Gaming Horizon Forbidden West (PS4/PS5)

Ainu said:
I think there's some confusion here.

There are two main ways to hit elemental damage:
1. Elemental build-up on a machine's body leading to a status condition, e.g. hitting enough cold arrows until a machine turns brittle, shock arrows until it gets stunned, etc. This mechanic existed in Horizon Zero Dawn as well but I don't think the machines had weaknesses and resistances, so the build-up rate will be different in this game, depending on the machine. I don't know if resistance just slows the process down or nullifies it completely. I think the former but I'd have to test it.
2. Shooting specific parts to trigger a large explosion, which works exactly the same as in the first game. You shoot a blaze canister with fire, it will explode and inflict burn on the target and surrounding machines.

The reason @Nanook said normal arrows seemed to do more damage is probably because they were looking at raw damage instead of status build-up. You don't hit a machine with its weakness to do raw damage, you do it because it's easier to build up the status. Once the status is hit (the icon gets filled), you benefit from whatever status was inflicted.
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Is that what the little up arrow is on the bottom arrow? You get like a normal fire arrow for 20dmg, then below there is another dmg icon with an up arrow an around 80dmg? So it inflicts 80dmg when it's on fire?

If so, the basic arrows are still better unless you inflict fire super quick?

I just use the elemental arrows again their canisters or whatever cause a boom, then smash them with the high dmg arrows.

It's quite badly explained in the game I thought. You can muddle your way through no problem though.
 
Reditus said:
I often say to myself to try and stick with the story but after a few hours Im the same and end up skipping most of it. The story in this new Horizon game really is not good at all.
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I’ll admit to not being overly fussed about plot in games like this at the best of times. But even if I was super interested in the storyline, the way each conversation drags on and on so slowwwwwwly is excruciating.
 
Personally I think the clones and the new big bad is a very interesting twist.
That's all I know so don't fecking spoil shit!
 
The more I play it the more it wrecks my head. Can't help but feel it's either a step back from the first game or just that because it stuck to the "classic" OWG format I have burn-out from that that I didn't when I played the first, I dunno, past the pretty graphics and presentation it feels really flawed to me in a lot of ways.
 
One Night Only said:
Is that what the little up arrow is on the bottom arrow? You get like a normal fire arrow for 20dmg, then below there is another dmg icon with an up arrow an around 80dmg? So it inflicts 80dmg when it's on fire?

If so, the basic arrows are still better unless you inflict fire super quick?

I just use the elemental arrows again their canisters or whatever cause a boom, then smash them with the high dmg arrows.

It's quite badly explained in the game I thought. You can muddle your way through no problem though.
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Right on the first icon, not on the second. The first icon is the base damage your arrow does, the icon with the up arrow represents how much elemental buildup you get with each shot (you can see that by looking at the arrows in the ammo section of your inventory). It's not exactly clear what this buildup value actually means from a quantitative point of view. I just tested it out my upgraded fire hunter bow, which has 46 fire buildup, on a Scrounger which is neutral to fire. A single shot filled almost filled up the buildup icon, so by the second shot it had the burning status.

This isn't exactly an RPG so many of the stats are hidden. What was the total HP of that level 8 Scrounger? What is the threshold value for a status effect? What is the DPS of burning? What are the percentage modifiers for weaknesses or resistances on machines? What effect does player and machine level have on all of this? We don't get that information, so I wouldn't really pay too much attention to it. The higher, the better, that's pretty much all we can say.
 
the more I play this (and it's not a lot, I have rarely a big urge to come back to it) the more I think it's actually not a very good game, underneath the lovely graphics. Ironically enough it's a far more infuriating game to play than Elden Ring. The story is bland, Aloy is annoying. Some of the puzzle sections straight up suck, you just have to constantly use your focus to try find some thing you pull or move that isn't at all obvious and then jump around a bit and then find some other thing with your focus bla bla, it's shite, how is that meant to be fun?

Then there's the combat which again, they've somehow made melee completely pointless against machines cause they just smash you away from them with their crazy ranged attacks and jumps that are completely unavoidable. And not including a lock is simply inexplicable considering the speed and crazy jumps they have moving around. Battles basically become a case of trying to attack, then healing when they jump a million miles to hit you or lock on with their ranged attacks even though you rolled. Also why are they all such crazy bullet sponges? I literally have to plaster them with about 50 fecking arrows to kill them sometimes, it becomes so repetitive. The elemental stuff is shite too, hitting the triggers barely does any damage so it's better to just blast them with arrows and bombs constantly. The valor stuff seems a bit pointless too. They made it a complicated mess and took away so much of what made it fun in the first game. Oh, and why are arrows now just randomly not hitting the target I point them at? That's very irritating.

And the open world is crap too. Like why have all these question marks and encourage me to explore only to have most of them blocked off because you haven't unlocked some item yet so you have to just come back then in the future once you get it, it makes exploration completely pointless for the most part.

Yeah, disappointing/10. I'll keep playing but it's just not fun in a lot of places which is some accomplishment cause the first one was a lot of fun.
 
Massive Spanner said:
the more I play this (and it's not a lot, I have rarely a big urge to come back to it) the more I think it's actually not a very good game, underneath the lovely graphics. Ironically enough it's a far more infuriating game to play than Elden Ring. The story is bland, Aloy is annoying. Some of the puzzle sections straight up suck, you just have to constantly use your focus to try find some thing you pull or move that isn't at all obvious and then jump around a bit and then find some other thing with your focus bla bla, it's shite, how is that meant to be fun?

Then there's the combat which again, they've somehow made melee completely pointless against machines cause they just smash you away from them with their crazy ranged attacks and jumps that are completely unavoidable. And not including a lock is simply inexplicable considering the speed and crazy jumps they have moving around. Battles basically become a case of trying to attack, then healing when they jump a million miles to hit you or lock on with their ranged attacks even though you rolled. Also why are they all such crazy bullet sponges? I literally have to plaster them with about 50 fecking arrows to kill them sometimes, it becomes so repetitive. The elemental stuff is shite too, hitting the triggers barely does any damage so it's better to just blast them with arrows and bombs constantly. The valor stuff seems a bit pointless too. They made it a complicated mess and took away so much of what made it fun in the first game. Oh, and why are arrows now just randomly not hitting the target I point them at? That's very irritating.

And the open world is crap too. Like why have all these question marks and encourage me to explore only to have most of them blocked off because you haven't unlocked some item yet so you have to just come back then in the future once you get it, it makes exploration completely pointless for the most part.

Yeah, disappointing/10. I'll keep playing but it's just not fun in a lot of places which is some accomplishment cause the first one was a lot of fun.
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I'm wondering if we're playing the same game...
 
Been playing it quite a bit, and my thoughts are similar to what’s already been said a few times. It’s too cluttered, too much going on and there’s no room for exploration like Elden Ring or BOTW. Having everything marked out on the map etc just sucks all the fun out of it. Far too much going on on the screen at times as well. It just doesn’t feel right. The game would feel much better if it was stripped right back imo.
 
Massive Spanner said:
Probably, I just don't have my Sony glasses on ;)
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Maybe....

Or maybe you guys are doing a great job of setting my expectations. I'm still here enjoying it and I'm waiting for the bad feelings to hit me, luckily nothing yet. Game is great!

But your experience with the combat, I haven't had anything like that. Do you use concentration much? Are you trying to snipe with a Warrior Bow? Are expecting the machines to flinch when you hit them with essentially a big stick (use combos on them esp. the vault combos)?
 
My experience of combat is similar to @Massive Spanner. I do use the concentration/slow time down thingy but that doesn’t help much. You don’t seem to ever get the really satisfying feeling of smashing an enemy with a BFG. It’s all nibbling away with underpowered weapons and a frustrating aiming system.

I’m probably missing something. What am I missing?!
 
Pogue Mahone said:
My experience of combat is similar to @Massive Spanner. I do use the concentration/slow time down thingy but that doesn’t help much. You don’t seem to ever get the really satisfying feeling of smashing an enemy with a BFG. It’s all nibbling away with underpowered weapons and a frustrating aiming system.

I’m probably missing something. What am I missing?!
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I don't know Pogue and it's a shame as I'm feckin loving that aspect of it. Maybe watch a bit of someone else's gameplay to see what they do. I might try and post some of mine later....

For example, I've had no bullet sponges. At times I don't have the tools for the job, in which case I bail... But usually I'm hitting pretty fecking hard anyway especially with the Sniping Bow (and it's weapon techniques). Sliding and using concentration never gets old, coming out of cover and going toe-to-toe and then getting back into cover when it goes pear shaped... Wish I was playing now tbh. Mounted combat works so well too, so many things have been tweaked and improved from the last.

Caveat though, I completed the last game on the hardest difficulty which will really make you perfect your playstyle, I was rusty on this new game until a week or so ago, and during that time lots of things felt slightly off....
 
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afrocentricity said:
I don't know Pogue and it's a shame as I'm feckin loving that aspect of it. Maybe watch a bit of someone else's gameplay to see what they do. I might try and post some of mine later....

For example, I've had no bullet sponges. At times I don't have the tools for the job, in which case I bail... But usually I'm hitting pretty fecking hard anyway especially with the Sniping Bow (and it's weapon techniques). Sliding and using concentration never gets old, coming out of cover and going toe-to-toe and then getting back into cover when it goes pear shaped... Wish I was playing now tbh.
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Hmmm. Not sure what bow we use (play with my young fella who has a better idea what he’s doing than I do!) I’ve tried two or three different ones and they’re all a bit samey. How is the sniping bow different to the one you start the game with?
 
I can't say I have experienced anything like what @Massive Spanner is saying regarding the combat. Granted, I haven't fought the biggest machines yet, I'm taking it slowly. But between blowing up canisters and shooting off removable parts, I'm cutting through most machines just fine, even those a couple levels above me. Shooting the main bodies doesn't do much, but then it's not supposed to.

On the whole, I've been enjoying the game just fine so far. I thought the first one was a good game but not a classic and this one feels similar. That's fine. Also, I've disabled everything on the hud, which makes it so much more enjoyable. There's one icon in the bottom left (the items section) which won't go away, but other than that it's completely clean.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Hmmm. Not sure what bow we use (play with my young fella who has a better idea what he’s doing than I do!) I’ve tried two or three different ones and they’re all a bit samey. How is the sniping bow different to the one you start the game with?
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Warrior Bow is shortrange doesn't hit hard and has shit accuracy, it's like a semi. Hunter Bow (the one you are talking about) hit's a little harder and is midrange, a bit like a carbine I guess? Sharpshot Bow can hit like a truck (especially with the exploding arrow weapon technique) and is for long range, takes ages to get your shots off, but you're not likely to miss. Use the bows and tools to match your playstyle and your situation. For example I will either stealthy snipe with heavy hitting attacks from far (getting a lot of one-shots so I cant say I've experienced any bullet sponges) or I will close in and do lots of running, concentration, slides and jumps using the environment, and a few melee combos.... or a bit of both as the situation dictates switching up my gear as a go.

With the lack of lock on, I initially felt that too but actually the camera is quite responsive and I'm over it now. I don't need it that would make it too easy.
 
afrocentricity said:
Warrior Bow is shortrange doesn't hit hard and has shit accuracy, it's like a semi. Hunter Bow (the one you are talking about) hit's a little harder and is midrange, a bit like a carbine I guess? Sharpshot Bow can hit like a truck (especially with the exploding arrow weapon technique) and is for long range, takes ages to get your shots off, but you're not likely to miss. Use the bows and tools to match your playstyle and your situation. For example I will either stealthy snipe with heavy hitting attacks from far (getting a lot of one-shots so I cant say I've experienced any bullet sponges) or I will close in and do lots of running, concentration, slides and jumps using the environment, and a few melee combos.... or a bit of both as the situation dictates switching up my gear as a go.

With the lack of lock on, I initially felt that too but actually the camera is quite responsive and I'm over it now. I don't need it that would make it too easy.
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Cool. Will pay more attention to the different bows. Sharpshot sounds like the one for me. Thanks.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Oh. Another combat quibble. Was fighting humans and tried sneaking around and sniping them on the sly. Turns out they can take an arrow in the middle of their forehead without blinking an eye. Which is weird.
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Yea I've found it more satisfying to use bombs or run in and start smashing faces...

Pogue Mahone said:
There was one boss battle I really enjoyed and that was when you were up against a massive Triceratops in a big cave. You could climb to the top of a pillar and snipe it at your leisure. That was fun.
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I feel like you're further than me.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Oh. Another combat quibble. Was fighting humans and tried sneaking around and sniping them on the sly. Turns out they can take an arrow in the middle of their forehead without blinking an eye. Which is weird.
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Some of them might have some form of head protection on which isn't immediately clear if you've just highlighted them with your focus. The glowing effect is only their bodies and not their armor.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Oh. Another combat quibble. Was fighting humans and tried sneaking around and sniping them on the sly. Turns out they can take an arrow in the middle of their forehead without blinking an eye. Which is weird.
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Humans are also annoying bullet sponges but at least melee is somewhat effective against them.

I don't think it's a bad game, it's just immensely frustrating at times and some of the puzzles and combat bits absolutely wreck my head. The first one was a lot more fun, I've played it twice over.
 
Ainu said:
What's so bad about them? It's just some mild puzzle stuff, nothing offensive, I would've thought.
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They're not puzzles though. They're turn your focus on, look around for ages and try find somewhere you can climb or use your ropecaster or maybe firegleam, and it's always really hard to find, especially in the later ones. Then it's just moving an annoying crate or whatever. They're tedious and frustrating. To be honest I've ended up just looking up most of them cause I can't be arsed running around with my focus on looking for all that crap. They straight up suck balls.

I'm quite far into the game now and I still don't think it's great. If anything they've taken a winning formula and over complicated it to the point where it's not remotely as fun as the first, which I only replayed last year and still loved.
 
I platinumed the first but coming off elden ring I haven't been able to get into this yet. Think I need a big session, 4 or 5 hours straight, to really get into it. Only got to that first little town and done a couple of quests there so far.
 
pacifictheme said:
I platinumed the first but coming off elden ring I haven't been able to get into this yet. Think I need a big session, 4 or 5 hours straight, to really get into it. Only got to that first little town and done a couple of quests there so far.
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Aye, it doesn't open right up till a little after that iirc.

I haven't completed it yet, I just don't want it to end :(
 
Massive Spanner said:
Performance mode still looked absolutely spectacular. That’s far from the games biggest problem!
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I'd heard it was full of shimmering and was a significant downgrade in comparison to fidelity mode visually. Maybe it depended on the TV/monitor.
 
I keep trying to push forward with this game but it just isn't fun in any way. I don't get it.
 
Alock1 said:
I keep trying to push forward with this game but it just isn't fun in any way. I don't get it.
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I loved the first game but struggled to finish this one. Found the story quite boring compared to the first & the combat/missions got repetitive.
 
Alock1 said:
I keep trying to push forward with this game but it just isn't fun in any way. I don't get it.
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They took a winning formula and completely ruined it by making everything overly complicated and basically rehashing the same plot line. I did finish it but it was very disappointing and took me months to do so.
 
ha_rooney said:
I loved the first game but struggled to finish this one. Found the story quite boring compared to the first & the combat/missions got repetitive.
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Funny. Mine is the opposite. Found the first one boring and this better. Didn’t like the tribal stuff, found it boring and I think this story is way more interesting and different.
 
In new game plus, does anyone know if you can fly a lot sooner since you have the skills carried over?
 
Massive Spanner said:
They took a winning formula and completely ruined it by making everything overly complicated and basically rehashing the same plot line. I did finish it but it was very disappointing and took me months to do so.
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I have to say I'm starting to agree with this. This game has a ridiculous amount of weapon types, arrow types, elements, outfits, coils, weaves, etc. I really can't be bothered cycling through all of that shit, as constantly going into the menus to change it is just not a viable way to play. The weapon wheel only supports 6 weapons anyway, and since you basically need a bunch of hunter bows in there to get decent coverage of all the different elements while still having some accuracy, that leaves very little room for experimentation. The machines are all absurdly mobile which makes targeting their weak spots pretty annoying, I don't feel like it works well with this control scheme.

Maybe I'm just not playing the game as the devs want it to be played. Maybe I should be using a lot more weapon techniques, but changing between them is pretty tedious as well and takes me out of the action. Changing Valor Surges is even worse, as you actually have to go into the skills menu, so once again it's something I consider completely unviable. Add to that Aloy is severely lacking in mobility compared to the machines, which are crazy fast and have insane hitboxes which ALWAYS stagger you and I just don't see how anyone can consider this combat fun. I played on normal for about 50 hours and just couldn't take it anymore, so I dropped it to story mode so I just don't have to give a feck and can blast my way through encounters. Maybe I'm not remembering it correctly, but I really didn't experience anything like that in Zero Dawn.

And while I'm ranting, did we really need hunting grounds again? It's the exact same shit as in Zero Dawn. And does every one of these fecking open world games need an arena? It's almost never fun. There's just soooo much shit to do. I'm on 60 hours now and I've seen about 50% of the map, with still loads of uncleared icons left on the revealed part. I'm starting to think I should just rush through it and see the story, which is still sort of interesting.
 
Ainu said:
I have to say I'm starting to agree with this. This game has a ridiculous amount of weapon types, arrow types, elements, outfits, coils, weaves, etc. I really can't be bothered cycling through all of that shit, as constantly going into the menus to change it is just not a viable way to play. The weapon wheel only supports 6 weapons anyway, and since you basically need a bunch of hunter bows in there to get decent coverage of all the different elements while still having some accuracy, that leaves very little room for experimentation. The machines are all absurdly mobile which makes targeting their weak spots pretty annoying, I don't feel like it works well with this control scheme.

Maybe I'm just not playing the game as the devs want it to be played. Maybe I should be using a lot more weapon techniques, but changing between them is pretty tedious as well and takes me out of the action. Changing Valor Surges is even worse, as you actually have to go into the skills menu, so once again it's something I consider completely unviable. Add to that Aloy is severely lacking in mobility compared to the machines, which are crazy fast and have insane hitboxes which ALWAYS stagger you and I just don't see how anyone can consider this combat fun. I played on normal for about 50 hours and just couldn't take it anymore, so I dropped it to story mode so I just don't have to give a feck and can blast my way through encounters. Maybe I'm not remembering it correctly, but I really didn't experience anything like that in Zero Dawn.

And while I'm ranting, did we really need hunting grounds again? It's the exact same shit as in Zero Dawn. And does every one of these fecking open world games need an arena? It's almost never fun. There's just soooo much shit to do. I'm on 60 hours now and I've seen about 50% of the map, with still loads of uncleared icons left on the revealed part. I'm starting to think I should just rush through it and see the story, which is still sort of interesting.
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You summed up a lot of my pains with the game there. To add to the combat problems, it really is insane that there’s no lock on considering the speed of some of the machines and how fast they can move around you and attack, and makes it soooo annoying to try and target them and dodge them. And yeah dodging is a joke, it’s almost impossible without constant fecking dodge rolling over and over.

also, who seriously thought it was a good idea for almost every machine attack to knock Aloy over and then have it take AGES for her to get back up? There were genuinely so many fights where I spent more time on my arse and dodging around trying to avoid being on my arse than anything else. It’s ridiculous.

it’s just not fun. It’s incredibly polished and pretty and a work of technical marvel but they just added so much unnecessary stuff to it and it ruined it. And I don’t think it’s that the formula itself has become stale because I replayed the first on PC last year and still loved it, they just botched the sequel completely.

Oh and seriously, relic ruins and vista points are fecking awful :lol:
 
Massive Spanner said:
You summed up a lot of my pains with the game there. To add to the combat problems, it really is insane that there’s no lock on considering the speed of some of the machines and how fast they can move around you and attack, and makes it soooo annoying to try and target them and dodge them. And yeah dodging is a joke, it’s almost impossible without constant fecking dodge rolling over and over.

also, who seriously thought it was a good idea for almost every machine attack to knock Aloy over and then have it take AGES for her to get back up? There were genuinely so many fights where I spent more time on my arse and dodging around trying to avoid being on my arse than anything else. It’s ridiculous.

it’s just not fun. It’s incredibly polished and pretty and a work of technical marvel but they just added so much unnecessary stuff to it and it ruined it. And I don’t think it’s that the formula itself has become stale because I replayed the first on PC last year and still loved it, they just botched the sequel completely.

Oh and seriously, relic ruins and vista points are fecking awful :lol:
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I have no idea how anyone could playtest that and think "yeah that'll work, that's fine". There's this machine that does a sort of ground pound with its tail, you can be about 5 meters away from the impact, dodge roll even further and Aloy is STILL staggered. What are you even supposed to do? Magically be somewhere else? We're talking about attacks that have pretty much zero wind up, so yeah, I guess you just have to tank it and wait for the stagger animation to be over. Unbelievable. Stuff like that just makes me appreciate From Software combat systems even more.
 
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