Horizon: Zero Dawn [Gameplay #3] - Empire of the Sun
0It has been argued that Horizon: Zero Dawn has more in common with a full-blown RPG like The Witcher 3 than it does with sandbox titles such as Assassin's Creed or Far Cry. While recent AC entries like last year's Origins and the upcoming Odyssey do complicate that picture somewhat, I think this is still a decent way to describe what's special about H:ZD (not to mention what's surprised me the most during my belated return to it). There's a depth to the world building, quest design and character interactions here which goes way beyond your typical action adventure. Side quests rarely consist of mundane open world chores and instead have a tendency to expand into lengthy adventures with extensive dialogue scenes, messy political intrigue and plenty of personal drama. While actual player choice is limited, it's much easier to invest in Aloy as a character when her story and Horizon's complex post-post-apocalyptic reality is this well realized.
Despite having played the game for more than 30 hours, I'm still pretty worthless at the combat system even on the Normal difficulty setting (and this ineptitude was probably also what turned me off when I lost interest in H:ZD shortly after its release in early 2017). I'm a simple guy and there's just too much variety, planning and weapon customization involved in optimizing your approach to the game's various challenges. Even so, I do appreciate the impressive range of bows and other projectile weapons available for construction and modification. These systems also feed into the resource gathering and exploration to ensure that there is always a good reason to keep scavenging the massive game world for useful stuff, and even at level 40 I feel there's still plenty of room for further loadout improvements.