3.5/5 ★ – PhatBaby's review of Horizon Zero Dawn.

Quickly revisited this as I'm moving on to Forbidden West guides tomorrow and it really cemented for me that Zero Dawn is essentially a shonen anime. Think about it. Aloy is the compassionate, mysterious, inexperienced but capable hero with a cryptic (yet clearly lore-crucial) back story, there are arcs with lengthy plotlines that mostly don't interconnect and there's a core story with anime-esque villains that stand around saying shit like: "Aloy, the metal devils will devour you whole before the might of the sun." I mean, c'mon. The world even looks like it was yanked directly from Dr Stone... This shonen-style storytelling is my favourite thing about Horizon. Alongside telling a familiar but fun story about a shunned outcast rising to become a fearless hero, It builds really compelling core mysteries and actually offers rewarding answers without forcing you to wait years for sequels. Infiltrating Zero Dawn specifically is one of my favourite video game story reveals of the last decade, as you discover the tragic, distinctly human reason that giant robot dinosaurs roam the Earth (and the whole thing is somehow not even remotely hokey). In the same vein, Aloy is a very likeable shonen-esque protagonist, and I love how the game depicts her growth as a character. It's good she's so engaging as she's the only figure in this world that doesn't somehow feel MORE robotic than the mechanical beasts roaming the wilderness... To me, the gameplay of Horizon Dawn is what lets it down. It's a fun game for sure, especially when you're battling big opponents by targeting and disabling their core systems using Aloy's skill with a bow. But the combat is clunky, the exploration is formulaic and it can never really strike a good balance challenge-wise. There are areas where it just throws waves of tedious robots at you because it has no idea how to make you think strategically, despite the fact it could give you a solid boss encounter with an imposing mechanical dinosaur that takes brains to beat. Also, WWWWAAAYYYY too many human encounters. The combat against humans is crap at the best of times but it's somehow present in like half of the campaign's main setpieces. In short, it's inches away from greatness for me. A good game, an exceptional sci-fi adventure but a product that definitely feels like a stepping stone to a more polished sequel. And, well, as I live and breathe. There's one coming tomorrow??? Who would've thunk it! I genuinely think Forbidden West is gonna be an utter corker, even if I'm gutted that Guerrila's jump to next-gen means all the NPCs won't look like they really need to go to the bathroom all the time.