Finishing Thoughts: Horizon Forbidden West
“More stuff” doesn’t equal “more fun”
I was a huge fan of the first game, but the trailers for this just didn’t excite me. I formed a suspicion that this game existed because it just had to, given the success of the first, but that it wouldn’t have the same vision that the first did. Having finished it, I don’t think my opinion has changed.
Basically, HFW is just more of the same, with a load more mechanics bolted on for the sake of it. The base game is still there, so all the machine fighting, side quests, crafting etc is all there and is enjoyable. But the overall experience lacked the polish of the first.
One thing I loved about the first one was exploring. But in the second, that’s not really a thing. There isn’t really anything that interesting to discover. The huge map is quite generic, and although there are different biomes, I didn’t really feel I discovered anything impressive that surprised me. It was always just go to the next quest marker. It’s hard to put my finger on, but ‘discovery’ in this game just wasn’t that good. I feel like the game lost its charm, compared to the first.
As an example, I loved exploring the ruins in the first game, but they hardly exist in the second. There are some ruins, but they are generally empty or unexplorable. The few that do contain things, are small and very tightly designed puzzles. I just didn’t get any sense of awe.
The graphics obviously need mentioning — this game is very pretty. Often I found it too oversaturated, but it did have some really impressive moments when I found good vantage points, like this:
Mechanically, the game was a bit of a mess. They have added a load of new weapons and ammo types, but it quickly became so confusing I just fell back to the tried and tested weapons I was used to. I think there was one elemental ammo type I never even attempted. I never got the impression that any of this stuff would equate to more fun — it just seemed more complex for no reason.
Lots of niggles too…
• Climbing was clunky — Aloy constantly not being able to progress due to invisible barriers, or just not going where she was meant to.
• The skill tree UX is bizarre.
• Whenever I approached a bonfire to save, the save button would appear then disappear and I’d have to wiggle Aloy around to trigger it again.
• Aloy constantly narrates every puzzle. It is annoying being spoon-fed.
• Melee combat is unsatisfying and complicated.
• The list goes on…
Then there’s the weird teleportation thing. If you ever pick up more than you can carry, it magically gets ‘sent’ to your ‘stash’ (a chest available at any friendly camp). How? Why? And if you run out of medicine in the field, you can simply refill ‘from your stash’ by holding a button down, and it magically teleports into your inventory. What is the logic to any of this?
One thing I really enjoyed was the character Kotallo. He was really cool and well acted.
All that said, I played this game a lot. I did a huge amount of side quests etc. underneath all the clunkiness, the simple act of running around and killing machines is undeniably fun, and that kept me coming back. I’d def recommend this game, but don’t set your expectations too high.
