Horizon game review. Review of Horizon: Zero Dawn. When nature calls (video). The plot often pits Aloy against human opponents. Very vain, I must say. They are stupid, boring, and often do not want to die with an arrow caught in their forehead. After fights with robots, fuss with

It's time to evaluate the game - the project is completed, the map is cleared, the platinum cup is in your pocket and emotions have settled down, giving way to drier impressions. Why not a perfect time to take stock? That's what it's all about. Probably, to make the story more interesting, some information blocks will overlap with the preview, but I will try not to repeat myself as much as possible, so familiarization with the past material is definitely recommended. However, this is unlikely to stop fans from looking only at the numbers from their favorite scheme.

Perhaps the main factor that did not allow me to sum up the final result for the release of Horizon: Zero Dawn was that at that time I had not yet completed the story, although I had overcome more than 80% of the game as a whole. Perhaps, if there had been another game on our operating table, such progress would have been quite enough, but the Guerrilla Games project still managed to surprise even at the last ~20%, and surprise thoroughly.

At the beginning of the game, many things are not clear to us and the main question is not what fate awaits Aloy, but how the world has rolled from the pinnacle of technological development into the abyss of primitive superstition. The heroine is certainly pretty, but she does not gush with charisma. However, the developers compensated for this shortcoming with another characteristic - mystery. From the first minutes of the game, we are presented with a child who is almost cursed by his own tribe, who is hated for no reason and is expelled just as incomprehensibly for what. Fortunately for her, the outcast warrior Rast takes over the burden of education, whose mystery is also a little intriguing, causing the same questions - why was he expelled? After a couple of hours of play and dialogues between the characters, the intrigue settles, because we are faced with stupid and religious people acting on the basis of signs that they themselves do not understand, which the priests interpret for their not-so-reasonable flock.

This impression is partly true and will accompany the player through many hours of adventure. Even Aloy herself repeatedly mocks the religiosity of her fellow tribesmen and representatives of other tribes, trying to explain to them that a person is the blacksmith of his own happiness and future. Sometimes successful. But even here everything turns out to be not so simple, when the plot crosses the equator and the scriptwriters begin to reveal the maps of the game world to us, one by one, gradually. This not only brings back to life the intrigue that was dying, but also thoroughly pumps it.

With its world concept and disaster story, Horizon: Zero Dawn is like a light and pleasant breeze in the field of post-apocalyptic gaming stories. Akin to The Last of Us. Here, everything does not seem hackneyed and banal, as in typical "zombie apocalypse". But I did not just focus on game stories, because such ideas have already flashed in various books. For example, something similar in terms of the base was in Dan Simmons' Hyperion, although there was no post-apocalypse there. Readers will surely catch a couple of parallels, and those who have not read should urgently correct this sad gap in literary education.

This game also introduces some innovations in terms of the process in which the player is carried away. The main core here is an excellent combat system, which is based on elements found in different games, but surely stands out among its peers. Archery here evokes associations with tomb raider, but it is implemented a cut above. This is due to the fact that the bow is the main combat tool of our heroine and the developers have polished his work to a shine. Aloy's work with traps and the rope launcher, a special tool for shackling opponents, can remind the player of monster hunter, where there are also powerful opponents that it is desirable to immobilize. But the implementation of the fettering mechanics here is peculiar and tailored for the fast combat system of the game, which requires the player to make quick decisions, rather than planning on the go.

Among the side quests, funny dialogues can also be found. Well voiced in Russian.

I am very pleased with the presence of a photo mode in the game. It works even during most cutscenes (but you can't control the camera in them).

Horizon Zero Dawn - it's time to take back the Earth.

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Sometimes you regret that the device for erasing memory exists only in the movie "Men in Black". Because when in the intro video Horizon Zero Dawn in front of a warrior dressed in skins, a giant long-necked leg descends, shaking the ground, the thought involuntarily flashes through the head: “It would be great if I just now, just like that, learned about this world!”

That is why in the review we will talk about some points in passing, or even say nothing at all. Only so that extra knowledge does not spoil the delight of personal acquaintance and discoveries.

Studio Guerrilla Games has unveiled a new trailer for Horizon: Zero Dawn. In the video, the developers paid attention to Aloy, the main character of the game.

Kojima understands

When the Dutch studio Guerrilla Games announced that her next game would not be a corridor shooter, but an action movie in the open world, it was hard to resist skeptical statements. The open world has recently become almost a mandatory item in the program: is there an open world? Not? Let's go. But how many of the worlds of recent years are truly alive?

But the declared setting bribed. The image of the same warrior who with a bow and a spear goes against huge machines turned into one of the options for the gloomy future of mankind. People in their progress have failed, and so powerful that it threw them back to the primitive communal system. They live in modest settlements, are engaged in gathering and hunting. And only the most valiant and skillful are not afraid to go against the robots, which now reign supreme on the planet.

Dutch developers showed great screenshots and recorded dynamic videos, talked a lot and willingly about the game and showed it to journalists. But one of the last nails in the memorial sign "Most Anticipated Game" was driven, voluntarily or unwittingly, by Hideo Kojima. He considered the engine of Horizon: Zero Dawn to be the best of the many presented to him Sony and decided to buy it for my future game Death Stranding . "Yeah, Kojima understands!" the skeptics agreed and joined the army of believers.

Let's allow ourselves one major spoiler - they believed in Horizon Zero Dawn not in vain.

blown by the wind

The beautiful world bribed almost at first sight. Endless expanses where huge mechanical beasts roam, ruins of civilization overgrown with grass, scorched deserts and snow-capped mountains, gloomy caves and primitive settlements. But the commercials will never convey the spirit of the local world ...

Kojima was right: the local world now and then gives out such views that you want to invite your neighbors to a slide show. No matter where we go, we never see a loading screen. Trees and grass look like real ones, day turns into night, rain turns into snow, and you can’t confuse the shadow of a petrel that covers the heroine with anything - which means you can’t hesitate.

The world is not too rich in discoveries familiar from other games. AT Fallout 4 teddy bears, skeletons and home furnishings act out a mise-en-scenes of the last days of pre-war humanity, and lids, junk or even something more valuable are found at every turn.

To the Earth from Horizon Zero Dawn, time turned out to be more cruel, and five times more passed. It will be a great success if you manage to dig out an ancient bell (a bunch of keys), an ancient toothpick (Swiss knife) or an ancient bracelet (wristwatch) in the ruins. And it’s really good luck to stumble upon a mug with an inscription on the side! A merchant in Meridian will generously reward you for such mugs, and at the same time tell your theory about their role in prehistoric society. "Majestically!" he sighs.

The game world is also captivating because it is honest. If a gap is visible between the stones or there is a hole in the fence, then in the vast majority of cases you can go there. If the mountain looks accessible, then it can be climbed. Particularly difficult parkour passages are marked with yellow marks, but there are no “right and wrong” paths here. Did you manage to squeeze through the hole and take the enemy by surprise? We won. Not? Okay, you can honestly try. By the way, we won’t be able to bury ourselves in an invisible wall even at the edge of the world, Aloy will simply declare that she has nothing more to do.

And the most impressive thing is when, after several hours of playing, you open the map and see that you still haven’t got out of a tiny nook and cranny in the very corner of the world.

Without clan and tribe

We will not see a truly open world soon. In order for our heroine to be released out of the gate, she and we will have to go through a lot.

If from the very announcement the world of the game conquered, bribed and teased with novelty, then the red-haired girl managed to interest few people at first sight. She lost in all respects to typical computer heroines. Ugly, somehow clumsy, with tow on her head, something awkward on her legs, and in general a red-haired misunderstanding.

Guerrilla Games pretty much cheated. In order for us to understand Aloy, we are introduced to her from early childhood. From infancy. It is growing before our eyes. And little Aloy turned out to be so ugly, such an ugly duckling, that, having got used to her, we instantly perceive the grown-up Aloy as "well, that's another matter"!

Although she is certainly not beautiful. Not a fierce warrior, graceful and sexy, not a heroine with a shining bust. Aloy is an outcast, in her entire life she has never had a full conversation with anyone other than her guardian, protector, mentor and friend, Rust. Mothers hid children from her, boys threw stones at her, and grown men began to pray loudly to the Great Mother if Aloy tried to speak to them.

The girl began to study martial arts in order to get a chance to return to the tribe. And she has that chance. But after so many years of exile and humiliation, is she ready to forgive the people who threw stones at her, accept them as her family and protect them?

There are no forks in the storyline of the game, all mysteries have one solution, and all events are steadily flowing towards a single ending. But there are variations in the dialogues. Aloy can try to cheat, threaten the interlocutor or open his soul. She can decide whether one of her recent acquaintances lives or dies. Some of these decisions slightly affect further events, but their main goal is to let yourself know: what is she, Aloy? How will she act, having turned from an outcast into the hope of her - and not only her - tribe?

Spear on microchips

Aloy is not a superhero at all. Yes, she dexterously jumps over rocks, runs along ropes and shoots accurately from a bow if we help her aim. But the main strength for her, like Batman, is given by technology.

At the observation point, you can see a piece of the world as it was a thousand years ago.

A visor found in an ancient ruin reveals things to Aloy that no one else can. For example, she sees the vulnerabilities of cars, their strengths and weaknesses, can calculate the route of the "beast" and even look out for what spare parts to really get hold of from the carcass. With its help, Aloy reads information from old devices, reads the diaries of long-dead people. And "in the field" the visor acts like Geralt's witcher's vision. A series of investigative quests is built on this: Aloy looks for clues, detects traces and follows them.

Having matured, the heroine acquires another artifact: by tying it to a spear, she turns it against the software: now she can open electronic locks and take control of machines and mechanisms. It is the microchip spear that provides Aloy with riding robots and "voluntary" assistants.

This wealth of possibilities may seem overpowering. But in reality, technological superiority only slightly increases Aloy's chances of winning, just as infinite stamina for dodges and rolls only increases the chances of survival. After all, her opponents are armored vehicles armed with flamethrowers, lasers, bombs and cutters, and one of their light jump knocks the girl to the ground. They are tireless and deadly, they notice any movement and never miss.

What about Eloi? And Aloy has problems again: she has run out of arrows, she has to go for supplies.

I will break the white birch

Herbs grow in an open field: some of them are used for healing, protective and strengthening potions, some can be eaten just like that, to improve health. Rabbits, foxes, wild boars jump through the forests and turkeys stomp waddle. Salmon swim lazily in rivers and lakes. And they are all doomed.

To cope with the machines, you need arrows, bombs, traps, potions, trip mines, ropes to tie the enemy to the place. Buy from merchants? No shards are enough! We do everything by hand: we broke birch trees, picked herbs, chopped foxes and rabbits into meat, and onward. Even to quickly move to an open fire, you need a bundle of supplies.

But the matter is not limited to this either. With a dozen arrows and a couple of bombs, you won’t get much, you have to alter old bags, and then expand them again and again. And here's the catch: arrows for each type of bow are folded into their own quiver, potions and bombs are in separate bags, and the ropes are not mixed up with wire for stretch marks. A whole set of bags will require a solid amount of hides, bones, wood and, of course, metal shards. Without them, nowhere at all, they are here instead of money.

Simple arrows are made from what is at hand. As soon as Aloy has fire arrows, explosive traps and electric bombs, rare components appear in the ammo recipes. They are obtained from cars. And they are not just removed from the wreckage - they need to be shot down with an aimed shot, before finding the place where they are located through the visor.

Even when Aloy is older, dressed up, armed and able to kill annoying ryskons with a single blow of a spear, she will now and then turn off the road to gut a rabbit or pick herbs. The constant need for supplies is evidenced by the fact that ordinary cars are returning to where we knocked them out from an hour earlier. Yes, diligently clearing the territory, and then running around it without fear of anything, will not work here.

combat bookkeeping

When Aloy catches enough rabbits and makes herself the biggest sack, there will be twenty slots on her weapon wheel. This is not exactly a weapon, these are different types of ammunition: three types of arrows for each of the three types of bows, three types of bombs for a sling, three types of tripwires for a thread thrower. We do not count booby traps here, they are in a separate menu. Yes, the calculation is given on the condition that all weapons are rare, purple, you cannot get this right after entering the main road. But imagining a twenty-slot clock face where we pick up the right ammunition, while the car rushes to Aloy at full speed, is very useful for understanding combat tactics. Or rather, a tactician.

And they are different for each type of car. It’s really only possible to kill a weak trotter with one well-aimed shot, and with a spear strengthened with the help of skills, you can fill up a modest scavenger. You will have to run from everyone else, throwing bombs on the go, setting traps and switching between different types of arrows: we break through armor with some, shoot down components with others, extinguish infection with fire, jam flamethrowers with ice and constantly get out of the way: in close combat, Aloy has little chance , even if she wears armor with metal overlays. Sheer fun.

Compared to machines, humans are dumb, clumsy, slow, and shortsighted. The intellect for them was cut out of the patches left over from the machine mind. But they compensate for the qualitative shortcomings with a quantitative superiority: as soon as you touch one, a good dozen will come running to the noise. Therefore, the bandit camps and protected fortresses turn into a platform for a stealth mission. Hitman from Aloy turns out to be quite good, if, in addition, you do not stint on a branch of stealth skills and dress up in a camouflage outfit.

Fights do not get boring, because at each new stage, new opponents appear, in most cases stronger than the previous ones. And old acquaintances are gradually losing strength, in comparison with the growing strength of Aloy: you don’t need to waste arrows on them, we’ll beat them with a spear or a rattlesnake.

From outcast to seeker

The story campaign is inferior in fascination and depth to the best stories from the third The Witcher. But CD Project Red had a solid literary foundation. Without going into details, let's say this: the main quests are well-designed, equipped with beautiful cutscenes and fraught with many unexpected twists and turns and discoveries. We always understand what we must do and why. And for the most part they really agree that we should go where they send us.

Animal machines roam the mountains, from which you can hide in the grass, people know how to hunt them and even take them apart, but still live an antediluvian tribal life. You can’t be angry at this happiness, but you can’t take it seriously either. However, we were lucky - Horizon: Zero Dawn does not claim any sane pathos from the very start. With the very first HZD trailers, the developers made a deal with us - we turn off all logic and in return we get complete nonsense, a good pretentious AAA game where you can hunt technosaurs.

A girl from the village of Arroyo lived her entire childhood near the ruins of Vault 13. Harry was destined for a fate full of trials - she was deprived of her home as a baby and thrown into the upbringing of a veteran of post-apocalyptic hot spots, also expelled into the wilderness for unknown reasons. The story takes the first sharp turn in the childhood of a young sorceress, when one day she gets a scar on her forehead and finds the Pip-Boy 500k. Since then, Neo has been able to see the Matrix and predict the behavior of the machines that have taken over Earth. The second significant hour struck when the Chosen One passed the test of sacred parkour and returned to the tribe. As soon as the matriarch proclaimed the victory of Eris, enemies from neighboring people came and managed to simultaneously burn their own hut, kill the heroine's father and raise an uprising of machines. After a triple dose of Zamotivine, the matriarchs couldn't think of anything better than to send the Vault Dweller to the big, scary world beyond the sacred lands. Look for a water chip, take revenge and find out who Luke's father really is. And mother. And generally speaking.

Jokes aside, this is how it happens in the prologue. But a contract, a contract. It doesn't matter how many clichés and nonsense are stuffed into the plot, scenery, characters, world, and in general all available angles. This nonsense is beautiful, and if you surrender to it, happiness will come, because Horizon: Zero Dawn managed to grab the blue bird named The Legend of Zelda by the tail.

So no, HZD is our standard sandbox with rattles of varying degrees of attractiveness scattered around the map.

It is worth the paternal tutorial to slightly lower the occasion and let us go to the microcosm of the sacred tribal lands, and the heroine immediately strayed from the plot path, because we fell for the hunt for animal pieces of iron. Isn't that the point of the whole game?

The first session of free conquest of the mechanical fauna turns out to be short, but stormy. Stormy, because butting with furs is fun right away - here you have a headshot-hungry bow, stealth in the bushes, close combat with rolls, and nice mechanics of the whole thing. Auto-aiming in close combat sometimes fails, but otherwise nothing interferes with a good addictive battle. Not long, because only iron dogs and horses come across the eye, and it is obvious that it is necessary to open the gates to the big world as soon as possible.

Well, everything is perfect there. You just stuck your nose over the threshold, and adventures are pouring on you from the left, right, above and below.

So, HZD is reminiscent of Zelda in that the game sort of goes by itself. You talked to a stranger two minutes ago, he called you somewhere, you went after him, drove to the other end of the map, ruined the bandit camp along the way, found three artifacts, met three new dinomekhs, collected a bag of healing and not very herbs, learned something new from the history of the world... And then suddenly it turns out that six hours have passed, half of the available amusements have been tested, and in general it would be time to move on.

For a long game session, only silly hide and seek in the thickets of red grass carefully planted by designers have time to get fed up. I want to go out and goof off. To anyone. And you know, if you want, you can go out and stupidly nail it! Not to everyone and not always, of course, but the opportunity as such cannot but rejoice.

The only thing that knocks out of the adventure trance is the episodic seizures of the main character. It happens that instead of obediently clinging to the rope, our Vault Dweller takes it and jumps upside down from the mountain. Or, forgetting about the hot fight with the machines, he begins to vent his anger on the stones. Yes, as usual, the camera mocks us. A separate anecdote is when some robotic buffalo rushes at you like a ram. He rushes, so he rushes, rushes, smears after a masterful roll of the torero and flies somewhere behind the back of the heroine and, most importantly, the cameraman. Well, if at this moment the homing spear from the melee button does not get lost, but if the target is lost, then that's it, we rush into the bushes and wait for a sudden attack. Invisible animal-like robots - they are.

But the camera team of Horizon: Zero Dawn is excellent at panoramic plans and those same sunrises. Whichever way you look, beauty is everywhere. It's nice to run around the world of the game even just like that, as a tourist. Especially in winter landscapes, especially when it's early morning in the post-apocalypse yard.

The actors don't disappoint either. Although our Chosen One frankly overacts, squinting all the time, raising her eyebrows and making complicated faces, and the Russian-language translation, traditionally for recent years, only spoils the mood, the heroes around us are also of a pleasant appearance - they are molded, dressed, painted and animated with love.

The design of the robots did not disappoint either. In general, there is absolutely nothing to complain about, the graphics of HZD are luxurious from all sides. Perhaps, your humble has never seen a more beautiful game on the PlayStation 4. I admit, with the grafon at the console, everything was not bad from the very start, take the same “Killzone: Captive of the Twilight”. But dont know. It's one thing to be poked in the face with someone's amazingly textured, but still annoying forehead, and another to be decidedly happy with every second spent in the game.

Overview of Horizon Zero Dawn - the main PS4-exclusive of the first half of 2017.

You should not write about good games at all or write as briefly as possible so as not to spoil the impressions for future players.

Plot. Humanistic post-apocalypse

The story of Horizon Zero Dawn begins with the birth of the main character Aloy. In the main shrine of the Nora tribe, a baby is found, whom the elders, out of fear of the Great Mother, decide to entrust to the upbringing of the outcast Rasta, who, being a serious warrior, began to teach the girl Aloy survival and hunting from an early age.

The introduction of Horizon Zero Dawn carefully immerses you in the game's universe. Haven't seen such a reverent attitude to this banal part of the game. Aloy's childhood lives with the players, where the developers talk about the main features of the game.

During the plot, it becomes clear that nothing is left of the world of people that we know. People have degraded to the level of the communal-tribal system. There are few of them, they are scattered and live mainly in the mountains and other hard-to-reach places.

And for good reason. After all, the planet is dominated by machines - strong and dangerous mechanisms similar to animals. Initially, it seems that all the troubles are due to robots, a kind of uprising of machines from the Terminator. But the writers of Guerilla, praise the Great Mother, did not fall into such banality.

The plot of Horizon Zero Dawn is a story about where the explosive growth of technology and innovation can lead humanity. The dangers that await us ahead are told here in a realistic way. The end of the world in Horizon Zero Dawn doesn't look far-fetched.

At the same time, this is a story about a human mind that can change the world for the better, correct its own mistakes, despite the terrible price.

I can’t tell you more without spoilers, but I’m sure that all fans of science pop and high-quality science fiction will not only like Horizon Zero Dawn, but will make you think about the topic that the developers have touched.

Graphic arts. New benchmark

Before the announcement of Hozrion Zero Dawn, I had little interest in Guerrilla Games. Yes, I did catch a glimpse of the Killzone series, exclusive shooters that most players thought were more like techno demos for new generations of PlayStation. They set the level of graphics, to which many companies collaborating with Sony were then drawn.

But their first big open world game made me change my mind. Guerrilla Games rolled out a product, the visual component of which automatically puts them on a par with the giants of the market.

The graphics of Horizon Zero Dawn are not striking because of technical aspects, such as the number of polygons in each bush, although everything is ok with this, but the level of game design.

The picture turns into wonderful landscapes, the dynamic change of day and night surprises with the play of light, and the amazing detailing of the appearance of cars makes us believe that such things are possible in principle.

The stability of the game is amazing. More than once during the passage of Horizon Zero Dawn had to stop to admire the scenery. Many of the screenshots I've taken from the game look just as good as concept art on the desktop.

Gameplay. Fresh but controversial

It may seem risky for some to make a young and not even particularly sexy girl the main hero, but the gameplay puts everything in its place.

After all, no matter how strong a primitive warrior is, it is beyond human strength to withstand a direct collision with a swift and aggressive machine. You need cunning, skill and the correct use of the weaknesses of the enemy. A head-on attack is almost always doomed, if not to failure, then to unjustified difficulties, which can be avoided if you do not ask for trouble.

And Aloy learned this skillfully from Rust. She knows how to approach cars, she knows how to shoot from a bow, aiming at the most vulnerable places of robots. Hence the choice of the main character - Aloy fits this role best of all.

Horizon Zero Dawn is a kind of hunting simulator. Only a hunter can easily turn into a victim if he is stupid. The environment is full of dangers, you have to be constantly on your guard.

Horizon Zero Dawn feels like a completely fresh game. The main mechanics of the game - hunting and fighting with cars - is implemented in such a way that there are no associations with other games.

The original gameplay and the balance between hardcore and simple makes Horizon Zero Dawn like no other.

The game is difficult, but not as hostile to the newcomer as Dark Souls 3, for example. They want the player here, too, no one explains anything, you have to learn how to use the hunter's tools yourself, find combinations of equipment interaction that are acceptable for your playing style.

The machines are unfriendly and they are everywhere, but they are busy with their own business, not looking for a player. Being a skilled hunter, Aloy is able to cope with any robo-beast if she thinks with her head, not her muscles. The main thing is to study their habits and weaknesses.

If the main mechanics in Horizon Zero Dawn don't get bored until the very end, they are so cool, then the secondary mechanics raise questions.

Horizon Zero Dawn wants to feel like an RPG, but judging it by that alone is stupid. It's too empty for a role-playing game, the side quests in the style of "give-bring, kill-report" clog game time, but do not serve as a worthy filler.

Compare Horizon Zero Dawn with other story-driven third-person action games such as the Assassin Cread or Far Cry series.

Horizon Zero Dawn is an action role-playing game. It will definitely not work out in a couple of evenings.

Even ignoring boring side missions, as I did, it's worth counting on 30-40 hours spent in the world of Horizon Zero Dawn. With side quests it will be longer, but again, they are not worth attention, all the juice is in the main tasks and hunting for robots.

***

At the time of writing, Horizon Zero Dawn has sold over 3 million copies, making it the most requested game on the PlayStation 4. After such a success, Horizon 2 is sure to be, as the ending clearly hints at.

Horizon Zero Dawn in its current state can't be called the face of PS4, because the game has enough shortcomings - boring side quests, lack of charismatic NPCs, controversial mechanics. Guerilla Games tried their best, but everything works the first time.

But the problems do not detract from the main thing - Horizon Zero Dawn is a bright and original game that can give new emotions to every player. Someone to catch the open world with its various climatic zones, someone tense battles with machines, and someone will stick to the plot, which makes you think about the future. No one will leave offended.

Review of one of the main exclusives of the year for PS4 now in a convenient video format!

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When Horizon Zero Dawn was announced at E3 2014, the gaming community was surprised to say the least. No one expected from Guerilla Games, known for shooters about red-eyed neo-Nazis, Action / RPG about a fragile girl who is looking for her destiny in a post-apocalyptic world captured by clanking robots.

In general, we lied a little: Guerilla Games already had experience in creating third-person games. Few can remember more than twelve years ago, in which players try on the boots of a US Army recruit sent to the Vietnam War in order to convey to the local "natives" the fallacy of their beliefs. In other words, Guerilla Games is familiar with the concept. On the other hand, this is the first experience of the studio in the genre and, it is worth noting, the experience is quite successful.

The story takes a very intriguing and promising start, telling of the fall of human civilization. Major cities are in ruins. Few of the buildings that have stood under the relentless pressure of time have turned into grotesque skeletons with steel beams sticking out from all corners, crypts of former human greatness dotted with wide cracks. Dense vegetation covered everything with a dense green veil. Rust-eaten skeletons of cars and tanks lie on the streets. The last days of mankind were clearly not rosy.

Nature finally won back what is rightfully hers. In reservoirs and murmuring rivers, fish splashes, animals run through forests, fields and snow-capped mountain peaks - hares, raccoons, wild boars and foxes. Familiar at first glance, the idyll is broken only by numerous mechanical monsters. Some, similar to horses and sheep, peacefully process vegetation and soil into some kind of green slurry, others, imitating crocodiles, lurk in the water in anticipation of an unlucky victim, and the earth itself trembles from the heavy tread of others.

A society with a vague past and an unclear future - people in it look completely out of place and even repulsive. It is they, and not machines that live in harmony with nature, that look superfluous in the new world. Some turned into savages living in tribes and wiping themselves with plantain leaves, while others were able to hide from the unpredictable and cruel world of machines behind the walls of huge and insanely pretentious cities. And in an attempt to learn more about the nature of mechanical monsters, they catch them and take them apart for parts, then putting some parts on their heads like hats.

The main character Aloy is an outcast who is disliked and shunned by the entire tribe, considering her a curse and an evil omen. From the very first frames, the player is made clear that the world is a cruel place in which you have to rely only on yourself. And hope that the wooden arrows in the quiver are enough to pierce the armor of a mechanical T-Rex before it tramples you into the ground.

Over time, Aloy will find out why people are so degraded that they kindle a fire with a spark from stones, but first she will have to complete a long list of story and additional tasks, as well as exterminate more than one hundred wild boars and hares to sew from their skins firebomb pouches and arrow quivers.

The script doesn't devolve into platitudes and slowly reveals all the details of the apocalypse that happened through audio diaries found in abandoned bunkers and ice-bound science facilities, as well as holograms of long-dead scientists and military personnel. Most of the additional tasks not only help to better understand the world, but can also compete with the main ones in terms of interest. At times, the player is asked to participate in the defense of a tiny village of blacksmiths from flying vulture robots, or to play a direct role in a detailed plan for a coup d'état.

Not without frankly boring quests, of course, which have absolutely no effect on the storyline and carry absolutely no semantic load. So, Aloy may be asked to find a thief stealing fruit, or help a sodomy who is not allowed by the clergy to stare at a statue created by his lover. Such tasks are clearly needed to artificially increase the duration of the game, because after completing about 90 percent of all available tasks and playing at maximum difficulty, the passage is unlikely to take you more than 60 hours. And by the standards of large RPGs, this is not so much.

And since we are talking about the shortcomings, we can not fail to mention the moral choice system presented in the game. Branching dialogues sometimes offer to choose one of three answers, which, according to the logic of the game, will be explained by Aloy's iron will and anger, her cold and prudent mind, or altruistic, loving nature. Difficult at first glance, the choice will almost never have an impact on the further development of events: there is only one ending in the game, regardless of the decisions made. One gets the feeling that Guerilla wanted to leave room for the creation of the moral character of Aloy, but at the same time forbade players to turn her into a rare bastard. Therefore, often, even if the player chooses the most evil answers, Aloy as a whole does not cease to be a sweet and good-natured girl.

The world of the game is not as big as, say, in the same one (even without the addition ""), but certainly no less beautiful and interesting for research. The map is divided into several regions, each of which is controlled by one of the few human tribes. The eastern lands belong to the tribes of Nora, from which the main character herself comes, and it is them that the player first sees. There are flakes of snow on the ground and trees, and the tingling touch of cold winter is literally felt in the air. At times, it can rain heavily here, or suddenly a thick fog envelops everything. The arid and desolate west, with intermittent sandstorms, is controlled by two tribes: the pompous Karja and the techies Oseram. There are also several tropical areas with lush vegetation - predatory machines roam there, similar to panthers and able to become almost invisible, like an alien hunter from the movie "Predator".

By the way, about cars. Robots have perfectly adapted to their environment. They are more animals than clanging pieces of iron, and they are ready to jealously protect their territories from stupid bipedal savages with spears and arrows. Conventionally, the cars are divided into several categories: some just peacefully graze in the meadows, collecting grass in special containers on their backs, while others, meanwhile, protect them from various dangers, mainly from people. Gatherers rarely attack first, and in the event of a threat, they are more likely to run away from Aloy, although they can trample into the ground with iron hooves if something happens. Defenders, on the contrary, are more likely to climb on the rampage, trying to burn a stranger, freeze, bite in half, shy away with current or stun with a sound wave.

Almost every robot can use several types of attacks, from crushing blows with hydraulic arms to electrostatic discharges that damage, stun and disorient at the same time. The larger the robot, the more weapons installed on it and the more dangerous it is. But all machines have their vulnerabilities that can be destroyed by depriving their owners of certain types of attacks. For example, a disabled cryo-module on a crocodile around its neck will freeze it and prevent it from spitting snowballs anymore.

To unlock more parts of the map, Aloy must first find a giant, long-necked, flat-headed robot gracefully walking around the area, then mount it and reprogram its mapping system. It is somewhat reminiscent of the turrets from the Assassin's Creed series, only it is implemented more interesting and better.

The process of destroying enemies can be greatly simplified by mastering the ability to seize control of certain types of machines. It's much easier to scrap a whole herd of mechanical buffalo if one or two fight on the side of Aloy. The only pity is that even when captured, the robots do not leave their habitat. It would be great to roam the world accompanied by a huge beast that shoots lasers from its mouth and is capable of crushing multi-ton boulders into dust with just one blow of its tail.

Since humanity is just recovering from the apocalypse, anti-gravity, rapid-firing lasers, cryogenic guns and several thousand volt electric spheres, Aloy can counter with a bow, arrows with tips of various thicknesses, a harpoon, trip wires, several types of slingshots and something like a shotgun that shoots wooden stakes. But this is enough, because Aloy is first and foremost a skilled hunter. She can prepare for a fight by first studying the area, setting traps and noticing several points with tall grass at once, where she can hide in case of emergency.

The game also features a branching skill tree that allows you to develop Aloy in one of three areas, including stealth, increasing damage and stamina, as well as the ability to find more useful things in the carcasses of disabled robots and killed hares.

As for the technical performance, like the previous games of the studio, it was made at the highest level. Often you will slowly turn the right stick, trying to see in detail all the beauty and splendor of the surrounding world, in which every detail, even the smallest and most imperceptible at first glance, is made with reverent love. Whether it's the sun-scorched deserts of Karja, the snow-covered lands of the Nora tribe, or the time-lost and ice-bound complexes of the "ancients" - each location is beautiful in its own way. Sometimes you don’t even want to use the opportunity to fast travel, preferring a long and exciting walk through a picturesque area, rather than a banal loading screen.

The game looks great on both PS4 and PS4 Pro. Any significant differences like draw distance and anti-aliasing will only be noticeable on a 4K TV. Regardless of the version chosen, the game keeps a stable 30 frames per second, only occasionally dropping this value to 28-29 - and then only in especially intense scenes that demonstrate the destruction of objects and many special effects like explosions and electric arcs from energy spheres.

Comparison of PS4, PS4 Pro and PS4 Pro graphics in 4K resolution

Guerilla took a big risk, trying to move away from the genre familiar to the studio, and this risk was fully justified. The studio managed to create a magnificent world full of secrets and mysteries, and write an interesting script with unexpected twists, which deliberately leaves several questions unanswered and open to interpretation. But this would not be enough if Guerilla were not complemented by an exciting gameplay in which even the smallest flaw is easily outweighed by a lot of advantages. And the ability to tame a mechanical tyrannosaurus rex.

Horizon: Zero Dawn is one of the best and most beautiful games of this generation and a must have in every PS4 owner's collection.