It’s a great title with a lot of flaws, but Horizon: Forbidden West has the promise to be something special. It’s a beautiful piece of work. Incredibly, the title appeared fantastic even on a basic PS4. The aesthetics of the machines, illumination, and landscape are all outstanding.
Even the little elements, such as waves on the shore, campfires blazing, as well as the overall clamor of settlements, all feel genuine and of great clarity. The soundtrack is just as impressive as it was in the original game, with the engines sounding excellent and having bone-chilling charge-up noises.
The Gameplay Beats That of Zero Dawn
Horizon: Forbidden West is an excellent follow-up to Horizon: Zero Dawn in terms of mechanics, enhancing many elements of the original. To begin with, the expanded diversity of components and ammo kinds offers a sound foundation for the game’s overall equilibrium. It’s a good middle ground between flame and frost harm, and it also weakens armor. Plasma is a fascinating component with captivating and strong physics; it’s also a good middle ground between fire and ice damage. In battle,
Adhesion performs well against speedier machines; Purgewater is a fantastic antidote to more elemental machinery; Berserk is an excellent alternative for Decay; as well as Aiming projectiles make it simpler to utilize overrun devices. Additionally, the addition of novel mechanisms, valor spurts, and firearm tactics enhances the wide variety of weaponry and playing styles accessible in the game.
Physical fighting has been made a lot more enjoyable thanks to a significant upgrade to the spear. The Resonator Blast feature provides a strong motivation to come up tight and utilize the spear even against a few tiny robots, providing a range of activities to do in the battle against other people further than the “slam the assault key” combat cycle from the original game. Forbidden West’s increased diversity of human foes enhanced the fun of close-quarters fighting.
The additional armaments, like the Warrior Bow as well as the Spike Thrower, are good contributions to the gameplay, but the Boltblaster, as well as the Shredder Gauntlet, seem either too specialized or unwieldy to employ beyond certain quests. Taking the devastating impact of Zero Dawn’s Rattler and making it more burdensome, the Boltblaster adds reloading that renders you stationary upon shooting one-third of your magazine and when switching bullet kinds, as well as substituting your evasive roll with a delayed plunge; likewise, the Shredder Gauntlet’s tossing and grabbing mechanism correspondingly mandates a sluggish style of hunting that doesn’t fit quite well with the gameplay.
When it comes to weaponry, creators went a little overboard. There are just too many varieties of identical weapon categories with minor differences in ammo. The increase in the weaponry wheel’s number of functional guns from four to six was a welcome addition, but needing to pick between a Hunter Bow with accessibility to Hunter, Burn, or Freeze projectiles is just more noise. A Hunter Bow may hold both conventional Hunter and Super Hunter bolts, which seem to be better than the ordinary arrows, although the former is seldom used in favor of its stronger equivalent, creating bloat that accomplishes little except confound the gameplay.
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Getting around has been much-simplified thanks to Guerrilla Games’ work on the scaling in Forbidden West; ascending was among the most frustrating portions of Zero Dawn, and it still is, however, the number of mounting sites has been increased and an option has been added to make all mounting spots constantly accessible and scannable for you. The Shieldwing, Pullcaster, Diving Mask, and Sunwing modifications are wonderful new mobility capabilities that greatly improve Aloy’s verticality, which was previously a major flaw in Zero Dawn.
Forbidden West also has a plethora of activities to keep you occupied when you’re not scouting: riddles aplenty in the shape of Relic Monuments and Vista Spots that need varied, out-of-the-box methods; the magnificent (if basic) Gauntlet Runs that enable players to experience the golden years of Mario Kart in a post-apocalyptic sci-fi scenario; as well as the magnificent Machine Strike, Horizon’s in-universe riddle game and a terrific leisure drain with deep tactics and difficult adversaries.
The Mehhh Plot!!!!
When it comes to plot, Forbidden West misses the mark of Zero Dawn’s brilliance in storytelling. Everything is explained and there are no unanswered questions, yet the plot as a whole is disjointed. Outside of rebel strongholds and certain plot tasks, players seldom meet the Regalla rebels. Afterward, her army of rebels and overpowered robots face off in a cutscene-based fight. Like the Sons of Prometheus, they don’t accomplish anything either.
Nobody’s story had any significance; rather, the game seemed like a series of disjointed stories inside a single storyline, while Zero Dawn was more unified. Not to mention, the revelation at the game’s conclusion was abrupt and seemed designed to assemble a successor. It was a large payout with no buildup at all. This is still a fantastic tale! Compared to its predecessor, it doesn’t seem nearly as linked or anchored in the present.
The storytelling in Horizon Forbidden West is really rather good, particularly for a follow-up, in my opinion. A large part of the first game’s awe derives from wandering the planet, unraveling the story, and trying to understand a backward world where people are primitive yet coexist with modern robots. Having the viewers guess what’s going on means that the script needs to be even better to match. It accomplishes the majority of its objectives well. While it is not directly related to Zero Dawn, it does indicate that even when the fate of the whole planet is in jeopardy, humanity can gain a way to remain self-centered despite what is at risk.
The Final Verdict
Finally, it’s necessary to note the problems in Horizon Forbidden West Though most of the issues I encountered have since been fixed in a news release, the regularity, and seriousness of a few game-breaking flaws, including several that deliberately stopped me from finishing the campaign 100 percent, tainted my enjoyment of the game nevertheless. Those who loved the original should definitely check out this sequel.
I’m a little skeptical of any subsequent releases because of several design decisions, however, the title itself is excellent. Since the PS5 update is complimentary, there’s no incentive to spend the additional $10 for the PS5 copy if you can get it for $60 in the PS4 shop.
Aloy (Ashly Burch), a teenage warrior of the Nora clan and a cloning of Elisabet Sobeck, resumes her narrative in Horizon: Forbidden West as she joins a group of allies on a trek to the Forbidden West, an occult region where a mystery illness kills all those it touches.
