gathering alongside levelling Aloy up as you go; these skill points and their unlocks are another tried and true open-world component, delivering more options for our heroine to use. Quests are broken up into storyline ventures, side missions, errands and last but not least, the cauldron missions; these are essentially Zelda-style dungeon escapades where you head into the belly of the facilities that produce the machines to obtain new hacking abilities, resulting in a fun blend of platforming and claustrophobic combat. It’s not a flawless design template however; the side quests fall short in terms of variety, making use of samey templates. You head to a location, scan the area for clues, talk to a few NPCs and kill machines. The game needed to create more unique scenarios that got the player to interact in with the setting in different ways. Outside of this, you’ll be pouring through menus to craft items, improve weapons with upgrade coils and reading up on items that flesh out the game’s backstory. All told, Zero Dawn is a massive game; it took me forty hours to complete the main game 100% and ten more to go through the expansion. The Frozen Wilds mixes things up a lot more by putting new spins on older missions while also bringing in several new gameplay scenarios, most notably repairing a tallneck before revealing the map. You’re certainly getting your money’s worth.
Where Horizon impresses the most is its gameplay; while at first it plays like most third-person action games, it’s the superb combat system that really entertains. Utilising its setting and characters, Guerrilla Games has crafted intricate gameplay that combines unique weapons with wildly varied enemy design. There are over twenty unique robot enemies in the base game alone and each one has its own behaviours, attacks, weak points and valuable parts to obtain. How you choose to deal with them is open to interpretation; stealth is often a solid opening strike, dealing critical damage between the machines spot Aloy outright. From here, you’ll make use of many inventive tribal weapons (The bow being just the start of your options) and evasive rolls to outmanoeuvre the machines, chipping away at their parts until they collapse. Or alternatively, you can hack a robot and watch the fireworks as they fight each other. What makes the combat so fantastic is its crunchy impact; weak points flash and spark as you hit them, the robots stumble to the ground after taking enough damage and spear strikes land with a distinctive impact. It’s a perfect balance of satisfying takedowns mixed with the daunting size of the robots and you’ll uncover more machines, identify their patterns and face them down in a game of cat and mouse that’s about more than just raw power and damage numbers. Add to this the countless resources at your disposal including traps, health potions and clever distractions and you’ve got some of the most thrilling battles in any open-world game; you can even shoot off heavy weapons from machines and operate them manually for massive satisfaction. These qualities ensure that combat maintains its tension all the way through the game. Outside of the combat system, things are straightforward and well-functioning. Platforming is as simple as tapping the X button to climb along handholds and melee combat relies on simple light and strong attacks. All in all, Horizon’s control and gameplay are both silky smooth with only a few small blemishes; AI on human bandit enemies is rather basic and sometimes the camera may get caught when you’re stuck under a hulking machine but other than that, it’s a blast to play.
Open-world games are often judged on their immersion and Horizon Zero Dawn sits at the upper echelons of the genre. The world presented here is absolutely stunning on every level from environments to character designs and overall atmosphere. From the moment you’re let loose to explore the world, the opening forests pull you in and the further you get, the more breath-taking the vistas become. Guerrilla made use of the Decima engine from Killzone Shadowfall and Until Dawn and everything runs with barely a hitch in performance. Load times are restricted to fast travel and specific missions only, ensuring that the immersion is never dampened. Weather effects and other details drastically differ depending on which part of the environment you’re in and animations throughout the game are especially detailed, showing off Aloy’s physical prowess as she climbs, swims and sprints around the game world. The soundtrack by Joris De Man is also excellent with a main theme making use of string and woodwind instruments to really instil the tribal lives of the characters. Later, I was left just as impressed by the gorgeous snow-capped mountains of The Frozen Wilds DLC, which really does feel as cold and frigid as an Arctic winter. If you’re lucky enough to run Horizon on a PS4 Pro at 4K resolution, you’re in for a treat; suffice it to say, Horizon Zero Dawn could be the best looking open-world environment ever produced for an eighth-generation console.
Horizon Zero Dawn may not reach the heights of the greatest open-world games, its side missions and somewhat weak story in the base release hold it back, but it’s still a stunning and often exhilarating release. By allowing Guerrilla Games to push the boat out with new ideas, the result has been one of the best new IPs of this console generation; a success story that other publishers should take note of. Now that the complete edition is out, there’s no reason for you not to get into it.
Base Game Rating: 8/10 (Great)
Complete Edition Rating: 9/10 (Brilliant)
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