Horizon Zero Dawn

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Opty

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Man, look at you using strategy and cleverness. Meanwhile I'm just here like "SHOOT IT SHOOT IT SHOOT IT FIRE ARROWS HARD ARROWS WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO TAKE YOU DOWN AAAAAGGGHHHH."

I am not a clever or skilled gamer. I am, however, determined and patient.
Ha, it was more a case of me dying about 15 times in a row and getting frustrated and going, "Hey, I've never used these explosive thingies before, I wonder what they do. Whooooaaaa...."
 

Teinz

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With a Thunderjaw I usually shoot off it's discthrowers, tie it down, freeze it and then kill it with it's own weapons. Two discthrowers usually suffice.

Two Thunderjaws? Hack one. That'll do.
 

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There's so much I love about this game. I recently finished it as well and was in tears at the ending cinematic. It really made me care about Aloy, the world, and the characters in it. H:ZD deserves game of the year, but damn Zelda HAD to come out for the switch.
 

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You sound like you went to the same gaming school I did - When it doubt, shoot more arrows and run around like a maniac.


Man, look at you using strategy and cleverness. Meanwhile I'm just here like "SHOOT IT SHOOT IT SHOOT IT FIRE ARROWS HARD ARROWS WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO TAKE YOU DOWN AAAAAGGGHHHH."

I am not a clever or skilled gamer. I am, however, determined and patient.
 

Kjbartolotta

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So rarely do I regret switching my loyalties from PS to Xbox at some point in my early thirties, but between this and Bloodbourne, kinda burns my hide.
 

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So rarely do I regret switching my loyalties from PS to Xbox at some point in my early thirties, but between this and Bloodbourne, kinda burns my hide.

To be fair, Horizon: Zero Dawn kind of surprised everyone. Guerilla Games didn't exactly set the world on fire with that last Killzone game as a launch PS4 title, so letting this one slip under the radar was understandable. I mean, yeah, the preview videos looked good, but a lot of preview videos can hype a game that's clearly not all that. I'm still smarting a little bit from Mass Effect: Andromeda...
 

Opty

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PS4 also has Uncharted 4. With that, Horizon: Zero Dawn, and the new God of War and the new Spider-Man games coming out, it doesn't look like Xbox has any exclusives that come close to being as good as those.

I traded in my Xbox One a few weeks ago because I hardly ever played it any more and I used to be a die-hard Xbox fan.

Mass Effect: Andromeda was also a bit of a letdown for me. They've patched most of the bugs and the combat is really fun, but the writing was atrocious. Good news is that Casey Hudson just came back to reclaim his old spot as General Manager of Bioware. Given that he was the architect of the original ME trilogy, and was the original head of the new Anthem game (it was originally his baby, just like ME was originally his baby too), hopefully he can turn things around at Bioware and get them back to the high quality company they used to be before this latest string of missteps.

I just started a New Game+ for Horizon on the new Ultra Hard mode. You keep all your skill points, weapons, and armors, but they nerf all your weapons. The machines are also a lot more aggressive. Everything at the vendors is a more expensive and the cheapest of the new Adept weapons (the Adept Sling) is 6500 shards. The most expensive is the Adept Blast Sling at 14,000 shards. On top of that, the game becomes a lot more stingy when it comes to giving shards, but I found a great place to farm them by the Nora Hunting grounds (but it takes about an hour of farming).

It's still fun and the Ultra Hard keeps it challenging. Only thing that sucks about New Game+ is that they cut out the beginning of the game with Aloy as a child. I really liked that part. Oh well.
 

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Mass Effect: Andromeda was also a bit of a letdown for me. They've patched most of the bugs and the combat is really fun, but the writing was atrocious. Good news is that Casey Hudson just came back to reclaim his old spot as General Manager of Bioware. Given that he was the architect of the original ME trilogy, and was the original head of the new Anthem game (it was originally his baby, just like ME was originally his baby too), hopefully he can turn things around at Bioware and get them back to the high quality company they used to be before this latest string of missteps.

I'm kind of on the fence about Hudson's return to BioWare. I give him full credit for the amazing accomplishment of the original Mass Effect trilogy, but I'm still a bit skeptical about how Anthem is going to turn out, since it looks like its basically going for the territory that Destiny has already staked out. More importantly, I don't know if it's really fair to say that the problems with BioWare lately are all just the result of Aaryn Flynn, and that him leaving as GM of BioWare Edmonton is going to necessarily solve all the problems. BioWare has been in something of a decline since the original founding doctors left. I still enjoyed Dragon Age: Inquisition a lot, but it was pretty clear that the switch to open world format hurt that game and messed with its pacing, and then the same thing happened to Mass Effect: Andromeda. That would have been a lot easier to forgive if Witcher III hadn't come out and shown everyone how it's done for a fantastic RPG open world experience, but CD Projekt did put out Witcher III, AND it had some great writing, so the standards have been raised.

I still think that BioWare has some good ideas and good writing, but they've now put out two games in a row that were hurt by open world mechanics rather than helped. Maybe it's time to let go of that format.
 
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lilyWhite

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When people say "[person] returning to [group] will surely make their things great again!" it's really more along the lines of "it'll surely make their things more like how I liked them again!"

Of course, that doesn't mean the entirety of the group wants to make things that appeal to the people who weren't appealed by their latest offerings. And more to the point, it certainly doesn't mean that they need to.
 

Opty

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I'm kind of on the fence about Hudson's return to BioWare. I give him full credit for the amazing accomplishment of the original Mass Effect trilogy, but I'm still a bit skeptical about how Anthem is going to turn out, since it looks like its basically going for the territory that Destiny has already staked out.
I somewhat agree about the Anthem/Destiny similarities. But, they haven't really revealed much about it yet, so I think it's a bit premature to draw any kind of conclusions other than "it looks cool."

More importantly, I don't know if it's really fair to say that the problems with BioWare lately are all just the result of Aaryn Flynn, and that him leaving as GM of BioWare Edmonton is going to necessarily solve all the problems.
I agree that it's not really fair to blame BioWare's problems on Flynn. Then again, I never did say or even imply that and if you could point me to somewhere that I said that, I would be both appreciative and completely bewildered.

BioWare has been in something of a decline since the original founding doctors left.
It was before that. Dragon Age II was criticized for its heavily recycled environments and changes in gameplay, but I wasn't one of the haters because I enjoyed that game. Shortly after came the controversy over ME3's ending, and the Drs. left after that.

I mostly enjoyed ME3, but I did feel that the ending sucked and they missed some big opportunities with the story, but I think that has a lot to do with the fact that Drew Karphyshyn had left BW after ME2 (thankfully, he's back with BW now too), and he's a much better lead writer and story developer than Mac Walters. Still, I was mostly satisfied with it and the ME trilogy is my all-time favorite series (with the Uncharted series coming in a close 2nd).

I still enjoyed Dragon Age: Inquisition a lot, but it was pretty clear that the switch to open world format hurt that game and messed with its pacing, and then the same thing happened to Mass Effect: Andromeda.
I didn't have any issues with DA:I and, aside from the monotony of the stupid shard-fetching, I thought it was a great game. The issues with it didn't have to do with the open world format as much as the switch to Frostbite that EA forced on Bioware. That was a really dumb decision, in my opinion and not the fault of Bioware.

ME:A, however, not only had severe issues with facial animations, animation glitches, and a bunch of bugs, but it suffered heavily from shitty writing and horrid dialogue. The Kotaku article gave a lot of insight as to what a behind-the-scenes clusterf**k ME:A's development was and it seems a lot of the blame should go to EA and not necessarily BW. I still mostly liked it, and thought the gameplay was great, though I feel the story/dialogue problems are pretty severe.

Though a few of Bioware's games have had some writing issues, the fact that EA forced Frostbite on them, coupled with the way ME:A was basically administratively sabotaged by shuffling good personnel to other games and leaving ME:A very understaffed, to forcing them to still release it unfinished, and also the fact that BW doesn't communicate well with players in terms of what's going on (they still won't come out and admit one way or the other about ME:A single-player DLC or tell us what Anthem's story is)...all of this has happened in the past few years and is really starting to tarnish their reputation, allowing companies like CD Project Red and now Guerilla Games to start to outshine them at their own game.

I have hope that they'll turn it around, and I think bringing Hudson back might be a good jolt of energy that they need.
 
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Shoeless

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The Kotaku article gave a lot of insight as to what a behind-the-scenes clusterf**k ME:A's development was and it seems a lot of the blame should go to EA and not necessarily BW. I still mostly liked it, and thought the gameplay was great, though I feel the story/dialogue problems are pretty severe.

That was a really great piece of research/investigative journalism and I was very impressed with the scope of it. They managed to cover a lot of ground and dig up a lot of dirt that I honestly wouldn't have expected them to. It's really too bad what happened with BioWare Montreal, seems like they really got shafted over this. Although yeah, I have to admit, I don't know how much more successful ME:A would have been if they'd actually managed to get their original No Man's Sky procedurally generated worlds mechanic to actually work.
 

lilyWhite

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ME:A, however, not only had severe issues with facial animations, animation glitches, and a bunch of bugs, but it suffered heavily from shitty writing and horrid dialogue.

That YouTube video is made by someone who deliberately takes things out of context and misrepresents the game to appeal to the people who want to declare the game a complete disaster. His most glaring example of that was trying to claim the game had a graphical downgrade by comparing pre-release trailers of the game to the PC version of the game—with the graphics settings turned down to made the game's graphics look poor.

Then again, according to NPD, Andromeda outsold Horizon: Zero Dawn, being the third-best-selling game of the year in March, despite H:ZD being released the month before...
 

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That YouTube video is made by someone who deliberately takes things out of context and misrepresents the game to appeal to the people who want to declare the game a complete disaster. His most glaring example of that was trying to claim the game had a graphical downgrade by comparing pre-release trailers of the game to the PC version of the game—with the graphics settings turned down to made the game's graphics look poor.

Absolutely none of that is true. You are living in a complete fantasy world of made up apologetics.

Then again, according to NPD, Andromeda outsold Horizon: Zero Dawn, being the third-best-selling game of the year in March, despite H:ZD being released the month before...
A game from a very popular, established franchise that was released on 3 different platforms outsold a brand new IP sold only on one platform?

Gee, how surprising.
 
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Opty

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The Frozen Wilds expansion for HZD came out on Tuesday. Anyone else get it?

It's pretty good (NO SPOILERS, so rest easy). As reported in several review articles, it's about 15 hours of content if you take your time and do all the side quests and errands. Since it takes place before the game's ending, the outcome of the DLC isn't earth-shattering or anything, but it is pretty engaging and it does expand on the background of the world and offers more insights into certain characters and story elements.

The graphics and landscapes are, of course, gorgeous and impressive. They've improved things like snow effects, water effects, and the conversation animations (facial expressions, body movements, gestures, etc.) are noticeably improved too. Voice acting is top-notch, just like the regular game. Some of the new background music is a bit "off," though, because it just doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the game. It's a noticeable departure from the style of the main game's music and seems like it'd fit better in a purely sci-fi game like Mass Effect. Not a big deal, though, but given that the rest of the music fits more of a fantasy genre, one or two bits of the new, "sci-fi sounding" music kind of stuck out like a sore thumb.

You get new weapons and armors. They're actually quite useful, and not just superfluous fluff. So, I recommend getting as many of them as you can. If you horded shards from the main game, they won't do you any good in most difficulty modes* because the Banuk use a new type of currency called "bluegleam," so you'll need to find as much of it as you can in order to buy the new stuff. You can dig it up around the map, you'll get it in reward boxes from some quests, and one of the merchants in Meridian now trades for it (you'll need shards and machine hearts to trade with him, though).

*But, if you're playing on Ultra Hard, New Game+ mode, then the 3 maps you need to purchase to find stuff in the new area will cost over 20,000 shards total (about 7,000 shards per map!).

Several new animals but only 3 new machines, but all of them are cool and challenging to fight (bring your fire protection!). One of the three was waaaayyyy too tough to fight (in my opinion) but thankfully they released a new patch today that nerfed two of the new machines so that they're not insanely strong and tanky. I was playing on "very hard" and one of those machines was about 3 times as tough as fighting a Thunderjaw, so it really did need to be nerfed.

I'll probably play through it again this weekend on Ultra Hard.

Over all, if you liked the main game, then this DLC is totally worth the money. I really enjoyed it. This is the only expansion/DLC they're going to release for it, so it's going to be a long, painful wait for the sequel.
 
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HD Simplicityy

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I was really hesitant on Horizon Zero Dawn when it was first revealed. As more bits of information came out, I was thinking "This looks so mediocre." I was a strict Xbox player; I didn't branch out to buy my first PlayStation until nearly a year ago. I'd played them a little before, but it was watching playthroughs of The Last of Us and Uncharted that got me interested. But I didn't decide until last year. Read one really great review, then said I'll try it.

Never before have I been so wrong about a game.

I loved it so much. Given its Guerrilla's first open world game, and my first from Guerrilla, I was later on blown away by the experience. I had some online help to give me ideas and explain a few things to me, which didn't hinder my playing. Aloy joined my list of favorite game characters; I love her. In the end I thought it was one of the top ten best games I'd ever played. Placed it with in a tie with Skyrim at #6, but I give it a higher score. I'm forever grateful for this game and how fun and intriguing, tragic and heroic, funny and emotional, it is. The Frozen Wilds DLC was great as well.

I have 92 hours played, and will keep adding a little bit more as I collect remaining data files and just take in the absolutely beautiful graphics ever time I play.
 

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So I've finally gotten around to playing this game and it's sooooo good! I love looking at it! I love figuring out which way to tackle fighting the machines! And I've barely gotten started, so I'm excited to see what all there is to do.
 

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Not going to lie Morri, I'm a little jealous of you being able to play it for the first time. It's such a great game. Enjoy it!
 

Richard White

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Well, I've just about finished every side quest, corrupted zone, etc. etc. etc. I guess I'm going to have to go back in and face the GraveHorde and Cauldron Zeta eventually. Gah.

I'm a much better sniper with this game than I am at shooting on the run.
 

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I think it's gravehorde where you start the final battle up on the catwalk? I tried to at least do some damage stealth before I had to fight on the ground. I felt off the catwalk and died repeatedly without the enemy even being alerted to me being there... :e2smack:
 

Richard White

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I think it's gravehorde where you start the final battle up on the catwalk? I tried to at least do some damage stealth before I had to fight on the ground. I felt off the catwalk and died repeatedly without the enemy even being alerted to me being there... :e2smack:

Yep, that's the one.

The saddest thing is, the first time, when I had no idea what I was doing, I came the closest to beating the boss there (keeping it vague to not spoil it for anyone). It seems like, since then, the more I try it, the worse I get at it. I think I'm overthinking the task instead of just doing it.

I'll probably take another stab at it this weekend.
 

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It took me a good few tries! (I think I died on the catwalk four times - the back doesn't connect to the wall!) Try using your stealth time to assess which arrows to use on which parts*. It makes that fight so much easier once you know where to target....

*if this is your SOP, you are a much more methodical player than I was....
 
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