Walking with cyberdinosaurs. Horizon review: Zero Dawn

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The biggest problemhorizon:ZeroDawnis that its details have been kept secret for too long. There is nothing strange in this: the plot of the game is very sensitive to spoilers, so revealing the details would be too risky for the developers. On the other hand, it was precisely this secrecy that played withHorizon bad joke. If you were expecting something out of the ordinary from the game, be prepared for the fact that it will either impress you to the core or disappoint you a little.

In the future, humanity, as usual, experienced some kind of large-scale catastrophe. Beautiful cities with skyscrapers, highways and burger restaurants have fallen apart and are overgrown with moss. Now strange mechanical creatures, very similar to ordinary animals, graze on former agricultural lands and in picturesque forests. Here you have deer robots, bison robots, and even dinosaur robots. The remaining people live in tribes of varying degrees of development: some live in wooden shacks and pick mushrooms and berries, others built a hefty city under the Middle Ages with knights and mechanical elevators, and still others do not allow the first and second to live in peace, attacking them with light machine guns and sticks. The fact that this is a post-apocalypse is only reminiscent of the ruins of ancient American cities. Only some curious comrades go there, but none of them really thinks about what happened to the civilization developed in the past. And this is a little strange: the concentration of rusty tanks per square kilometer is off scale, and this suggests that something terribly bad has happened.

The main character of the game, a young girl named Aloy, just refers to such curious individuals. As a child, she enters an ancient dungeon and finds a small device called a visor, which, apparently, works via Bluetooth. Aloy, of course, does not know about this, but keeps the device to herself, using it to its fullest. The cheat visor gives her witcher senses and the ability to see hidden tracks, it helps her communicate from a distance and, most importantly, allows her to interact with ancient technology. This interaction, however, is limited to opening doors and reading all sorts of diaries.

The concentration of rusty tanks per square kilometer is off scale, and this suggests that something terribly bad has happened.

The diaries are the backbone of Horizon's story. Through them, the whole story of the game is revealed. In fact, most of the main storyline is a long journey from end to end of the map, from one underground room with a set of diaries to another. They came, listened, killed some hefty robot, ran on - and so on until the very end. Apparently, Guerilla was sure that the story contained in these diaries alone would impress the player so much that he would turn a blind eye to all the shortcomings of the game's storyline.

It can be interesting to hear about what happened to the ancient civilization and where the beast-like machines came from on the planet. Curious, but no more. According to Guerilla, what happened on the planet seems very far-fetched, and sometimes even absurd. That is, the idea, of course, is cool, but sagging in all respects. There are obvious holes and inconsistencies in the plot that are very striking. Although for many players the scale of the very idea of ​​​​the developers certainly compensates for its underdevelopment. And this is good: you will not have to regret the money spent.

It can be interesting to hear about what happened to the ancient civilization and where the beast-like machines came from on the planet. Curious, but no more.

It was very strange to realize that history is the weakest side of Horizon. The dialogues in the game are childishly naive, the heroine now and then rushes to extremes, the characters behave absolutely illogically. The whole game is based on the confrontation of conditional "good" and conditional "evil", and the characters are trying their best to show their belonging to the first or second side. Well, Aloy herself is just the queen of some incomprehensible sarcastic altruism. Today she is at odds with everyone, and tomorrow she forgets about all her affairs and rushes to help others right and left, turning into some kind of people's detective. She searches for missing brothers, missing sisters, and missing objects without asking for anything in return. Okay, Geralt from The Witcher did all those things. After all, this is his profession, which he made a living from. But why yesterday's exile voluntarily becomes an errand girl for the whole world is absolutely incomprehensible. Maybe she just wants to be loved by everyone? In general, there are big problems with the characters in this game.

As you can see by now, the side quests in Horizon are not to be praised for. Obviously, they were created only for the sake of having them. The same can be said about the dialogue wheel: it is in the game, but its influence on the plot and on the passage is simply zero. The ability to select lines in the dialogues serves only to ensure that the next NPC tells you some sentimental story or tells you about what is happening in his area.

Why yesterday's exile voluntarily becomes an errand girl for the whole world is absolutely incomprehensible. Maybe she just wants to be loved by everyone?

Horizon: Zero Dawn is Guerilla Games' first attempt at a massive open world game. The studio, apparently, decided not to be smart, and as a result, Horizon is a huge constructor assembled from elements of many other games that you might have seen before. The situation, in principle, is normal, but in the Guerilla game all these elements do not fully add up to the whole picture. The heroine travels to huge locations on the local Roach, collects colorful grass for making potions, skins wild boars for crafting and hacks huge cyber-dinosaurs that personify towers.

The feeling that all this has already been somewhere does not leave for a minute. On the other hand, the game will be quite understandable to everyone: you already know that you need to look for animal skins to craft bags, and plants with red flowers will be useful to create healing infusions. Well, extra items can be drained to local merchants in order to then buy better weapons from them. Weapons, by the way, in the game is quite small. The main striking force is made up of bows of two types: rapid-fire and sniper. It is with their help that you will most often literally tear apart the robo-fauna of Horizon: Zero Dawn. And I must say, she is very angry here.

The feeling that all this has already been somewhere does not leave for a minute. On the other hand, the game will be quite clear to everyone.

If something went wrong with the plot of Guerilla, then in terms of battles with the robots inhabiting the world, the game is all right. These guys are plentiful in every location, and most of them rush at the player at the first opportunity. Trying to mindlessly shoot them is a bad idea. Each robot has its weak points, which are carefully illuminated by the visor main character. However, opponents do not stand still - they run around you, waiting for the right moment to attack. You have to constantly be on the move, dodging throws and trying to seize an opportunity to send a couple of arrows into the enemy's weak spot. Robots have their own resistance and their own vulnerability to certain types of damage. Therefore, you can easily deal with some especially healthy creature in a matter of seconds, freezing it from head to toe or blowing up its fuel tanks.

Fighting robots in Horizon: Zero Dawn is a real pleasure. If you wish, you can avoid large-scale open fights by developing stealth skills, hiding in tall grass and luring them out one at a time. But passing the game with a twinkle is, of course, much more fun. The difficulty of the battles here is high, and at such moments, Horizon will be a serious challenge for you.

Fight the robotshorizon:ZeroDawn is a pleasure.

But what's most impressive is how the game looks. Today, Horizon boasts perhaps the most beautiful open world on the current generation of platforms. Even on a regular PlayStation 4, the game produces a chic picture by modern standards. It seems that every corner of the game map was made by hand. There are huge forests, and high mountain ranges, and even a real desert, getting into which, one wonders how the developers managed to fit all this beauty in one game. The map looks huge though. There are no through paths in it, so you will have to travel a lot, but there is simply no desire to use the ability to quickly travel. Everything is too beautiful - it would be imprudent to ignore such magnificence. Horizon is a paradise for lovers of beautiful screenshots, to help them, a photo mode with a bunch of useful settings is built into the game from the start.

Guerilla Games has yet to learn how to make open world games. They know how to create stunningly beautiful locations and cool action that challenges the player. Horizon: Zero Dawn is dragged down by a weak storyline and a complete lack of any unique mechanics. The creators of the game seem to have spied them everywhere they could. And I really wanted them to present us something of themselves.

Vasily KURGALOV: I'm kind of glad I didn't have to write a review for Horizon: Zero Dawn. All because of ambiguous impressions and feelings of disappointment in the game. Especially against the background of the fact that there are not very many exclusives on the PlayStation 4 today. The expectations of the game exceeded the game itself. To some extent, this is the fault of the developer, and to some extent, the hungry public. Horizon: Zero Dawn came out as a rather controversial project. The first pancake for Guerrilla Games turned out to be lumpy. The team that gave us Killzone made a number of, one might say, childish mistakes.

Guerrilla Games is definitely good at graphics and design. The world in which we are immersed looks incredibly elaborate on the outside. This is not just another post-apocalypse where there is nothing and, most likely, there will be nothing. We got a very interesting concept of the meeting of the primitive present and the high-tech past. Sometimes you just stand and "stick" to the local views, the play of light and shadow, admiring the same robots. Horizon: Zero Dawn was definitely made with love.

The game is based on a very unusual idea - this has not been shown to us anywhere else. Mankind has returned to primitive times: someone wages tribal wars, others live in a feudal system. Instead of animals, there are robots here, and watching people fight with them with arrows is very funny at first, and then interesting. The concept of Horizon: Zero Dawn is really very unusual - the developer can and should be praised for this. But that, unfortunately, is where the praise ends. Guerrilla Games has shown that it can come up with an interesting idea and competently implement it in technical terms. But only technically.

Everything rests on the secondary plot. An interesting idea breaks down into a rather banal and predictable story with obvious moves. The main character Aloy solves absolutely standard problems that would fit into the world of any game, and the entourage of Horizon: Zero Dawn acts only as a “backdrop”. Aloy's story would look exactly the same in any other game as it does here. And this is a problem, because before the release, everything said that we were waiting for a very original character and a unique story. In fact, it all came down to the hackneyed "save everyone" and "thank you for saving me." The same one also had a rather unusual concept. But take Joel and Ellie out of the world of the game and the whole story loses its charm. You can’t transfer their journey to another world - it simply won’t work. And the story of Aloy will quietly exist in any other post-apocalypse.

Guerrilla Games could not find a competent balance between dynamics and statics. Often the action is interrupted by a cutscene or dialogue, the presence of which is completely unjustified. Often you are cut off at a moment when you just want to move on in the story. Instead, you have to listen to the dull speech of the NPC. This greatly squanders the narrative, and at some point it seems that in this way the developers were simply trying to increase the duration of the passage. Of course, you can skip dialogues, but you will lose a lot in understanding both the plot and the game world as a whole.

There are also simply banal errors that other developers got rid of a long time ago. So, you can finish the task in one place, and at the same second a cut-scene will begin, where you will be a kilometer away from the location where you were a second ago. This is a trifle, but it is very striking.

Because of the frequent dialogues, we have to look at the faces of the characters for a long time. And here, for completely incomprehensible reasons, another major minus comes out: the facial animation is very bad. Maybe I'm not understanding something, but still, even Alyx Vance, released in 2004, could express more emotions and was more alive than all the characters in Horizon: Zero Dawn. And this fact causes a huge cognitive dissonance. The localization of the project also falls into the same piggy bank. The vast majority of actors either don't finish their acting, portraying exactly zero emotions, or overact. No surprise, questions or anything else - just a statement of fact. Dry, dull, boring. Apparently, the voice actors were not provided with a document describing the scenes for which they are recording lines.

You can and should play Horizon: Zero Dawn. Just be prepared for the fact that this is not the level of exclusives that have always been a source of pride for any console gamer. We can say that this is a kind of test of the pen, a bold experiment of those people who are used to making corridor shooters. Horizon: Zero Dawn when scrupulously completing all side quests and knocking out achievements can easily take you 70-90 hours. Core gameplay is a matter of taste. Fans of the genre, most likely, will not find big problems in it. Those who expected something else will be disappointed. Guerrilla Games needs to do a lot of work on the bugs before releasing the next part.

Horizon: Zero Dawn

Reviewed version of the game: PlayStation 4

Pros:

• Dynamic, exciting battles;
• Huge detailed open world;
• Outstanding graphics;
• Animal robots;

Minuses:

• Weak plot;
• A small number of weapons;
• Lack of original ideas;

Grade: 7.5

Verdict: an incredibly beautiful, but in many ways secondary game, whose sensational story may well not impress you.

There are a lot of games that take place in a post-apocalyptic world. I immediately recall the classic series and dashing shooters Borderlands and Rage or amazing personal stories like. It is almost impossible to surprise us with even the most unusual setting, we are too spoiled by everything that we have played before. Things may change after you check out Horizon: Zero Dawn, developed exclusively for the Sony PlayStation 4 console by Dutch studio Guerrilla Games. This is exactly what I would like to tell you about today.

The Guerrilla Games studio, whose main office is located in the heart of the Netherlands - the capital of Amsterdam, throughout its 17-year existence, has been developing its single franchise - Killzone. Immediately after the release of the first game in this series for the PlayStation 2 console Sony acquired a small studio and made her one of her key in-house developers. In those years, Sony urgently needed a response to Microsoft's Halo series, so talented developers with their spectacular shooter came in handy. Over time, the Killzone series migrated to the PlayStation Portable, PlayStation 3, and then to the PlayStation 4. But after the release of the last game in the series to date in 2013, almost nothing was heard from Guerrilla Games. True, rumors were in the air that its employees were actively working on a completely new IP that combines science fiction and post-apocalypse.

Jumping from first-person shooters to a whole new genre of action/RPG in the open world is not an easy task. Therefore, many fans of Guerrilla Games were very worried about the quality of the future game. It is understandable. The scales of these two genres are too different. It's one thing to make a bright, daring corridor shooter about the war of earthlings with the inhabitants of an out-of-control space colony, and quite another to create a huge new world, and even convince the player that he is real, alive. After all, this is just an incredible, titanic work: you need to work out its style, create a landscape from scratch, fill it with flora and fauna, make it all obey some kind of general rules, link everything together, and even about settlements, NPCs and dungeons with a bunch of quests, you should not forget. Tens and hundreds of thousands of man-hours are required to make it all come to life on our screen. A game of this magnitude is oh so expensive (the final budget was about 45 million euros), so the Sony producers could only entrust it to the battle-tested specialists of Guerrilla Games.

Horizon: Zero Dawn takes place in the distant future, when the world as we know it was completely destroyed, and completely new life arose from its remnants. Moreover, this life is divided into two completely different types: biological and artificial. Not only hares, squirrels and wild boars run through green meadows and dense forests, but also creepy metal creatures that vaguely resemble animals we know and even dinosaurs. Metal robots resembling crocodiles live in rivers and lakes, and steel buffaloes and horses graze in the fields. From time to time, gigantic mechanical dinosaurs slowly float above them all. And all this seems completely natural to the new generation of people, because they have not seen anything else in their lives. Mankind, meanwhile, rolled back into the Middle Ages. The local king lives in the huge city of Meridian, and the commoners huddle together in tribes and huddle in small settlements. There is a place in the new world for several religions and even dark cults, but this is how people are arranged - without this, nowhere.

I will deliberately not tell you about what happened to our planet, as a result of which the Earth completely rebooted and was inhabited not only by people, but also by cybernetic creatures. Each player must discover the great secret for himself. You can speculate on this topic as much as you like, remembering the well-known plots of The Terminator or The Matrix, because in these films humanity doomed itself to death at the hands of machines created by them. Let me just say that this game will surprise you with an incredibly addictive plot, the development of which is unlikely to be 100% predictable by anyone. Horizon: Zero Dawn reminded me of the fascinating fantasy novels that I loved to read as a child, its plot component is so carefully and deeply worked out. This is not a dummy game where you just have to run and shoot robots. The developers have made a lot of efforts to make the players believe in the reality of what is happening, to believe the emotions of the main characters. And worst of all, they managed to make me believe that something like this could actually happen to humanity in the distant future.

The main character of Horizon: Zero Dawn is a red-haired girl named Aloy. Even in infancy, for some unknown reason, she was abandoned by her native Nora tribe, so an outcast hunter named Rust took up the upbringing of the child. He teaches the girl how to track down animals and robots, how to hunt them, how to survive in the difficult conditions of the new world and wildlife. But, most importantly, he teaches her not to lose heart when the whole world turns away from you, because both of them are outcasts. When Aloy turns 19, she decides to take part in an initiation rite, victory in which can restore her right to become part of her native tribe. It is at this moment that her long journey begins in search of answers to the many questions that torment the girl. What happened to the people who inhabited the world in the past? Who were her parents? Why did her native tribe abandon her? Who created all these amazing machines that flooded the planet? Answers are sure to come. It just takes a little patience.

While still a child, Aloy found in the old ruins a tiny device "Visor" (in the English original - Focus), which, when attached above the ear, allows a person to see and hear amazing things. So she learned to read the archives left over from extinct humanity, learning more and more about the sad history of the so-called "forerunners". Also, the Visor helps her track down people, showing their tracks and the evidence left behind (just like in The game Witcher 3). And most importantly, the Visor points to weak spots in the bodies of machines, allowing them to deal a critical hit and disable them. The device also allows you to scan the surrounding space and discover mechanisms hidden from the eyes, signal sources and all sorts of secrets. The visor will repeatedly save the main character's life, so you need to learn how to use it in the very first place. The Visor is activated by pressing the right analog stick of the DualShock 4 controller.

The combat system of the game is based on the use of several types of weapons, the main of which, of course, is the bow. If you're a fan of archery video games, then Horizon: Zero Dawn is just what the doctor ordered. There are many bows in the game, they all differ in basic parameters, as well as the type of arrows used. You can shoot normal arrows, fire arrows, arrows that rip off armor from the surface of vehicles, high-precision arrows, and so on. If the bow seems not enough for you, you can resort to using slings and throw explosive shells at opponents, or you can put stretch marks from a special cannon along the enemy’s path, on which he will definitely blow up. There is even a weapon in the game that shoots a whole hail of arrows, a kind of primitive shotgun. However, one of the heavy guns can be shot down from some machine, taken in hand and turned against it. There are a lot of strategies related to the use of different types of weapons and ammunition for them. And each player will find the perfect combination for himself, allowing him to dominate his opponents.

If you are not a fan of archery, you can fight enemies with a spear. This is a little more difficult than fighting at a long distance, but also very effective when used correctly. By alternating strong and weak attacks, you can knock down the enemy, and then deal a fatal blow to him. Large vehicles can be knocked over by using a special tool that entangles their legs with ropes. Do you remember the scene from Star Wars where Rebel fighters tied the legs of AT-AT walkers with ropes? Here you can do something similar here. Among other things, you can place various traps on the battlefield, which, upon contact with the enemy, explode or hit him with electricity.

As you progress through the game, Aloy will gain experience and skill points that can be spent in a special menu. The skill tree is divided into three branches. The Hunter category focuses on silent attacks, dodges, and stealth. For example, you can teach Aloy to attack enemies from behind completely silently, sneaking up on them in tall grass. The Warrior category focuses on archery and spear attacks. Time will slow down when you aim at enemies, and melee attacks will become much more powerful. The third category is called the Collector. She will teach Aloy how to extract the most valuable loot from killed enemies and vehicles, as well as more efficiently make ammunition and disable traps.

Crafting plays a very important role in the game. From the bodies of dead animals you will get bones, meat and skins, and from fallen cars you will get valuable parts needed to make ammunition or sell to local merchants for a handful of metal fragments - the local currency. In a separate menu, you will craft arrows for yourself, create healing decoctions, and also increase the capacity of bags for carrying loot and other valuables. Somehow it all reminded me of a similar system from the games of the series Far Cry. But such borrowing in no way makes the game worse or secondary. On the contrary, the system has proven itself perfectly and works just perfectly. You can improve any of your weapons (except for the spear) with the so-called modifiers: make it more accurate, more powerful, more convenient. Clothing can also be upgraded with special fabrics that make it resistant to arrows, fire, electricity, and so on.

In the course of his travels, Aloy will learn to bend machines to his will, hacking into their internal systems. From now on, they will become a serious help in your travels. For example, you can hack a mechanical horse and ride it wherever you want. Hacking more complex machines requires Aloy to have certain security protocols, which can only be obtained in the ancient ruins left from the former civilization. Fans of collectibles will be delighted to learn that mysterious wooden figurines, ancient vessels (actually ordinary mugs with the names of their owners), and metal flowers are scattered all over the world of Horizon: Zero Dawn, which can then be exchanged with merchants for valuable items. . However, merchants will be happy to buy from you in general any finds related to the forerunners, for example, ancient bells (army tags) or ancient bracelets (wristwatches). Do not forget about the numerous audio recordings and holograms that allow you to understand what actually happened to the planet in the distant past.

Quests in the game are divided into main ones that develop the storyline, as well as side ones, which are also very interesting, and they have some influence on the plot. In addition to quests, the game has the so-called "Cases" - simpler tasks, like: go there, kill that one, bring it to me. As for the quality of the quests in the game, I can say that the developers most likely focused on the same Witcher, since some tasks are so interesting that it’s almost impossible to tear yourself away from them. By the way, John Gonzalez, the lead scriptwriter of Fallout, was specially invited to write the script for the quests: New Vegas. Yes, the world of Horizon: Zero Dawn is not as huge as the brainchild of CD Projekt Red, and the number of quests is not as impressive, but the desire of the developers to make game process the most elaborate and exciting - inspires respect. There are investigation tasks when you need to find a thief or a murderer based on the evidence left by him. There are tasks, in one way or another related to the implementation of simple puzzles. There are quests that permeate with the soulfulness of the stories told in them. In this regard, the game is just great and you should not worry about it.

If you are worried that you will have to constantly run on foot from one point to another, I hasten to reassure you: the game has an excellent system for quickly moving around the map. Around the world, you will stumble upon bonfires, approaching which will activate a fast travel point on the map. At first, you will need special kits for this, which can be obtained from killed opponents, and then you can buy an item that allows you to roam the entire map without restrictions. This is especially helpful when completing quests, when after completing them you need to return back to a certain NPC. I also want to note that during dialogues with other characters, Aloy can choose options for her answers, which are divided into three types. The first, marked with the fist symbol, is a direct and aggressive approach. The second, accompanied by the symbol "brain", is a cunning path that uses the ingenuity of the main character. Well, the third option is the use of the “heart” symbol, when Aloy chooses the most gentle and gentle approach to the interlocutor. In general, the ending of the game will in some way depend on how you treated other people during the passage, so be especially careful in the dialogues.

What Dutch developers have never had problems with is the technical side of their projects. Sony management liked their new game engine Decima so much that they began to develop games on it, including in other studios. For example, the horror Until Dawn was created on it, and not so long ago, game designer Hideo Kojima chose Decima as the engine for his future game Death Stranding, which will become a console exclusive to the PlayStation 4. The engine does an excellent job of calculating artificial intelligence, realistic physics, while it produces a wonderful picture in 4K resolution with support for the HDR color range. The engine code is constantly being rewritten and refined by the best programmers from various internal Sony studios, including Kojima Productions, so we can say that this is no longer just a work of Guerrilla Games, but a kind of joint brainchild that satisfies a wide range of game design needs.

Visually, the game looks amazing! The most beautiful landscapes, the ruins of cities covered with greenery, the foliage of trees swaying in the wind, fish splashing in lakes, magnificent sunsets and sunrises - nature in Horizon: Zero Dawn is perhaps the most beautiful that has ever been depicted in a video game. The costumes made a very strong impression on me. It would seem, well, what costumes can be in a video game? It's not a costume drama, after all. And here I would argue with you. When you see all these incredible patterns, fur, bone and metal inserts on the robes of tribal elders, you can imagine how many artists worked on all this beauty. Each Aloy outfit is a small work of art, and you'll have many of these throughout the game. However, the same can be said about the quality of the game's scenery. The love of developers for every, even the smallest detail of the environment is felt all the time.

Personally, I was very worried about the facial animation of the characters, since in the studio's last game, Killzone Shadow Fall, it was implemented very badly. But my fears were not confirmed. Guerrilla Games did an excellent job and animated the faces of the characters to a solid five, they even managed to surprise me, because at some moments I saw the movements of individual facial muscles on the faces of the characters, which, as a rule, are not implemented in video games at all. True, there are secondary characters whose animation is not as expressive as that of the heroes of the first plan. Luckily, this doesn't happen very often in the game. Do you know what struck me the most? In the 35 hours that I spent in this incredible game, I did not come across a single bug. Seriously. In general, not a single slightest glitch, a failure in the texture, a ruined quest, a crash in the console menu. The quality of the work done by Guerrilla Games' QA department is simply amazing. I applaud standing!

But what I want to scold the developers a little for is that they borrowed some game mechanics from various popular series. I already told you about The Witcher and Far Cry. The dialogue wheel is painfully similar to what we saw in mass effect and other RPGs, while Aloy's jumping on mountain ledges immediately brings to mind the Uncharted and Assassin's Creed series. It's not that it's illegal to borrow successful ideas these days, but in this case it looks very blatant. Right here under the blueprint, without any veiling. In this regard, the developers disappointed me a little, but just a little bit, because in the light of the titanic work they have done on the game, this shortcoming seems extremely insignificant, and generally sucked out of my finger. Moreover, despite the secondary nature of many elements, in the aggregate, the game, oddly enough, still feels incredibly fresh.

It is necessary to note the excellent work with sound and the soundtrack that sinks into the soul for a long time. Music for the game was written by composers Joris de Man and Niels van der List, as well as the British duo The Flight. Famous actors were involved in the voice acting of the characters. Aloy is voiced by Ashly Burch, known for her role as Chloe in Life is Strange, as well as dozens of other characters she has voiced in various video games and animated films. Another character in the game was voiced by Lance Reddick, who many remember from the Fringe series and the recent Quantum Break game. In general, I really liked the voice acting. If you wish, you can choose Russian voice acting and not be distracted by subtitles, but I chose to play the game in the original sound and did not regret it.

Pros:

• The game is simply excellent, exciting and very deep story.
• Finally Guerrilla Games allowed to create something new besides Killzone.
• An amazingly detailed living world and incredibly beautiful nature.
• Visually, this is one of the most beautiful and technically perfect games.
• There are never too many robots. And here they are just great.
• Flexible and well-developed combat system that opens up scope for tactics.
• Wonderful voice acting of characters, sound engineering and pleasant music.
• carefully written game quests who want to go to the end.
• Excellent character costumes, worthy of a separate review.
• No bugs. The game never allowed to doubt its quality.

Minuses:

• Many mechanics were borrowed from other successful game series.
• The built-in navigation system does not always provide an ideal route.
• The animation of some minor characters could be better.

Horizon: Zero Dawn is another powerful and exclusive addition to the already impressive PlayStation 4 game library that leaves a great aftertaste. And now I would really like to call this game the beginning new series. Simply because such wonderful projects must necessarily acquire one or even several sequels. It seems to me that the story of Aloy is far from over, and all the most interesting things are waiting for us ahead. A team of 350 people worked on the game for six long years. What did they get in the end? Have they managed to revolutionize the genre? Unlikely. But they managed to create a surprisingly exciting story, a great combat system and a huge living world, full of secrets and mysteries, beckoning to explore every corner of it. Only one thing is frustrating in this situation: the sequel will have to wait at least a few more years. I bet the game 9 points out of 10.

Horizon Zero Dawn combines popular online gaming trends for a single player experience. Everything we are used to is here: gathering, crafting, open world, non-linear passage and more. It would seem that such a kit should have been boring for a long time, but maybe in some other video game. Horizon quickly addictive and does not bother at all, literally at every step the player is waiting for hints and hints, more and more piqued interest.

What is Horizon Zero Dawn

Horizon Zero Dawn is the story of a young huntress named Aloy, who is trying to find her place in the world around her.

The player sees an unusual universe in which people are thrown back into primitive society, and robots rule the planet. People live in small settlements, hunt and gather. Mechanical beasts are found in forests and meadows. Today, it is safe to say that this is where the most beautiful video game landscapes are. The world captivates with endless expanses, scorched deserts, snow-capped mountains, grassy ruins of civilization, gloomy caves. Everything looks like the real thing. It is worth noting that the developers have provided for the presence of a photo mode, with which you can save all the moments of the "journey".

Main character Aloy

The heroine grew up in exile with her mentor Rust. Throughout her life, young Aloy proved to others that she was a worthy person. But, without even blinking an eye, the fiery-haired archer becomes the hope of the tribe. The heroine is endowed with the following abilities:

Finding a visor in the ancient ruins, she sees what is hidden from others. For example, she can determine the hidden places of cars, calculate the route of the robot, read information from old devices;

Having matured, she becomes the owner of another artifact that allows you to open electronic locks, as well as intercept control of various mechanisms;

With this list of abilities, a huge arsenal and good stamina, Aloy has an increased chance of defeating opponents, which are armored vehicles equipped with a laser, bombs, and flamethrowers.

An interesting point is the emphasis on combining ammunition, "tuning" modifications. Available in the game and pumping Aloy, which is carried out in the direction: warrior, gatherer, hunter.

Horizon Zero Dawn is an RPG where tactics, focus, and personal skill play an important role.

Still at the announcement stage Horizon: Zero Dawn seemed like a dark horse to me.
There was very little information about the game - we knew that it would be Action RPG in an open world where the main opponents are mechanized creatures, and the action takes place in the world of the future, in which people in their existence "rolled back" to primitive society, while retaining some of the technology of the previous time.

In addition, to developers from "Guerrilla Games" I have always had a versatile attitude, because their games have always been beautiful, but empty, after passing which, for the most part, nothing was stored in the memory, but this is just my subjective opinion.

There was a fear that the whole game would slide into thoughtless battles with cars and running around in a beautiful, but stingy on details and tasks open world, without a decent plot and further incentive to be in this world.

Is it really so? This is what we have to find out, having analyzed in detail each aspect separately.

1. Plot and characters.

Characters immediately catch the eye, whose characters and motives are revealed one-sidedly and in some places even mediocre. Of the entire galaxy, only one can be singled out Eloy, her mentor rasta acting as a caring guardian and Silence- the mysterious companion of the main character, because his person gives rise to many questions: Who is he? Why here? What are his motives? Is he dangerous?

The other characters are basically unremarkable. Valorous warriors, hot-tempered army commander Erend, young king Avad, trying to right his father's mistakes, formulaic villain and stuff like that.

I was very annoyed by the general admiration for the main character. She is chosen, special, the best, the most beautiful and kind. In the modern realities of the art industry, such as literature, cinema and video games, slightly different postulates operate. It is important to reveal the character from different perspectives, showing the dark side and the light side - this strengthens the emotional connection between the player and the character, but if we have only one side, then we essentially have nothing to compare.

Chosenness has long ceased to be a criterion for determining the character of the protagonists. There are a number of exceptions in which, at first glance, an ordinary technique is transformed into something more, deep and interesting, as an example - « The Last Of Us», but there the whole point lies precisely in the thoughtful work on the characters, placed in a completely standard plot outline.

Paradoxically, having characters at their disposal, "revealed" in this way, the writers manage to create a good intrigue, which is maintained throughout the story missions. This effect is achieved due to the atmosphere of mystery, synthesized with the help of the external environment and the entourage as a whole. In this case, the characters do not divert all your attention.

We roam the ruins of a bygone civilization, penetrate old forerunner complexes, explore secret bases, we find a variety of recordings, audio files, holographic installations that simultaneously complement the picture and raise more and more new questions. These files are worked out quite scrupulously and competently - they are really interesting to study and immerse yourself in this world even more (yes, the technique is rather hackneyed, but if it is done at the level, then why not). Plus, the intrigue is maintained until the very end. This is a sign of good dramaturgy, which from the authors "Killzone" To be honest, you don't really expect much.

The game world itself is quite interesting. Various cults, religious overtones, personal philosophy of each tribe - all this is done on a level. Life is in full swing in the settlements: people are discussing something, all sorts of events are taking place around. The feeling of "puppetry" of what is happening does not arise.

Side quests leave a lot to be desired in terms of variety and the emotions they are able to evoke. Everything slides down to the banal "Give-bring", often without further development and transforming those quests into something bigger that can move the story forward. It smacks of category B projects, but in all honesty, we can say that most games in the open world have a similar "peccadillo".

It is worth noting two more types of missions: "Boilers" and "Hunting Grounds".

The first are caves in a modern way, with loot, small puzzles and enemies, at the end of each cauldron we will have a battle with one of the mechanical creatures, from which special resources and pumping for a spear drop out (I will mention it later). There are four boilers in the game, they differ little, but they are definitely worth going through, for the sake of pumping and replenishing resources.

With hunting grounds, things are much better. This is a series of tests for Aloy of different difficulty levels, interesting, requiring a certain skill and patience.
In addition, there are missions for collecting certain items, capturing bandit camps, but they do not fundamentally affect the plot.

Still story missions- the best thing this game can offer in terms of storytelling.

2. Gameplay.

As mentioned above, the game is Action RPG in the open world. This is where all the salt comes in. HZD. Game mechanics really built quite interesting. Perhaps this is one of the few games in which you have to use almost the entire range of devices provided by the developers.

The grain of the mechanics is based on battles with various mechanized creatures, representing varying degrees of danger to the player. Each of the opponents has several weak points. Where to shoot and what to weaken - the player decides. Some are vulnerable to fire or freeze, others to electricity and armor damage. Often, in order to destroy the enemy, you have to combine different types of arrows and weapons in general.

To eliminate robots in the arsenal of Aloy there are several devices, each of which must be used in certain situations.

Three types of onions with various arrows, including electric, fire, freezing, poison, arrows that knock down components from enemies (especially useful when robots have guns with them that you can shoot and take away to eliminate them. Works well against large opponents), etc. .d.

Sling- an analogue of a slingshot, which has sticky bombs, exploding and freezing shells in its arsenal.

A spear- used as a melee weapon.

Nitemet, with which Aloy is able to arrange different traps representing a stretch.

Rope launcher- acts in the manner of a harpoon, helping Aloy to shackle the enemy for a short period of time.

rattlesnake- a kind of self-propelled gun. Effective at close range

In addition, there are small traps in the form of mines, etc.

However, the main thing in Aloy's collection is the visor, which she got under certain circumstances. He acts as a scanner of everything and everyone. With it, you can get information about the enemy’s weak point, what kind of shells are needed to destroy him, track the trajectory of his movement (a very useful feature), outside of battles, he is used to scan objects and files, for their subsequent study.

On difficulty levels above average, the enemies pose an increased danger (I advise you to play on high), of course it is too pompous to say that there is a parallel with the series « Dark Souls» , but sometimes opponents can give you serious trouble, even if problems most often do not arise with one individual (again, it depends on who you run into), then two or more will make you work hard.

A feature of the ecosystem is that sometimes robots interact with each other without your direct participation, attacking each other and dividing territories, which adds liveliness to the world. Total in reality Horizon: Zero Dawn» inhabited by twenty-five kinds of machines.

The mechanics of hacking monsters with a spear looks very interesting (this is why you need to visit the cauldrons, I talked about them above, because with each new cauldron the list of animals that Aloy is able to take under her control increases). This is used both in combat and as a way to move. On the battlefield, an allied vehicle is able to equalize forces with a superior enemy, and also serve as a vehicle.

The combat system in battles with people is banal and boring to disgrace. There are two types of enemies: normal and armored, most often with enhanced weapons in their hands. Fortunately, the main opponents are still robots.

Apart from action component we also have in stock RPG criterion with which everything is ambiguous.

The main problem is that the leveling of the character is devoid of depth, in addition to the development of the skill tree, the levels are not used anywhere else. In addition, all skills can be pumped in one playthrough and they will be involved all at once. This destroys the balance a little, because. in most games of this genre, you can choose a certain skill, sacrificing another.

There is a system of modifications to improve the characteristics of weapons and uniforms - everything is standard here. Crafting ammunition, items and trade is also in place.

The quality of "clothes" is conditionally divided into three categories: simple (green), improved (blue), rare (purple). They differ slightly from each other, only in the number of cells for modifications and a slight improvement in performance relative to each other.

The uniform and clothing of the main character is not tied to the level, i.e. - all things are available to you immediately, the only question is whether you have enough resources to purchase them. In my opinion, this is a huge omission that deprives the player of a certain incentive.

Dialogues, for the most part, practically do not affect anything. Here you will not find a variety of endings, and the plot from your choice in a given situation will not really change. In other words - passing the game for the second time, you will not discover anything new for yourself.

3. Graphic component

Here I will try to be as brief as possible. Games Guerrilla always looked very nice and HZD was no exception. To be honest, I don’t know with what secret technologies they managed to achieve such picture quality on a regular Playstation 4, but apparently the potential of the engine Decima really is, even if Hideo Kojima chose it as the basis for his future "Death Stranding".

I didn't notice frank subsidence of FPS - everything works smoothly and clearly. The world is colorful, sometimes reaching almost perfect photorealism. Fans of taking screenshots, digging around in the photo mode for a long time, will definitely have something to do here.

Specifically about the version for PS4 PRO I can’t say anything, since I have at my disposal the usual PS4 Slim, but judging by the reviews - there are no significant differences, except perhaps the drawing distance and more stable operation.

It is also worth mentioning the facial animation, but after the release Mass Effect: Andromeda, HZD seems to be the apogee of the development of technology igrostroeniya.

4. Bottom line

Summing up in general, it is important to remember that this is only the first experience of the studio in this genre with high competition, and if we take into account the fact that before the release HZD in the portfolio of developers there were only three parts of the shooter "for the evening", then we can conclude that this is a big breakthrough.

The game is not devoid of cons, but there are enough pluses in it. Ideal projects in our time - an extreme rarity.

I think that Guerrilla they will definitely draw conclusions and the subsequent parts will be better, because the universe has potential and personally I would very much like to return there again.

Important qualities HZD- playability, the desire to get to the bottom of the truth and return to this world, having received an emotional outburst.

On February 28, 2017, the massive open-world action/RPG Horizon: Zero Dawn will be released. Plus another high-profile event in the industry over the past month. The project is expected and promising. It has an interesting story concept and decent implementation in terms of overall quality. This generally applies to graphics, features, quests, music. Now that there are plenty of open-world RPGs out there, the Horizon: Zero Dawn universe is still getting interesting. There is a desire to study it deeper, to find out what is the essence of the confrontation between human tribes and robotic animals. Just the other day, Guerrilla Games lifted a strict embargo on journalistic reviews. Game resources received the full version of the game for review. Let's take a comprehensive look at their new offspring.

Not so long ago, an article was already written with the announcement of the project, the first information about the plot, the quality rating according to the official and beta versions. And now the decisive hour has come. Ready game and a portion of fresh impressions. As always, in order.

Plot of Horizon: Zero Dawn

The player meets a harsh post-apocalypse. And this is not some typical world with ruins after a nuclear disaster. Although the main screenwriter is John Gonzales, who came up with Fallout 3 New Vegas. No, it's much deeper than that. Thousands of years have passed since the death of the forerunner civilization (as our contemporaries are called here). Apparently, they were killed by technology. The earth is now inhabited by animal robots of various types, up to huge monsters. People also remained on it, but the level of development of their civilization is low and they are very scattered. Some tribes live according to the primitive system of the Stone Age, others have developed the state system a little more. The most advanced nations have some technology and developed politics, but still, this is the maximum level of the Middle Ages. There are few memories of the forerunner era, only ancient fossilized remains, which people simply cannot explore. It already feels like a serious scenario, doesn't it?

The main character of the game is the huntress Elloy. She was born into a tribe of pagans who worshiped the Great Mother (meaning nature), From the very birth she was made an outcast. These are special members of society with whom others are forbidden to communicate and are expelled from the village. It happened because of some misconduct of the parents, which Ella has yet to learn about. She lives alone far from the village and since childhood has been learning all the skills necessary for survival from another outcast named Rust. He is much older, experienced in many things. Rust became the girl's father and mentor. By the age of majority, she is already an excellent hunter, not afraid of robotic beasts and able to survive in extreme situations. She decides, by all means, to go through initiation into her native tribe and save him from the impending great danger. This is the plot of the story for more than 30+ hours of the main plot alone. With side quests, this number can be safely doubled.

Outcome. And from the plot, and in the course of the entire development of the storyline, it is clear that this is the work of professional screenwriters. The plot here is by no means just an excuse for action and quests. It is interesting to watch him, you empathize with the characters. Cut scenes and scripted videos on the game engine are staged perfectly. Some veterans of games and films with similar plots may find the plot twists too predictable. But still, top notch.

Horizon: Zero Dawn Graphics

Guerrilla Games has never skimped on graphics when creating their PS exclusives. That Killzone 2 on Playstation 3 squeezed out very beautiful graphics, that the third Killzone on PS4. But those were corridor first-person shooters, and how are things with role play in a huge The answer is unequivocal - no worse. Great detail, high resolution textures (1080p for PS4, 4K for PS4 Pro versions), amazing landscapes and glare of light. The developers have said they want to make the most beautiful PS4 exclusive to date. And partly it succeeded. Even the facial animations in scripted story cutscenes don't look as clumsy as they do in other RPGs, to say nothing of everything else. The environment of forests, mountains and fields, as if referring to Far Cry Primal. There's a lot in common. The animation of movements, battles and acrobatics is beautifully done.

Outcome. Console exclusives often try to show off the full power of their platform. And this is just the case. On PS4 Pro, the picture is simply gorgeous.

Gameplay Horizon: Zero Dawn

The gameplay of Horizon: Zero Dawn contains all the elements of a great open world RPG. The player has to perform story quests, collect resources, upgrade numerous skills, explore a huge map. In its type, the gameplay is reminiscent of the third Witcher. But here it is much more interesting to walk around the map just like that. This world is truly alive and beautiful. You believe in him.

You have to fight not only with powerful animal robots, but also with people. Humanity is incorrigible. No matter how few people and peoples inhabit the Earth, there will always be reasons for wars. Naturally, the approach to the destruction of machines and people is completely different. The combat mechanics of the game are varied. You can use stealth or try to go ahead. You also have to climb a lot of rocks and ledges. By the way, if in games like Assassin's Creed new places for a hook are highlighted or indicated as something else, then everything needs to be determined by eye. And this is good. Does not spoil the atmosphere.

At some point in the game, Elloy will find a special device called a visor. From now on, the gameplay will change significantly and acquire unique features. Now she can learn the properties of all objects, read traces, look through walls, see the weak points of robotic beasts, and much more. The subject of high technologies of the future (in this context, probably the past) on the head of a primitive huntress is an unusual approach. Immediately opens up a lot of space for stealth strategies and other quest-facilitating solutions.

Outcome. At its core, classic Open World RPG gameplay with a number of interesting features. Implemented perfectly.

Soundtrack

This part was also ignored. Unlike no less, the music was not left here as a simple motive in the background. She sometimes gets goosebumps, emphasizing dramatic moments, tension, anxiety, fear. In addition, the game has excellent Russian localization and voice acting (which is rare lately),

Outcome. They didn’t even forget about this part and made it at the highest level.

Conclusion

The gaming press, as before, mainly evaluates the game as “good” and “very good”. And here it is impossible not to agree with the opinion of the majority. It objectively does not have any weaknesses or significant shortcomings. Beautiful, big, interesting. Whether she will become the “face of PS4” is still too early to judge, but there are all the prerequisites for that. If you are the owner of Playstation 4, and even better PS4 Pro, then it is definitely recommended to play.