An embargo's lifted on Horizon: Zero Dawn previews today, and Sony has delivered with over 20 minutes of gameplay footage showing off an entire quest. In this commentated video, we get a glance at the game's structure, with inventory management segueing into dialogue trees and the excellent combat wrapping a big bow around the beautiful package.
The jury's still very much out on the writing and facial animations, but the combat seems on point and the role-playing elements appear to be all present and intact. A round of new hands-on impressions also reveal that Sony may be onto something here; the Kinda Funny folks open their preview by describing the game as "f*cking awesome". Fingers crossed?
[source youtube.com]
Comments 57
No comments on this? Really?
It does look very promising. I wish BioWare would show ME Andromeda gameplay like this, with a quest segment.
I hate the way they say her name. Ah-loy not Ay-loy
@get2sammyb looks like people aren't as hyped as they made out lol
Personally I'm going to avoid all videos for this game because I want to go into it blind and the fact Kinda Funny describe it as "F***ing awesome!" Is good enough for me
Im hyped as hell but i dont want to see anymore. My body is ready
This is my next game, no doubt
Yeah I'm avoiding any more videos at this point. I've seen enough to pre-order what looks like pure gaming nirvana. I don't want to spoil the experience for myself.
This is my first digital pre-order ever... That's how confident and hyped I am π
Definitely buying this game but the writing seems weak by what I've just seen. Also is it me or does Aloy mumble really quietly? I'm hoping there's a side quest in which she receives elocution lessons.
@ApostateMage I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be Ay-loy, but I guess they're working on the game... Weird.
@Mergatro1d I can't listen to her without hearing Chloe from Life Is Strange.
The pop in in the video puts me off a bit but normally I'm not bothered by it when playing
Voice acting and animations are still very iffy
Yeah, I'm going in blind too. The story trailer gave me more than enough.
Looks like Far Cry Primal but with a girl and robo-dinosaurs. Think I'll hold off on this one for a few weeks after release, and see what the reviews say.
The facial animation is kind of weird; some mouths barely move and others move too wildly. I usually get used to weird lip syncing so it's not much of a problem.
It's Guerrilla Games. The visuals were never going to be anything other than impressive.
Not a huge fan of most of the character designs, but the gameplay itself looks solid enough. I'll wait to hear how much of a balance there is between the exploratory and narrative elements.
The gameplay still looks great and we know it's visually impressive and I don't get the fuss over the facial animations. My only concerns are if the story turns out to be any good and if we can tone down that messy HUD, why do I need health in numbers and a bar? Why do I constantly need my mission objective written on screen? and I don't need an icon above every enemy I encounter to show me what they're doing especially when they have bright lights showing basically the same thing. If all this nonsense can be turned off then I'll be happy
Reading the 19 Things You Never Knew About Horizon Dawn article over on playstation EU blog, it seems to be just Far Cry Primal with mechanical dinsosaurs complete with camp fires as way points..
Sure does look pretty though!
I watched the Kinda Funny video and it looks great. The facial animations are sometimes a little goofy but they usually are in most games (Arkham series comes to mind along with Fallout 4). Part of me wants to keep watching more gameplay and the other part wants to keep the rest a surprise. I think one thing I'm really looking forward to though is using arrows. It will be a nice change from using guns.
@carlos82 Well, the facial animations aren't Uncharted 4 levels of goodness. This isn't that good, but neither was something like The Witcher 3, and that's one of my favourite games, despite the sometimes goofy facial animations. I think I can live with this, the rest looks absolutely amazing though.
@Octane to be fair Uncharted 4's facial animations are head and shoulders above pretty much every game I've ever played and no open world game is going to match that for a long time. For the type of game this is they are above average for me, Witcher 3 was good in that regard for the important characters and as you said everywhere else looks great and this is where we'll be spending 99% of our time
Played by a hipster version of Tim an Eric, they just seem odd. The characters had some pretty pathetic facial expressions and lip sync, please ask sucker punch how its done. Side quests never usually interest me that much but the environment they've created does interest me so I'll wait and see.
#hype
@carlos82 @Octane yeah but when you have UC4 and the absolutely stunning facial animation in Infamous SS, it's a shame they couldn't do better. It just looks wonky.
@Bad-MuthaAdebisi Uncharted and inFAMOUS are both quite linear, though. If this is going to have as much content as it's looking, then it would have took years and years to animate at the same level. You need to compare to its peers like Fallout 4 and The Witcher.
That said, I do agree that it's not very good.
Combat actually requires skill! It's hectic and ferocious. Reminds me of monster Hunter mixed with witcher except faster. This is one is an early Xmas present lol!
@get2sammyb I read the title and thought they released a demo for us.
@gmxs @CD456 Isn't Far Cry Primal 1st person? As somebody who can't stand FP and won't play them, so I skipped Bioshock and Skyrim, though I did try, but plays a ton of 3rd person adventure games like Infamous, Uncharted and Tomb Raider, that makes all the difference in the world to me.
Now this game does look a lot like Zelda, releasing days apart, so I still need to choose 1 sooner and 1 later, but if either were FP I wouldn't even be paying attention, I just can't play them. It's not a headache or naseua thing, it just feels all wrong and it's too weird for me to enjoy.
It's worth mentioning that most of the previews were on a standard PS4 rather them Pro.
Second game I'll pre-order in my life!
I hope it's as good as it looks.
@get2sammyb "quite linear"
Funny, I've been feeling that way about FFXV lately. After XCX, which I know you never played, it feels like I'm constantly running into invisible walls and barriers that I should be able to get past but I can't. Besides the big valley next to Lestallum there are 6' tall rock walls everywhere it seems. It's a huge mostly open world, but XCX had zero limits besides the map border at the end of the oceans. I'm OK with the car on the road, Chocobo opened up some stuff, but it still feels like I am constantly running around stuff to get places. That rock area northwest of the Chocobo place is always in my way. I'd say 2/3 open would be generous. I need to map it out when I'm done, or find one.
I hope this is better laid out and explained on the map. I know there have to be boundaries, but don't make them all 6' tall, make them 30' so I know in advance. The FFXV map, both the 4' poster I got with the hardcover guide and in game, looks open, they don't do a good job at marking walls. It's almost false advertising.
@get2sammyb on twitter you seemed to have really strong opinions which aren't reflected here - "Worst Horizon: Zero Dawn fears realised? Haha, holy crap this is bad" ( https://twitter.com/_get2sammyb/status/826086402496593920 ), though I can't watch the video you linked in that tweet. I'm curious why you wouldn't share those thoughts and insights here or on the site in general?
Seems very similar to the situation with RotTR where all the site's contents were positive but you clearly had issues with it expressed later.
I'm calling this out only because if the site's content related to games is slanted towards the positive then us readers need to go and search out the whole story separately. Also, if this is part of the embargo conditions or similar arrangement, then that is an issue for the industry in general.
@Mega-Gazz Because I plan to do a separate video/article on that tweet I just haven't had time to make it yet. And also, that cut-scene wasn't in this video.
I did however say: "The jury's still very much out on the writing and facial animations..."
With Tomb Raider, no one agrees with me.
I don't know why people keep mentioning the facial animations. This isn't Uncharted, they probably can't do mo cap due to the time it all takes. Besides it's not as bad as Fallout 4s, even The Witcher 3 has issues because it seemed like they only had 5 faces for random NPC's so every other person looked the same, just with different haircuts.
Hi, new here. A few things...
1) If the combat and RPG elements are good, I am fine with suboptimal facial expressions, etc. That said, I'd have loved the full package.
2) I'm also pretty much on lockdown on watching videos, as I don't want to spoil even the littlest bit. I'm this excited about the game.
3) It's AH-LOY β like the metal. Makes sense if you think about it that way.
Cannot wait for Horizon i also think its going to do very well review wise.
Doesn't really look fun to me. Guess I'll wait for Yooka Layle.
@get2sammyb Thanks for the context
I don't want to spoil myself of the game but I can't stop watching kinda funny preview video, really glad they say it's more rpg than they expected. I also like we can shape aloy personality through conversation (there are heart, punch and brain icon on the conversation lol).
Man sony is on the roll this year
I don't get it. Normally I be all over a game like this, but for some reason this just bores me to tears. I think it might the paleo/technology juxtaposition thing. I'll probably end up renting or trying a friend's option though.
Im gunna watch this real baked tonight so I dont remember too much
@rjejr
Skyrim is 3rd person. Just push in the left stick.
I can't stand 1st person perspective games either!
I can genuinely say the only footage of Horizon I've watched are the trailers Sony showed of on stage.
No way I'm spoiling myself now. Waited long enough
It looks great. I just hope the performances and writing are generally ok. I'm not expecting the best story ever written, but if it's all above the level of that one now-infamous cutscene, we should be alright.
And, it's definitely Ay-loy. They've been calling her that since they revealed the game. It's inspired by the Eloi from The Time Machine by H.G. Wells
@get2sammyb For the record, I'm with you on RotTR. I enjoyed the game, but Lara's voice actress was dreadful.
Ok, but what about combat and core gameplay? I already have a gorgeous looking waving plant life simulator known as TW3 so this time I'll wait and read a lot about how you actually play and enjoy the game before buying.
I diden't saw the story trailer so... Don't want to watch this too
But im already hyped with it
I'm really encouraged by the overwhelmingly positve hands-on impressions posted around the web. Most people seem not only to like it and find it promising but straight on love it. Also like the fact that some pointed out that it really is an RPG after all.
More worriesome are the Far Cry comparisons, the clustered UI and the overall structure of the open world (I'd really like it to offer something different, but it seems will get the generic bases and hunts).
Also (and I know I'm nitpicking here) ..why the hell the tribsemen sound so "modern" (for a lack of a better word) 1000 after the collapse of humanity?? The bearded guy on the bridge especially sounds likes some bored hipster dude.
After seeing the latest footage from this game I'm actually starting to get a bit hyped for this. The world looks promising and I'm a bit intrigued by the whole concept. I'm really happy to be a gamer atm. So much win.
@Lurker Regarding the modern speech - it's an interesting point, but I'm sure that in one video or article I've looked at, they said they decided not to fill the game with imaginary words etc. in order to keep the story and characters relatable. Makes sense from a storytelling perspective, but as you say, it's set far into the future - language would realistically have changed, especially given humanity's societal collapse.
But there we are!
I'm super Over Hyped for this game, I could only survive 5 minutes of the footage...can't go any further, I'm just gonna wait 27 days with skipping the media...can't wait for it...
Quitumply β it's seemingly not AY-loy if in the game itself the characters pronounce it as AH-loy. As this is the case, it still seems like it would be a play off of the alloy metal. http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/pronunciation/english/alloy.
If I'm wrong, and the Eloi influence is indeed the origin of her name, then the lack of congruence in pronunciation is odd at least and at worst a baffling error.
@doctommaso I'm aware of the resemblance to the word alloy, but I didn't know the in-game characters were calling her that rather than Ay-loy? That's odd.
@Gold_Ranger "Skyrim is 3rd person. Just push in the left stick."
Now somebody tells me that? Years after it released? Ugh.
Well thank you very much kind sir. Maybe if game discs still came w/ manuals I would have figured that out. I'm such an idiot. Ugh, ugh I say. grr Well at least I can look forward to playing it now, so I have that going for me. Sorry for the tantrum.
@rjejr No problem buddy!
Just get it for the Switch when it comes out or wait for a decent price.
The DLC is really good, and as you know from NintyLife... I hate, even loathe dlc!
Re: the ay-loy, or ah-loy - it probably depends on who is talking about the game, and where they are from. to a dutch speaker, it would typically be pronounced the latter.
you could just as easily have the argument about the word amen - ay-men or ah-men?.
@Gold_Ranger I own Skyrim on PS3, came in a dual pack w/ Bioshock 1 and 3 for about $15, so I bought it even though I don't play FPS, figured for that price I could learn to like it. Never did. Any chance Bisohock has 3rd person, those settings are great but I hate playing like that.
@rjejr Never played BioShock, sorry.
@rjejr I agree Xenoblade Chronicles X was asome in the overall world design and the fact you really could get to everything and walk on anything. Sorta hyped for Zelda because I know that will also feature that aspect to it. Anyone know by the way if Horizon Zero Dawn have invis walls or not with a source confirming?
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