Let's not pretend thats not exactly how this thread was made and the type of responses it was looking to get. And yes, Ubisoft game are mostly open world bloat fest that feel designed by committee.
Its not a compliment
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Let's not pretend thats not exactly how this thread was made and the type of responses it was looking to get. And yes, Ubisoft game are mostly open world bloat fest that feel designed by committee.
Its not a compliment
Pray to god your trolling.
Story is average at best and the gameplay was whatever until near the end.
Was a cool game but not very replayable.
But that's the best part. Ubisoft has "pioneered"so much of the modern open-worlds game design that it's impossible to avoid.
The trend of having collectibles strewn in the open world was popularized by ubisoft.
Emphasis on traversal such as climbing.
Using towers to unlock parts of the map.
Open ended mission design that allows multiple approaches.
"Dynamic" and "emergent" gameplay such as being able to set things on fire or wild animals.
And so much more I'm probably not even thinking of.
Like the only other open world games at the time where fairly static. Like aside from cops gta was largely mission based. Bethesda and rockstar is the only other "types" I can think of that managed to do its own thing.
Almost every other open world game will have traces of ubisoft DNA. It is undeniable. That includes botw or whatever darling you can come up with.
The story was fine, this is crazy hyperbole.
I think the issue here is the critical vocab employed is just... crap. 'Ubi' defines a set of open world tropes that generally work well and are engaging, albeit with varying degrees of success. HZD absolutely uses them, this is undeniable. That isn't enough though, as HZD also has a good story (at least the historic stuff, contemporary world was less engaging) and cool dinos. 'Ubi' just becomes a reductive, thoughtless slogan that allows people to pivot into crazy negative or positive hyperbole.
I enjoyed it but I didn't think it was anything particularly novel or superlative. The dinos were very cool tho.
And in Ubi defense, they dont get 6 years to develop and fine tune their games like the Sony first party games do. At their core they absolutely bite things from Ubisoft, the difference is that the Sony output is just way more polished
You just described almost any new open world game.
Like I can break down how almost everything in BOTW was pulled from somewhere. Mainly far Cry.
I think Horizon is still way better than any Ubi open world game from last gen (mainly due to the good combat mechanics and more interesting setting), but it's undeniable that it's basically a highly polished Ubisoft game. If it was called Far Cry: Horizon I wouldn't even suspect it wasn't made by Ubi.
This can be said about all three of Sony Studios attempts at open worlds tbh. Like the fact that you can see stuff like this while just wandering around in an AC game is crazy:
As you said it's really only surpassed by npc animations and behaviors in Rockstar Games like Red Dead 2. On the surface level GoT, Horizon, and Days Gone are all beautiful but that beauty only makes me wish we could have even more like the above instead of like, Horizon npcs carrying boxes to a preset location in the towns and/or generally standing mostly still.
BOTWs quests made horizon's look like the Witcher.
Many of them where Korean f2p mmo levels of collectathon
This is disrespectful to Ubisoft. HZD was dead. Like one of the most dead and lifeless worlds I've played last gen. There was more world interactivity in Assassin's Creed III. If you're going to make and open world game, you have to you know…make a living world. Guerrilla absolutely failed point blank at that aspect. Sure HZD played better than Ubisoft games in some aspects, but that's not enough to say it's way better. And honestly with Origins, Odyssey and Valhalla that's not even true anymore.
Yeah honestly Ubisoft surpasses Rockstar in some aspects, especially when it comes to jam packing the world with little scripted "events" like you showed in those gifs. I think where Rockstar shines is how the NPCs react to the player's actions in entertaining ways.
I think HZD is great too but...
Is this satire? Lol.
Whelp, lmfao.
Botw has some amazing deep and nuanced quests like killing getting a girl a bunch of fire flies, showing a kid a bunch of random weapons or a dude like 30 butterflies.
To be fair this is just a Zelda thing. Outside of Majoras mask, the side activities in 3d Zelda are well...shit.
That was my impression too. Combat is different enough but the whole map and busy-ness of it all screamed Ubisoft design.
But the world was way, way worse. Boring and annoying to traverse for the most part. The story is interesting thought.
But the world was way, way worse. Boring and annoying to traverse for the most part. The story is interesting thought.
No they don't. I'd rather play with Horizon's ranged tools than any Assassin's Creed, Watchdog or Far Cry. Any day of any week.
I only made it about 5 or 6 hours into the game. I like the setting, but even the story wasn't enough to keep me playing. I don't tend to make it through repetitive open world games.
I have never beat an Assassin's Creed or Far Cry game for example. I will try any game though. I tend to stick to games that are driven non-stop by their story. When it strays into fetch or crafting territory I tend to lose interest.
I have never beat an Assassin's Creed or Far Cry game for example. I will try any game though. I tend to stick to games that are driven non-stop by their story. When it strays into fetch or crafting territory I tend to lose interest.
i wish it had climbing like ubisoft games
that color coded climable shit only works in linear games
thank god the sequel fixed that
that color coded climable shit only works in linear games
thank god the sequel fixed that
There is minimal crafting and fetch quest in this game. Stick to main missions and it will just feel like a liner game
I just finished HZD yesterday. Gorgeous game (4K, max, ultrawide, 100fps).
I felt the game had more heart and soul than Ass Creed, Far Cry, etc. You could really feel there was a team behind it that truly cared. The attention to detail was phenomenal. The robots were awesome.
However, I was shocked at how linear and limiting it was. No climbing. Limited crafting and customization. Few weapons. No memorable side characters or quests. The world didn't really feel alive.
I do look forward to the sequel when it comes to PC!
I felt the game had more heart and soul than Ass Creed, Far Cry, etc. You could really feel there was a team behind it that truly cared. The attention to detail was phenomenal. The robots were awesome.
However, I was shocked at how linear and limiting it was. No climbing. Limited crafting and customization. Few weapons. No memorable side characters or quests. The world didn't really feel alive.
I do look forward to the sequel when it comes to PC!
User Banned (3 days): Accusations of shilling
HZD has more interesting and engaging combat in 30 minutes than the AC series has had in its entire run.
This thread certainly has some takes in it.
Ubisoft gets the crown for a slightly less lifeless looking gameplay world, but it's stories, animation, and overall presentation is such a downgrade I almost go into conspiracy mode and have to assume half these people are paid shills. Combat in AC has basically never been good, side stories some of the worst in the genre, main stories barely engaging and entiriely forgettable.
This thread certainly has some takes in it.
Ubisoft gets the crown for a slightly less lifeless looking gameplay world, but it's stories, animation, and overall presentation is such a downgrade I almost go into conspiracy mode and have to assume half these people are paid shills. Combat in AC has basically never been good, side stories some of the worst in the genre, main stories barely engaging and entiriely forgettable.
I initially played HZD right after BotW and didn't enjoy it. Thought it wasn't fair b/c I kept comparing it to botw so gave it another go couple of years later and still couldn't find myself to enjoy it.
The game looks freaking amazing. But I couldn't get into the story and I can't name another character in that game besides Aloy - and I've played the campaign twice!
The game looks freaking amazing. But I couldn't get into the story and I can't name another character in that game besides Aloy - and I've played the campaign twice!
Agreed. I've enjoyed the Ghost Recon open world games, but even those could be way better.
HZD is when I realized I'd fallen out of love with Sony exclusives. It has a couple of interesting ideas running underneath the surface but the vast majority of them are undercooked. what you're left with is bog standard open world action stealth story driven rpg soup with some pretty visuals attached.
it's a good technical showcase, but its far from a good game.
it's a good technical showcase, but its far from a good game.
It is not an Ubisoft game.
You might term it a Konami game, as in "Metal Gear Solid 5". That is a really well put together game that is shoved into an ubisoft open world setting which adds nothing to it.
Had HZD been made up of carefully crafted levels? It would have been a much better experience. A lot of the game is like this, when you get funneled into a linear bit, but it just means your time is wasted in between.
I highly suggest you mainline the shit out of it and just pretend you are not pointlessly walking for 10 minutes to get to the next section of content.
Ubisoft's design is not like this. The pointless open world is the whole experience, there really isn't a game to be found.
You might term it a Konami game, as in "Metal Gear Solid 5". That is a really well put together game that is shoved into an ubisoft open world setting which adds nothing to it.
Had HZD been made up of carefully crafted levels? It would have been a much better experience. A lot of the game is like this, when you get funneled into a linear bit, but it just means your time is wasted in between.
I highly suggest you mainline the shit out of it and just pretend you are not pointlessly walking for 10 minutes to get to the next section of content.
Ubisoft's design is not like this. The pointless open world is the whole experience, there really isn't a game to be found.
I remember the principle characters of Frozen Wilds because you spent more meaningful time with them. I also remember some of the past characters like Sobeck, Herres and that fuck Ted Faro. But I honestly cannot remember the names of the secondary characters in the main, present day campaign other than Sylens. My man Lance Reddick knocked it out of the park.
That's as hyperbolic as the "best story in any medium" comment.
One day people shall realize that "I don't like this game" does not equal "it is not a good game".
This was basically my take, but the story did end up hooking me a bit.
Except it really isn't since it uses the Ubi template. I had a slightly better experience with the game than the OP did, but it really does scream "seen it, done it a million times already since 2007" gameplay and general structure. The best thing about the game was fighting a new Zoid for the first time, but after one or two encounters they become trivial, and the game runs entirely out of steam as soon as you've been introduced to your last one, which is around the halfway mark depending on the course you're following.
And "literally one of the best stories in any piece of fiction ever"? My god...
Even if that were close to being true (it isn't remotely), you cannot sustain a 30+ hour game based off of a general concept of the world alone, especially when all of the NPCs are dull, all of the quests are dull and aside from certain regional aesthetic differences, the world as a whole is dull outside of the Zoid fights.
Yeah, it's really hard to see why the comparison to a Ubisoft game is being made since it literally (proper use of the word this time) is following the same template Ubisoft has been doing since the first Assassin's Creed. Try to imagine any of the Ubisoft games without the constant collect-a-thons if that makes it easier. I know you can do it, because while their games have that garbage, they weren't all equally egregious in that respect and it also wasn't the totality of their template either. Not even the main focus, just added padding. Way too much at times, but not even mandatory to bother with either.
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If I'm not enjoying myself, there's not much of a functional difference between "I don't like this game" and "It is not a good game"
This is exactly why I fear for a Splinter Cell made by current Ubisoft. Their design philosophy doesn't fit the series.
While I thought every character and quest in HZD (not related to unearthing the mystery behind its story) was lacking and boring as hell, the game certainly didn't give me the feeling of "focus/committee tested open world bloat content churned out monotonously and designed to make you spend time in that world monotonously" (aka Ubisoft open world).
Seriously, my number 1 gripe with HZD is how boring the non important characters and all quests are. The minute you step out the gates as a Seeker, the one thing that should make you super excited about exploring the open world, was.... "go here and find this person and talk to them". And the supposed biggest settlement was this boring ass city with a boring ass king.
I really hope they've upped the game in that aspect for the sequel, but seeing how they brought back another boring character (that captain guard guy) for the trailer, I'm not super optimistic.
Seriously, my number 1 gripe with HZD is how boring the non important characters and all quests are. The minute you step out the gates as a Seeker, the one thing that should make you super excited about exploring the open world, was.... "go here and find this person and talk to them". And the supposed biggest settlement was this boring ass city with a boring ass king.
I really hope they've upped the game in that aspect for the sequel, but seeing how they brought back another boring character (that captain guard guy) for the trailer, I'm not super optimistic.
Yeah it has all the trappings of your average AAA open world game, and a lot of those trappings are the usual Ubisoft shittiness that Assassin's Creed has poisoned the industry with. But there are also a lot of wonderful aspects of HZD that you can't find anywhere else.
Valhalla, with its bloat, is one of the best games I played in years and I think it is the best assassin's creed ever. I should try this game again. It didn't pull me in when I tried it.
I really do hate that this is almost my exact experience. I'm not sure why I immediately loved GoT and still couldn't really get into HZD. Sigh.