The Art of Horizon Zero Dawn Book Review
20The Art of Horizon Zero Dawn is an average video game art book. It contains concept art from various stages of the design process and a fair amount of commentary from the developers.
0:00 - Introduction
0:27 - Quality of the Physical Book
0:50 - Content
7:30 - Aesthetics
9:01 - Nostalgia
10:16 - Backstage
11:27 - Closing Remarks
QUALITY OF PHYSICAL BOOK
-9x12 inches.
-It has 192 pages.
-The quality of the covers and pages is average.
-I’d say the quality of the printing is probably a bit above average.
CONTENT/INNARDS
Variety of images and image types
-Concept sketches
-Finalized concept art
-Finalized prop designs
-There are a few things like monotone concepts that show the shape of the landscape.
-There are some images that show how they developed what they decay and re-growth might look like.
-Though there is some variety, it’s mostly what looks like finalized concept art or what could be called “inspiration” art.
Organization
-I think it’s organized a little weird. It’s organized by tribe, so there’s a section on the Nora tribe with the locales, buildings, weapons, people, etc. for that tribe, and then it moves on to another tribe. I guess this makes some sort of sense but I think it’s kind of a strange way to organize a book about Horizon.
Is there writing or insight from the artists and developers themselves?
-Yes. It’s all throughout the book. For example, they talk about how, as time went on, they realized they needed to place an increasing emphasis on Aloy’s hair because she needed to be easily identifiable in a variety of clothing and armor.
-Though I wish there was a bit more of this type of commentary, a lot of the remarks from the developers act as a sort of “tour guide” for the images.
Quality of writing.
-The writing is generally fine but some entries feel repetitive or not very important, or sometimes a bit dramatic. I liked the commentary and quotes from the developers.
-Strangely, I quite liked the substance of the writing from the author but didn't really think there was anything exceptional about the writing itself. Some of it reminds me of a textbook - interesting information but without much personality.
Does it have what you want it to have?
-While there’s a good amount of artwork on the environments, there’s actually not much focus on the machines, which is very perplexing to me - they’re a major part of the gameplay and story, and probably the thing that makes the game stand out from the crowd. It is simply beyond me that this book doesn’t contain a featurette on each and every machine, how they were designed, why they were designed that way, challenges in designing them, and so on. It seems like the most obvious thing in the world to include in this book. Very disappointing.
AESTHETICS
-I liked that the scraps of art aren’t just put on a white background, but that some effort has gone into making the presentation more aesthetically pleasing, like having a soft blue background with a symbol from the game.
-As usual, this book would have benefited from being in a wide format because it would enable to images to be displayed more prominently.
-There are many full pages of art and I think it really contributes to a pleasing aesthetic.
-A lot of the art is quite nice and painterly, but a fair amount has the sort of “image database cut-and-paste” look, which I don’t actually mind that much but it does feel a bit more sterile than art that’s . . . less digital.
-I think the book itself looks pretty cool, and I like that the cover doesn’t have any writing. It has a matte texture to it, which is nice.
NOSTALGIA/AFFINITY EVOKED FOR THE GAME
-I think that nostalgia is hampered somewhat by the organization of the book - it’s organized by tribe but the tribes aren’t really a major focus of most of the gameplay, or really even of the story.
-There are images here and there that, for me, remind me of memorable parts of the game, like the stadium.
-Though some of the environments in the book aren’t in the game, I did want to explore them and felt that sense of adventure that the game gives.
BACKSTAGE
-There’s a number of details that I didn't notice while playing, like how the Banuk decorate themselves with monster parts in order to “be one” with them, and the Eclipse decorate themselves with military props, like shell casings.
-I happen to know that many of the artists with Guerilla are industrial designers. I imagine this has something to do with why the machine designs are so interesting and functional. However, this book doesn’t have anything in it about that. I wonder what other interesting tidbits there are about this game that we simply don’t know about because they aren’t in the book? Another missed opportunity.
There are 17 book reviews in Season 1 of my series “Mike’s Video Game Art Book Reviews.” I hope you enjoy them!
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