Horizon Zero Dawn is a third-person action RPG developed by the same folks who put together the many, many Killzone games–none of which I have played.

Mr. Riven and I had been following the news about this game since we saw the first trailer for it. As time went on, we both had concerns that it was going to be an Assassin’s Creed clone …but with a pre-historic feel and metal dinosaurs guise!!11! Thankfully, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Not that I didn't try, of course

Too beautiful to kill

The game doesn’t have much in the way of traditional tutorials other than some very brief scenes when you’re a child. I, personally, love that. A game that encourages you to learn by playing it takes me back to simpler times. That’s not to say that prompts won’t appear on screen to help you out–press triangle to gather herbs or loot downed enemies, etc.–but you also won’t have to go through 10-minutes of forced actions with a new weapon, either. (“OK, use this weapon to kill enemies this way, now that way, now this other way, congratulations on completing the mandatory tutorial!” I’m looking at you, Batman: Arkham Knight, even though I think you’re otherwise a fabulous game.)

The world map looks small …until you start playing. Fast traveling costs resources, but I found that I preferred to hoof it from one place to another, anyway. The absolutely stunning world is populated with plenty of machines and wildlife, all of which you are free to kill as you please or not. I highly recommend killing everything that moves because I dislike being resource-starved. That said, as meticulously as I do hunt and gather, I haven’t out-paced the economy; there’s quite a few shinies for sale that encourage “saving up.”

You could say he has a predilection

“Mecha-raptor butt-hacking has never been so beautiful.” – Mr. Riven

The skill point system and accompanying skill trees offer some decent customization options regarding gameplay. Consider yourself a brawler? There’s a tree for that. Prefer a stealthier style? There’s a tree for that. The last tree seems to be largely environmental: gather more resources from fewer sources, override machines for longer, that sort of thing. But it should be noted–so, y’know, note it–that you will certainly max out each of these trees by the end of the game, so it really comes down to what you want first. I’d also like to point out that Mr. Riven plays like Deadshot (lots of ranged combat), while I prefer more of a Deathstroke approach (up close melee combat). So, like I said earlier, options.

Finally, the story is compelling and downright beautiful, and it shows you right away in the first thirty minutes (ish) of gameplay that the dialogue choices you make might come up again later. Not having played through the entire game, I can only hope that this continues to be the case. Mr. Riven is further along than I am, and there seem to be all kinds of tangled webs to unweave and mysteries to solve. I’m definitely looking forward to seeing how it unfolds, especially considering how gorgeous that unfolding has been so far. (Seriously, the main character’s hair [and hips] are mesmerizing.)

9/10; will continue to bang.

If you have questions, please feel free to leave them in the comments below, and I will do my best to address them in a spoiler-free manner…after I put this game down for two goddamn seconds.