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> top #1 for me as far as story goes - ignoring the game play completely - was Horizon Zero Dawn I watched people play it to the end - mostly. I played it when

> top #1 for me as far as story goes - ignoring the game play completely - was Horizon Zero Dawn I watched people play it to the end - mostly. I played it when it came out on PC - never completed it; the combat didn’t work for me. Personally I think it has a cool sci-fi premise but that’s it. I found the characters … stiff, shallow, and pretty cliché. Aloy is yet another messianic player character that we have seen a billion times. Apart from the enigmatic main villain - which is yet another well worn trope - all the side characters feel pretty 2 dimensional. I’m going to get skewered for saying this … but the story feels like it’s pandering to current social political trends - i.e. the obsession with diversity. I don’t know why exactly the “diversity” in modern stories bug me so much but I never had a problem with Star Trek. Maybe it’s the egalitarian in me, modern stories seem to have an emphasis on differentiating people by their ethnicity and background while Star Trek promoted the view that all people regardless of ethnicity or background be treated as peers - where you stand on your own merits as an individual.

dudeman13 5y ago
>I’m going to get skewered for saying this … but the story feels like it’s pandering to current social political trends - i.e. the obsession with diversity How so? I didn't get that feeling at all from Horizon Zero Dawn. If someone told me HZD had an obsession with diversity I'd react with a standard "wat?". I do agree that some of the forced diversity in modern stories is annoying, mind you. I just didn't get that vibe from that one story.
marvinvz 5y ago
While I agree on your general point about "diversity" in games I'm pretty sure HZD was before that topic became an issue.
- worrycue 5y ago
  HZD was released in 2017. I think we were already seeing "diversity" in most media then.
Merad 5y ago
> I’m going to get skewered for saying this … but the story feels like it’s pandering to current social political trends - i.e. the obsession with diversity. How do you think HZD pandered to diversity? The main point that I have heard brought up is the wide variety of ethnicities in secondary/background characters, but IMO that is completely consistent with the game's setting and story. The game takes place in a world where human society has literally been reset and rebuilt from scratch, so you'd need to have the full variety of human kind for genetic diversity while at the same time all of the racial and ethnic prejudices that exist today would cease to exist unless the AI was trained to preserve them (it wasn't). Naturally the new world would see new prejudices arise (people are still people after all), and the game does attempt to portray this.
- worrycue 5y ago
  > is completely consistent with the game's setting and story That’s true but I can’t help but feel it’s deliberately written this way to score points.
- pjc50 5y ago
  He means it had female main characters.

dudeman13 5y ago

>I’m going to get skewered for saying this … but the story feels like it’s pandering to current social political trends - i.e. the obsession with diversity How so? I didn't get that feeling at all from Horizon Zero Dawn. If someone told me HZD had an obsession with diversity I'd react with a standard "wat?". I do agree that some of the forced diversity in modern stories is annoying, mind you. I just didn't get that vibe from that one story.

marvinvz 5y ago

While I agree on your general point about "diversity" in games I'm pretty sure HZD was before that topic became an issue.

worrycue 5y ago
HZD was released in 2017. I think we were already seeing "diversity" in most media then.

Merad 5y ago

> I’m going to get skewered for saying this … but the story feels like it’s pandering to current social political trends - i.e. the obsession with diversity. How do you think HZD pandered to diversity? The main point that I have heard brought up is the wide variety of ethnicities in secondary/background characters, but IMO that is completely consistent with the game's setting and story. The game takes place in a world where human society has literally been reset and rebuilt from scratch, so you'd need to have the full variety of human kind for genetic diversity while at the same time all of the racial and ethnic prejudices that exist today would cease to exist unless the AI was trained to preserve them (it wasn't). Naturally the new world would see new prejudices arise (people are still people after all), and the game does attempt to portray this.

worrycue 5y ago
> is completely consistent with the game's setting and story That’s true but I can’t help but feel it’s deliberately written this way to score points.
pjc50 5y ago
He means it had female main characters.