Horizon Forbidden West2022

Horizon Zero Dawn was my personal Game of the Year in 2017. And on the whole, I liked it a bit better than the successor. However, Horizon II Forbidden West cannot be denied the incredible quality of a Sony Triple A blockbuster. However, I also have criticism: which goes far beyond the game itself, as it generally annoys me that games are becoming more and more oversized and as a “normal” employee no longer has the time to play this mountain of much too huge, sometimes also unnecessarily huge games (Assassins Creed from Origins). More about that in a few months (LOL) when I go through Elden Ring. Story: The story of Aloy begins about a month after the end of Part 1. [Spoiler for Part 1] Hades is defeated and everything seems wonderful. Unfortunately, this is not so, because a disease spreads over the world. Aloy hears about a backup of Gaia, the AI developed by Elisabeth Sobeck. The AI monitored and executed Zero Dawn. Gaia is needed to stop the plague. So Aloy goes in search. In my opinion, the story does not come close to Part 1, which for me is mainly due to the rather curved ending. Furthermore, I find Aloy, as in the predecessor, too one-dimensional. She has no weaknesses, can do everything and is loved by all. Like a Mary Sue. Only once in the game you notice a certain drop height Aloys. Unfortunately, there is also a chance to give Aloy more character depth. However, Forbidden West also has great moments that cover the palette of all emotions. Graphic: Now let’s get to the graphics and wow! With Horizon II Forbidden West we have finally arrived in the next gen! All textures are super sharp, the animations of the faces look, not as in the first part, realistic and the game runs butter soft at 1800p at 60fps or 4k at 30fps. Aloy also reacts to the environment: she sweats in the desert and freezes in the snow. (more and better information: https://youtu.be/AtTLrfdchoo ) I have seen such a level of detail in The Last of Us Part 2. The metal beings are equally detailed and look fantastic. I spent several hours in photo mode and took various snapshots. Gameplay / Open-World: The game principle is identical to the predecessor: With arrow and bow, the player fights with Aloy against various, fundamentally different and interesting metal creatures that range from T-Rex, Triceratops to the ant bear. Fighting is a lot of fun. The opponents have different weaknesses, which can be exploited with different elemental shells. The fight against humans has become better, through more variance in close combat with the spear. However, it is not enough to begin the fight with the machines, as I have hardly ever used the combos that were newly introduced. Stump on it has, except for the practice sites, always sufficient. My biggest criticism and the only one that really annoyed me during the game was climbing. Aloy is constantly climbing somewhere else, jumping into nothing and falling down. As a result, I had to repeat climbing passages several times until I arrived at the top. The quest structure is typical of open world: main and side quests are processed, collecting objects are collected. The fact that the Open Game World is animated but by varied territories and interesting opponents and the story is, despite weaknesses, very interesting, makes me look beyond the old-fashioned mission structure and not bored, as in Assassins Creed Valhalla make out. The graphics are beautiful, which also increases the immersion. It was a pity that the most beautiful area – the coast with San Francisco – could only really be explored to the end. Maybe, as with the first part, the developers should have thought about embedding the story into a more linear adventure in order to give the story even more pep and avoid the open-world quest uniform pulp. Conclusion: Horizon II Forbidden West into a very good game, with fantastic graphics and a good story. Unfortunately, like its predecessor, it is slowed down by the Open World. I don’t understand why today, felt, every game has to get an open world. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the game and I am looking forward to the successor. Rating: Graphics/game world: 92/100 Gameplay: 80/100 Story: 80/100 Total: 84

Translated from German·Show original