Horizon Zero Dawn | PS4

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Horizon Zero Dawn’s fresh face immediately brought intrigue to a genre that's seen fans become  increasingly jaded over the years. The vast open-world setting, peppered with explorative opportunities, possessed just enough charm to keep most of us curious throughout the development process.

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​by Gabriella
​Petty

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​@gabriella_petty

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Developer: Guerrilla Games
Publisher: Sony
Platforms: PS4
Players: 1

The PlayStation exclusive lives up to its promise while pulling influences from its peers, including the loot system from Dragon Age: Inquisition, the mighty boss battles from Monster Hunter, and the survival elements from the recent iterations of Tomb Raider. Horizon bolsters a fantastic balance of challenging gameplay and addictive combat sequences, all whilst teaching you how to handle its uniquely post-post-apocalyptic world.

You play as Aloy, a softly-spoken warrior who sets out to uncover her roots in a purposeful journey of self-discovery. Raised in the wilderness, Aloy quickly learns the art of survival as machines now ravage the once-lush lands she calls home, regressing humans to a tribal state of living in the process.

You're equipped with the Focus, a nifty device that enables you to scan machines to identify their strengths and weaknesses, which helps to plan your approach. Although stealth is advocated, and rewarded with loot, the ability offers flexibility, and encourages you to explore a range of approaches to combat. Focus, universal in its capabilities,  is also a handy feature for hunting and decrypting audio data points - a feature developers Guerrilla Games brought over from their Killzone series.

Whilst the inclusion of more weapon types would have been pleasing, Horizon offers an arsenal that feels adequate for taking on the world's inhabitants - both mechanical and human. An example of this is the Ropecaster, which is perfect at bringing larger machines to their knees, leaving them open to devastating attacks to their core. This is handy when the odds are stacked against you, offering a moment of solace during tougher encounters.​​​

The PlayStation exclusive lives up to its promise.

The D-pad allows you to flick through Alloy’s inventory items - various potions and traps - on the fly, but feels awkward during intense situations. You'll often come to a standstill as you fumble around for the correct item, which is equivalent to serving yourself up to enemies.

The world, known as the ‘Embrace’, is a huge accomplishment on Guerrilla's part, constantly flirting with the technical limits of the PlayStation 4, and, arguably, this generation of consoles in general. Horizon’s visuals play a spectacular part in bringing the world to life, frequently causing you to pause and utilise the built-in picture mode to capture the sights as you overlook wintry mountains or traipse through blazing red deserts. Climbing onto a Tallneck - dinosaur-inspired machine hybrids - uncovers  parts of the map to allow for deeper exploration; the desire to do which is hard to resist.

​Travelling across the game's vistas is a seamless experience, with abundant save points spread throughout the world. This allows you to easily dictate the length of your play session and dodge any potential open-world fatigue.

There's plenty of opportunity for looting and hunting, too. Plants can be collected and act as a natural remedy when it comes to restoring your health. While potions do a better job, it's nice to have them to fall back on.

Cauldrons -  Horizon’s equivalent to archaeological gold mines - provide light challenges that are best conquered through stealth. These cavernous pits reap rewards in the form of overrides, allowing Aloy to hack a plethora of machines to turn them against each other. This feature compliments stealth greatly, particularly if you're one to generally avoid confrontation.

Whilst Cauldrons and other side quests offer a moderate experience boost, many are simple and unengaging fetch quests. This paired with awkward NPC encounters can drain some of Horizon’s infectious energy.

Its world is a warm and open invitation that encourages you to explore its every corner.

Aloy works with a number of tribes, who resort to blind faith and religious tendencies in the uncertain times, throughout the course of her adventure. A dialogue wheel injects an element of player choice as you interact with these settlements, but the decisions you make are far from imperative; put simply, it serves only to bring you closer to Aloy.​

The shared struggle of humanity makes for an intelligently woven story that touches on many of today's relevant political and societal themes, evoking a sense of genuine curiosity to discover more about Horizon and its world. How Aloy’s role fits into this puzzle is constantly challenged, and the result in its conclusion is riveting.

Horizon is an exciting addition to the PlayStation catalogue and a testament to the prospect of what an open-world game can be. Although Horizon’s cohesion is often disrupted by the occasional bit of goofy dialogue or clunky inventory management, its world is a warm and open invitation that encourages you to explore its every corner. With a surprisingly charming storyline that will feed your curiosity, Guerrilla have produced what will likely be the next big PlayStation franchise.

Pros

• Plenty of side quests to keep you occupied
• Combat is challenging but thrilling to experience
• Rich open world ripe with explorative opportunities

Cons

• NPC encounters are sometimes tedious and uninspiring
• D-pad inventory scheme could do with some refinement
• Bizarre costume changes during cutscenes

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​Score 9/10