Horizon Forbidden West looks incredible on both the PlayStation 5 and (perhaps, surprisingly) PS4, but it’s not flawless: its presentation does have a few issues, including HDR hiccups, shimmering, and pop-in. The good news is that developer Guerrilla Games is on the case, and after last week’s hot fix, it’s already planning to release another title update as soon as possible.
“Thank you for sharing your various visual issues with us via our Support Form,” a spokesperson wrote on the game’s official Reddit page. “The team are working vigilantly to resolve these issues. Please continue to use the Support Form and share videos (recordings of your TV and monitor are useful) and provide us with as much information as possible.”
The Dutch developer added that it appreciates fans’ frustration, but it’s working as quickly as it can: “We understand your frustrations and appreciate your patience. We are doing our best to quickly get you back out into the wilds so you can explore all the secrets of the Forbidden West.” Have you experienced any issues with the game’s visuals at all?
Sadly, we can’t help with iffy HDR implementation and bugs, but we can still refer you to our Horizon Forbidden West guide, which will help you on your path to 100 per cent completion. Hopefully the first-party studio is able to issue some fixes before you’ve discovered everything in the Forbidden West.
[source reddit.com]
Comments 136
It certainly could do with it. I’m getting plenty of glitches. But also anyone else finding traversal an absolute pain in the rear lol
I had a serious issue where it’d literally dropped to below 10fps while playing.
Had to delete the game and reinstall. Glad they are looking into more permanent fixes
As disappointed as I was when my copy got delayed, this kinda thing proves why I'm often okay with waiting a couple weeks.
Although I don't use HDR, it's evil, so maybe I'd have been okay.
I'm left unbothered by most of the issues, the biggest problem I've encountered on PS4 is the delay in rendering or is that what pop-in is? Idk, it does look weird, but well... I just love it too much to be bothered by it
@Mikey856 Yeah the platforming's the weakest aspect of the gameplay and will need to be improved for a sequel.
@RogerRoger Out of curiosity, why aren't you a fan of HDR?
Smooth sailing for me on PS5. A few minor issues that come and go but are not that distracting
@XOF yes that's what pop in is. Most likely has to do with the PS4's use of a hard drive as opposed to an SSD
I'm actually waiting to pick this one up. I'd have no doubt noticed all these art bugs, it's kind of my job, so I'm perfectly happy paying less for a more stable product. Especially considering Elden Ring is only a few days away.
Still looks like a fantastic game!
@get2sammyb Makes everything look washed out, drab and "real" and I tend to prefer it when games (and movies, and TV shows) look artificial and over-the-top. Games like Forbidden West are constructed realities, after all.
Not only that, but Photo Modes don't like HDR. You'll spend ages getting the colour and brightness right, and then you transfer your shot to a non-HDR device and it's a freakin' disaster. Some games go as far as deactivating their Photo Modes if they detect you using HDR, and I don't blame 'em.
These are just my personal preferences, though. I get that a lot of folks like HDR, and hope that any issues with it in Forbidden West get fixed for them, and quickly.
@RogerRoger I used to absolutely HATE HDR, but I got a new monitor and it looks really really good now. Turns out it just looked like garbage on the Samsung TV I had, it was just waaaaaaay too bright and blinding.
With my new monitor colors are more vibrant, and different colors are more easily noticeable, contrast looks a lot better, and my blacks are better distinguished in the overall color pallet. My old TV made everything look either way too dark or way too bright.
The only pop-in I noticed on PS5 is when the game transitions from a cutscene back to a playable segment. Character models or machines will pop-in a second later.
Definitely a lot of visual quality issues. In performance mode anything beyond like 30 feet in front of Aloy has this horrible granulated / static sheen too it that is only exacerbated by the issue that has been dubbed shimmer. It essentially is like a pixelated undulation of this granulation that makes it look like shimmer. It's very noticeable in areas without the significant fog/ dust. wind particles, etc, they have used in most of the areas. It makes me wonder if they knew it was a problem and used these effects to mask it as best as you can.
If you pull up the digital foundry ps5 tech video on this game toward the beginning of it with the very few shots comparing the resolution and performance mode, you can actually see the shimmer in performance mode as compared to it being lessened on resolution (despite digital foundry barely doing any actual technical analysis discourse regarding the two modes).
Surprisingly I had to turn motion blur back on, only to the low setting and I think it may have reduced the distraction of it, but that may just be a placebo generated from entering the larger portion of the map with far more fog. Either way the game does not look like its hitting its resolution targets in either mode due to this visual problem because it really does dictate clarity of anything beyond that very close-range depth.
It's odd it isn't mentioned in any reviews or even in tech videos, foundry's video felt more like a marketing preview than an objective analysis.
The woes of the way games are released now and it being an open world game are apparent. .
however, I am confident that Guerilla will absolutely address it if possible, and hopefully maybe consider a 45-fps mode that really fleshes out the best balance between smooth performance and resolution combined.
It’s a lot more technically rough than I expected. I’ve had Aloy get caught on scenery, quests not progressing until I restarted from a checkpoint, the shimmering in performance mode, the blurry textures in resolution mode, pop-in in the bloody opening credits of all things. I’m sure they’ll fix these things over the coming weeks.
@Medic_Alert completely agree on this. Its literally just like auto climbing much like the lame climbing in uncharted, but there is a lot of Jank and missing that automated detection in it. especially platforming sections in ruins and cauldrons.
I am genuinely shocked out how this and the climbing is largely unchanged from the original. The developers and ALL of these game sites pushed a false narrative on changes to it. The developer came out and said climb basically everything. The game sites said it's not everything but like an AC game. LMFAO what we actually got was the EXACT same very limited climbing freedom that was in HZD, but instead of yellow handholds painted onto very specific and limited climbing areas, we can now use the focus to paint the spots on temporarily, but oh they also left the physical paint on in a most non cliff wall areas too. Essentially, they falsely represented a change adding a desired improvement to HZD, rather than actually changing it, which is not different than CDPR's lying about elements in their game, they just lied a whole lot more and didn't even finish the game before releasing it.
HFW is a decent game, but very iterative, and largely repeats its first outing faults rather than improving on them.
Good as the visual issues are pretty immersion breaking at times. May hold off playing until this patch drops now.
Nowt worse than getting stuck on the scenery whilst trying to avoid the murderous intent of a robot beaver. Great game, though.
@Constable_What Yeah, there was an element of that with my old television as well, but then I upgraded to a ridiculously fancy model to compliment my PS5 and, after testing it, still feel the same way. I appreciate the thought, though!
Around twenty hours in and finally had an issue today, which was the well documented frame rate drop. Started to chug mid-mission so I restarted the game and it cleared the problem. Plus there was a mid-mission checkpoint - so no progress lost, fortunately.
With games of this scope there are bound to be issues, but it looks like Guerrilla are on it and it hasn't taken away my enjoyment of what is an incredible game imo.
Guess when I get it at Christmas it'll be fully patched. Messed up HDR is a thing (some games really have a bad implementation of it thus making them look washed out). GT Sport and ironically HZD are great examples of HDR done right.
@Medic_Alert yeah, I’ve leapt from a few high places now because the circle button makes you jump backwards for some reason and square makes you drop down. What madness is this???
Also I think the npc’s have been drinking the brain potion from Gremlins 2: The New Batch because they’re way more cleverer in this game 🤪
@Medic_Alert I know exactly what you mean pal
Aloy's hair went all medussa on me during a cutscene, and i've had my fair share of pop in on PS5, but nothing major so far
@get2sammyb certainly as. I know it’s hard to do traversal in a 3rd person game and I can’t remember a 3rd person game ever getting it perfect, but this really is way off par for me
@Medic_Alert I suspect it will have been. Development will have started after the success of Zero Dawn and before PS5 dev kits were available. Gran Turismo and God of War Ragnorak will be the same. Doubt we will see many games that started development on ps5 and truly harness its power for a year or two yet. I do wonder if the inevitable dlc for forbidden west will be next gen only though
@Medic_Alert it was quite a thing to behold 😂
The pop in is bad but I've noticed it's alot worse when console has been in rest mode or when you suspend the game and go watch Netflix or something and go back to it. If you close the game actually improved it alot for me.
Visually stunning I haven't noticed any issues and I'm playing HDR 4K resolution mode. Quite possibly the most 4K, 4K game ever! Its razor sharp and the HDR implementation is resplendent.
I'm about a third through the game I suspect and haven't experienced anything weird, I think an NPC popped in once in the background during a cutscene, but other than that it's smooth on PS5.
@get2sammyb honestly, I'm not a huge fan of HDR in gaming either. So far not a single game has been improved visually using the feature even after an enormous amount of tweaking on the tv settings side, ps5 side, and game settings.
Everything ends up being washed out, sometimes with a yellowing sheen. Whether it was AC, Ghost of Tsushima, this game, or countless others, it just isn't the visually groundbreaking experience it has been marketed as, even in movies.
I think the TV industry has to come up with a new gimmick every 2 or 3 years to justify this nonsensical yearly release of overpriced tvs, when in reality if they really wanted to innovate, implementing a stronger, more technically sound device that is upgradeable it would create far better client retention and revenue over time. They could then charge a subscription fee for firmware updates that improve the TV for its lifespan which could be pushed to like 2-3 years. Which would be far less sleezy then: a bunch of made of buzzwords for the same reused internal hardware with maybe a few more twinkle lights.
@Jacko11
I had that same issue in a battle near the first “Forge” you can access. They spawn a crap ton of Leapers there. I ended up having to fight almost ten of them and the games framerate dropped to a crawl (I’m playing performance mode).
I didn’t have to reinstall though. I found two fixes for it.
The first thing I tried was switching to resolution mode. The framerate shot up to 30 and held steady. But I made it a point to play the game on performance mode. So I decided to restart my PS5 and go back the Campfire save point nearby and see if it did the same thing again. Didn’t happen again. Whole battle played out super smooth the second go round.
@Shakybeeves It’s not really all that sharp outside of a small circle around Aloy. Anything slightly in the distance gets a weird haze around it.
@get2sammyb
HDR can be a blessing and a curse. It depends on the implementation in the media itself and how your TV’s HDR output works.
When it works well, it works really WELL. When it works poorly, it’s Godawful. I had to turn off HDR in Forbidden West because it was washing bright colors out.
Had an instance when NPC's suddenly disappeared from the background when I was talking to erend & when I got into the 'neutral zone' the frame rate tanked but when I quit out & loaded back up it was fine but nothing that's ruined my experience so far
I love HDR I play all of my games with it turned on assuming the game in question supports it but this game's HDR is quite rough around the edges. Glad they're working on these fixes but still.
I still believe to this day Ori and the Will of the Wisps is one of the nicest looking games to play in HDR. In fact I refuse to play Ori without it.
Interesting. I've struggled to see the benefit of HDR on HFW, and on Ghost of Tsushima it made everything look worse. Thought it was my TV's fault but maybe not...
And here's me 12 hours in and no issues that I've noticed. Traversal is easy aslong as you quick scan the walls to see where you can hold onto
Noticed the odd graphical glitch here and there but nothing game breaking or immersion breaking. It makes me wonder with studios working from home during development means some of these things slip through the cracks then they normally might be. Still no game is ever going to be buf free, just as long when it comes to to sell it you don't have a Cyberpunk or Fallout 76 situation.
I've had zero issues so far on a PS5, no need to wait to pick up this masterpiece. I will admit to a couple annoying platforming drop offs but when I slowed down I progressed just fine.
Another problem with HDR is the deceptive marketing around on TV sets. A TV set can support a certain HDR standard (like HDR 10 for example) but it may not have the peak brightness to do it well.
My TV is a good example. I bought it before I knew the things I know about HDR now. It honestly doesn’t get bright enough to make HDR worth it most of the time. I still try every game with HDR on because certain developers prioritize HDR on low light level panels. But most of the time, I end up turning it off because most developers simply apply the expected standard, not optimizing for TV sets that are “fraudulently” advertised.
The washout effect is commonly caused by the media scene in question demanding a higher brightness level than the TV can output at its peak brightness level. In addition, most cheaper HDR panels lack variable lighting. That’s where the panel can dynamically change the lighting on certain parts of the screen. Which is needed for the best HDR implementations, since not all scenes in games or movies are equally lit at the same frame of motion.
So ultimately, HDR can produce stunning results. If your panel has extremely high peak brightness, variable panel lighting, and actually meets the specifications stipulated in the most common HDR standards. Also it’s on the media developer as well. They have to shoot their scenes or design their game’s lighting around an HDR environment.
As for Horizon, I’ve had my share of glitches and problems. But overall the game is just so well designed and fun to play that it powers over the problems.
Plus I’m confident that most of my issues will be ironed out with this next patch. I’ll keep enjoying the game as is until then.
Fun fact: was playing the game yesterday, and during an in-game secondary mission cutscene, a big dude simply popped on the screen all of the sudden, and he was looking around as if unsure where to go. And he just stood there until the cutscene ended and the camera moved further... then he went on with his business walking away ^_^
There are occasional glitches here and there.
The most frustrating so far are the enemy paths that are not always correct... not often, but just enough to make you not trust them, which is annoying when you try to slip by or to plant a trap.
And of course it suffers from the Ubisoft open world plagues, like small trees in barrels, or in rocks, even happens to the small collectables like rocks berries and wood.
All it's left now is to see 2 horses into 1 and a bear just sitting on it's ass chilling on top of a house ... fun head scratching "WTF! O_O" memories from Assassin's Creed Odyssey.... but hey that's how a game sticks to people's memory, right?
Anyway, just small potatoes in the end.
I'm sure the above will be solved in future patches.
What's important is that the game looks amazing, is fun and entertaining and make you want to play it to the end. Well worth the preorder money, imo.
@get2sammyb
It's kinda a missed opportunity.
Uncharted has been at it for years and could've been a solid example of a job well done.
Sometimes you don't have to invent the wheel.
Horizon FW is an amazing game and truly enjoyable to play, besides the traversal bits.
Another thing what annoys me a bit is sprinting with a mount. Running between trees or parts with rocks constantly hampers fluidity of moving forward because the mount often slows down to halt.
And yes, I encountered quite a bit of texture issues but those aren't that annoying, imo.
I regularly find myself taking a small stop to enjoy the view. Guerilla Games really did a outstanding job trying to create a beautiful colorful world.
How strange... Two ps5s through two different tvs and we've not experienced any issues.
Sounds like im lucky. Hope the fix is soon as this game looks phenomenal with no issues...
I’m not having any issues apart from the odd bit of pop in I noticed.
HDR seems fine and no shimmering.
PS5 on top end 65” tv.
As for someone saying they can’t read the notes there is a setting where it keeps the notes up until you press x.
People just moan and don’t look at settings that are there to overcome certain issues.
No issues for me and don't mind the traversal. I'm having a blast.
@Medic_Alert I’m pretty sure it was always intended as a PS4 game and PS5 was added later. They were talking about that on the latest Sacred Symbols.
@Sladey69 I’m in the same boat as you. I might have had one or two very small hiccups in the seven hours I’ve played, but it was a texture pop in. Other than that I’ve had no issues and am having a good time with the traversal.
@Dezzy70 wait what notes?
Having a hard time deciding if Digital Foundry is a good or bad thing for the industry. On one hand, it holds devs to a higher standard, which I am all for. On the other hand, it seems to turn a lot of people into wanna-be-analysts who no longer enjoy their games because they noticed a slight pop in or a frame dip. There’s definitely a balance to be struck here.
I've only played about 7 hours so far and quite a chunk of that was in machine strike. Only issues I've had is clipping with aliyah hair and climbing ladders the hands go through the ladders 😂
I thought from the reviewers that most of the problems was fixed with the day one patch! Eventually that was a lie, I didn't bought the game for my ps4pro and i'm glad, Waiting for all this issues to be fixed.
Out of all recent big games HFW suffers quite badly from the run of the mill open world bugs I've found.
Animations on traversal glitching when climbing unsuitable spots.
General scenery glitching, very noticeable on cloth roofs on settlements as they blow in the wind with threats popping in and out of existence.
The same bug from HZD when cut scenes switch there's visible pop-in and stutters incidentally missing from Death Stranding
Over all its a great game so far but it's probably a few months from being the finished article.
I’m getting myself through the tutorial part and then back to Dying Light 2. Bloody loving gaming at the min!
Definitely noticing weird blurry imagery on PS5.
Playing on ps5 i got the 10 fps bug, wow was it bad ..
Been fine on the bug front for at least the first 10 hours. Some minor animation issues and clipping stuff. Nothing major.
The anti-aliasing in the performance mode however, is pretty horrible imo. The other drawbacks to the performance mode are acceptable but the constant pixel-crawl makes it a tough sell over the 30fps mode (which I'd recommend). Let's hope they can tweak it for an improvement.
@KundaliniRising333
Someone mentioned things load quick and they miss the notes because of PS5 quick hard drive.
But in the settings you can set to keep the notes up until you press X. That’s was all.
@Dezzy70 oh yah totally. Mine came default set to press x to complete loading. So that's a non issue for sure
@KundaliniRising333
Same as mine, I think some people find things to complain about.
@Dezzy70 I think the point that the commentor was making wasn't about the annoyance of the short loading screen, but instead that this was clearly a mad for ps4 game in design and scope that was just ported over with improvements visually to PS5
@UltimateOtaku91 I agree traversal seems pretty easy. I turned on “ Climbing Annotations” in the settings, which turns the yellow bars on all the time, makes it pretty problem free.
@KundaliniRising333 the thing with HDR is to use expert settings for your tv (place like rtings.com for example) then leave the PS5 HDR and game HDR settings on default. Also keep in mind if you run HDMI through an AV receiver you often have to manually turn on high-color mode, as it is off by default on most receivers. HDR should and does look amazing, night and day, especially on PS5. Bad results are often an improperly calibrated TV.
Currently playing on the PS4 and so far so good. Really happy with the performance overall and just dealing with some pop in and that’s it. Looking forward to this patch though.
I've encountered an invisible object in the overworld, even arrows get stuck in it. Don't know if it's a giant rock with Stalker powers or just a glitch, but I'm going to find out!
@Medic_Alert I agree with you, though I don't think it was destined to be a PS4 game as the general flavour of the comments suggests PS4 users are having more issues. It's not what I thought it would be on ps5. I think it's something we're stuck with in general atm, the cross into this generation of consoles is more vague than it's ever been and that's probably been largely driven by the pandemic and how that's effected the industry top to bottom.
It's incredibly frustrating that we don't really have any true next gen games but I do understand the problems developers must be facing having to create games that are playable over both generations, to make them financially viable. It's a case of damned if you do, damned if you don't, damned if you do both...
I've had some pop-ins but the pros of the game far outweigh any con it's easy to ignore, however if long load times would help iron things out, I'd be okay because everything loads so fast it feels unbelievable and at a cost. And I had it crush just once so far, the game is highly ambitious.
@Jacko11 I've had that 10fps happen at an intense fight scene, but I only reloaded a recent save and it was fixed.
@Bubba_Cho_Tep imagine how frustrating it must be for PC gamers with £2000+ setups 😂
I haven't had any major issues, although I've been playing in Resolution mode, so shimmering isn't an issue there. I have noticed very rare pop-in, but nothing major there either.
Regardless of whether one person is having more issues than another, it is good to see Guerrilla already on top of it and working on getting a patch out quickly. I know they aren't the only ones, but it is still refreshing to see a developer not just letting there game sit there with issues.
@RogerRoger I don’t use HDR either. All that fafffing about with paper white & peak brightness settings, which you have to tinker with on every single game...no thanks.
Hmm, don't people play test these games before they come out??? Saying that most of the people I know on PSN say they are enjoying the game and none have had any real problems with it tho(I still got to get thru my back-log of games so once I do hopefully all will be fixed) I like everyone bug testing for me then
@commentlife Why the dig at DF? They highly praised Horizon 2. They deal with things objectively so yeah they do nit pick because that's kinda the point, if you listen to them though even games they really critiqued like Pokemon Legends they still really liked as a game and give credit where credit is due.
A game of this scope and size, is bound to have a few bugs, here and there. So long as none are game or immersion breaking, then I can guess it's all good.
Should have been delayed even further, so that bugs and glitches can be dealt with.
Runs great in performance mode on PS5. HDR looks brilliant on what is a mid/high end screen.
@KnightRider1982
Nah the game is in a fully playable state and the bugs and glitches are fairly minor and to be expected of a game of this scope and scale. It’s a hugely ambitious title developed for one console on its last legs and another console that they have no experience developing for.
This isn’t Cyberpunk. Or even COD: Vanguard. The game works as intended. It needs a little shoe shine and polishing work but I’m willing to bet this next big update will get that taken care of.
A lot of people here love and adore Days Gone. And that game launched in far worse shape and took about three months to fix.
Now I will say this. The amount of small jank in Forbidden West is surprising considering the Sony 1st party pedigree. But I’m gonna give Guerrilla a passing grade on the technical front because this game was finishing its active development and pushing into bug fixing and correction during the Pandemic. In addition to this game being the studio’s first PS5 title and it clearly pushing the PS4 to its very limits.
This is the PS4’s first party swan song. The most ambitious game that console will ever receive from Sony. And it’s a stellar first effort on PS5. I’m proud of Guerrilla and once again they have proven why they are my favorite Sony studio. I’ve owned all of their titles since Killzone on PS2. They push boundaries and what the hardware their games run on can achieve when pushed to the max.
Most of their older games still hold up visually. If you go back and properly upres Shadow Fall to 4K and give it a little TAA, it would look like a shooter released this year. Because that is what Guerrilla does. They craft games that push Sony’s consoles to their breaking points. And those are my favorite kind of developers. I want them to come within an inch of breaking my console. That’s why I drop big money on PlayStations in the first place. To see what they can really achieve when the limits are pushed up against.
@nessisonett "pop-in in the bloody opening credits of all things" you mean the recap?
@KundaliniRising333
you must be thinking of another game. uncharted has very good climbing that isn't automatic at all. the best climbing i've experienced in any game ever and if horizon is like that...it's a plus in my eyes.
in what way is the climbing like the original horizon? you just said it's like uncharted now lol. the devs said everywhere where it's realistic to be able to climb not every single thing. from what i've seen there's way more to climb than in the original so you sound like you're exaggerating. the devs also said you don't have to use the focus if you don't want to...it's just to see in areas where it's dark and can't see where to climb.
lol you funny. this is nothing compared to what cyberflop was. the fact you said this is worst shows you're biased lol and you lost all credibility.
uh huh sure. lol nobody will take you seriously and I don't believe a word you say. if it was just a decent game it wouldn't had been praised so much. cope
@middyone No, the opening credits. With the song. And the credits.
@nessisonett are you playing in performance mode?
@Medic_Alert
you know how much money it would be for a version of a game to be scapped and restarted? no they definitely didn't do that lol. load screens are optional...just turn them off if you want instant loading. obviously there isn't time to read tips lol...again just change the settings. ya'll find the weirdest stuff to complain about.
@KundaliniRising333
it wasn't. the director came out and said they got the ps5 very early and was able to work on it from pretty much the beginning and scale it down to the ps4 version.
@middyone I’ve switched between the two. Both have their own problems.
@AdamNovice "It makes me wonder with studios working from home during development means some of these things slip through the cracks then they normally might be"
definitely. these worlds are already so complex these days...i am sure it's harder working from home making them.
@Aexurion how does the climbing compare to uncharted?
This wont be an issue if sony would just make these next gen games TRUELY NEXT GEN meaning strickly made on ps5 not ps5 and ps4. Same thing with xbox. Cant be making games to run on xbox one and series x the games needs to start being next gen console exclusive. Just look at how beautiful ghost wire looks. Cant get that to run on PotatoeStation4. Yea horizon looks great but imagine if it was just ps5 exclusive? Itll look even better than what it looks now that's for sure.
@JoyconGang being next gen only doesn't mean no bugs lol. there will always be bugs in games. ghostwire looks significantly worse than horizon in terms of graphics. it can definitely run on ps4. it won't look better than it does. every generation starts with devs learning how to take full advantage of the hardware. there's a huge difference between a ps4 exclusive at the beginning and the end. infamous second son is nowhere near as good looking as god of war or the last of us 2.
@middyone true you do have a point there. Within the next 3 years the games will start to look so much more like next gen. Arc raiders baby 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
@Marquez
Any chance this was a mission when you arrived at a camp and it was under attack and you needed to help them out ?
@JoyconGang yes sir. glad I got my ps5...I'm ready for next year. that's when it starts(well we already have ps5 exclusives) with spiderman 2. sony said 2023 is the cut off period for cross gen.
I've played 3-4hrs on PS4 (base, CUH-1200 model) and haven't noticed any major issues. One time it seemed to freeze for 10 seconds or so when opening the map, but sorted itself and was fine after, I played for another hour or so.
I haven't noticed pop-in, but I do have an SSD installed in my PS4 (1TB Crucial MX500), so its possible the faster read speeds are reducing pop-in. Granted I've probably only spent about 60-90mins in the games main area, so it's possible I simply haven't reached more densely packed areas, that are maybe more prone to pop-in.
I stop now to play when they fix Anti-aliasing and some minor graphics bug !
Hopefully all of these problems are patched out by April...going to focus on older games in my backlog for now.
at least the devs did not have to crunch.
@Medic_Alert I personally think the traversal was better in the first game. It seems to be hit or miss grabbing a ledge in Forbidden West but I don't think I ever missed a ledge while playing Zero Dawn. The traversal is my only complaint about the game other than that I've had a great time with it.
i had textures slow loading in PS4
Honestly, I don't know what this shimmering effect is everybody is talking about. It's probably there but I just don't notice it, which is a good thing. The pop-in is minor and doesn't bother me and it's butter smooth in performance mode. I think the game looks beautiful. My only nitpick is with the way a little step or terrain will stop Aloy dead in her tracks. In the first game, Aloy would automatically vault over anything so I don't know how that didn't transition over to this sequel.
@DaveSimonH Best SSD for the PS4 - really flies in the Pro!
@Medic_Alert I use the option to tap the focus (R3) which highlights objects in the vicinity around Aloy for about 10 seconds. It helps when playing with no HUD or radar on and the game looks so much better without highlight lines for resources and loot littering the screen.
@Medic_Alert you don't have loading screens on ps5. they literally said it was optional.
https://www.techradar.com/news/horizon-forbidden-west-loads-so-fast-on-ps5-the-developers-had-to-slow-it-down it started off as a ps5 game as they had the ps5 way early. you should be able to turn them off.
why would it cost money for them to scrap a version of a game? lol dude it's not rocket science. it's not the same game...it has different models, lighting, water tech, higher count of polygons and textures, density, lod etc. whoever told you it was just resolution and framerates lied. it is way more.
there is no mandate for backward compatibility lol where are you getting this from? why the hell would anybody run ps4 version on ps5 when there's a free upgrade?
@BleedingDreamer no way you just said the traversal is better in the first game lmbo. if it's so hit or miss why does this article say otherwise https://www.sportskeeda.com/esports/how-climbing-work-horizon-forbidden-west. you never missed grabbing a ledge because you could either just hop your way up a cliff weirdly or there would be one section to climb so there is no room for limited error. it's mindboggling you actually thought it was good.
I am quite happy I didn't buy this game yet, especially after some of the gameplay I've seen. Falling through maps, loads of visual glitches etc. The polish of their game's need to match the price tag, they'll always be small little glitches but this obviously needed more polishing (QA Testing).
@Medic_Alert Of course it started as a PS4 game, they started development before the PS5 dev kits or specs were even out internally. But that doesn't mean it wasn't also planned as a PS5 game in due course, they would have known a rough console release window.
I don't doubt that they could have done more if it was solely a PS5 game but then two things would happen:
1) Release date would be later, we wouldn't be playing it now.
2) The budget would be smaller. You don't spend the same budget on a game for 20-25 million PS5's that you spend on a game for 115 million PS4s + 15 million PS5's
A lot of people seem deluded that PS5 only titles would be the same size and scope. They wouldn't. You can't regain your spending with a much smaller market. Budgets and scope would be smaller.
@Medic_Alert I'm sorry you're not wholly enjoying it mate.
Personally loving my 18+ hours playtime, while there are a few flaws I don't have any major complaints thus far.
You may not care about the business arguments, but that doesn't stop them being real. I'd love a world where devs could just focus on the next gen with virtually unlimited budget to see what they can do unrestrained... but it's just not the realistic world we live in.
If we want to keep these high budget, high production value games then they will more often than not need to sell to a larger audience (e.g. be cross-gen or cross-platform) until PS5 has enough sales to warrant that hefty budget.
Back on topic: Digital Foundry touched on the pop-in issue. I found it odd that some reviews mentioned the pop in whereas others like DF hardly mentioned it. (Especially weird for them as they can be pedants) It turns out that's because they didn't suffer from it so badly. There's a bug somewhere in the game causing this to happen erratically which is why some reviews mention it others don't.
Thankfully so far I haven't had that at all.
The only major bug i've had is the frame rate dropped to about 10fps once, when in a cauldron with lots of steam/alpha effects. I just restarted the game and haven't had it again.
@Medic_Alert Fair enough, that's your take.
Personally I couldn't disagree more. Every shot oozes big budget, beauty and attention to detail in my eyes. I find myself just staring at the detail of the characters outfits or faces, or the moving parts on the machines, or the open world... staggered at just how far we've come.
In terms of gameplay I don't know what you expected of H:FW. It's a sequel to a game that already borrowed all it's ideas from elsewhere. This is more of the same, except in most aspects it's improved upon it's systems. Yes it's iterative, but so are most sequels. I wasn't expecting them to completely change what made the first game such a success.
If you go looking for flaws you'll find them, if you go in enjoying the game you'll end up happy, choose wisely whingy whiners.
Even Sony has buggy launches now. So glad I'm not paying the $70 beta tax anymore. I'll be on sale soon enough. After it's a fully tested game.
@RogerRoger Your description sounds more like a calibration issue than anything else. What you describe HDR causing is exactly the thing it's supposed to fix. I could be wrong, but I wonder if you just need to calibrate the TV, the PS, or the game differently. (Or the color space settings on the PS are wrong?)
Normally HDR makes things more vibrant and bold (what you want) while SD should be more flat and grayish, looking kind of hollow in areas of transition (what you say you have with HDR on.)
The notable exception (or one of several) is RDR2 where Rockstar inexplicably screwed up the HDR and when they "fixed" it still didn't fixed it and the game looks horrible in HDR mode because it wasn't actually implemented correctly. But for most games HDR should be giving you more of what you want. If it's not, there's something else at play, I think.
@middyone there have been several times when climbing I'll be pushing the stick in one direction and she'll go in the total opposite when the other direction is much closer to where I want to go. There are times I don't even feel like I'm controlling her. Regardless of what that article says my experience has been different other than that I like the game.
@ApostateMage
That’s the exact same way I play.
Makes the world super immersive.
@Medic_Alert Jesus mate, you playing a different game from me or something?
Did you like the first one? If you did I can't see how you can't be enjoying Forbidden West. Maybe your expectations were too high.
It's the same but bigger with better graphics and writing and new machines. It was never going to reinvent the wheel because it didn't have to. I've had no major technical issues and traversal is fine. I think people just like to nit-pick over every little detail nowadays and are never happy.
@RogerRoger Did you test the HDR on an OLED TV? On mine, HDR looks the furthest thing away from "washed out". Deep blacks, beautifully contrasted against colors that pop out.
Loving this game! It's not very innovative compared to the first one, but the first one was great and I'm definitely happy with more of the same. If they do another one though, hopefully they find some ways to spice up the formula a bit more.
HDR is awesome. If it looks bad, you're doing it wrong.
I have definitely experienced some glitches: textures popping on and off at extreme rates, Aloy and/or enemies getting stuck in the environment, floating objects, visibility warnings that don't turn off... Worst one was that I couldn't finish a mission without reloading as snapmaw i needed to kill fell through the environment.
It's a little rough in it's current state, but overall the game is incredible and I am loving it. Nearly 30 hours in already!
So glad I let my bro play first while I dawdle away at FFX
What about the weird faces and awkward conversations. This was weird in Horizon 1 and it's even worse in this one. It's pretty close to Mass Effect Andromeda in my opinion. If you need an example, find the quest with the two women with one of them named "Boomer".
Loving the combat and general gameplay, but conversations with NPCs are really rough and I tend to skip as much as I can.
I'm glad I waited to pick this up and went with KoFXV instead. I'll play Horizon 2 when it's cheaper and in better shape.
@NEStalgia @Darian_Lambert I appreciate the helpful replies, folks. It's clearly a feature that is heavily dependent on the quality of screen being used, and I find that kinda unfair, as people who can't afford top-of-the-line models will be left underwhelmed by a TV that can still process and display HDR signals, despite not being able to optimise them. If I didn't know better, I'd swear the whole thing was a FOMO ploy to upsell premium tech.
For the record, my current television is OLED, as was my previous, and I've never played Red Dead Redemption 2 before. It's not just games, either, since I was just as dissatisfied with streaming services, both when accessed via the TV's built-in apps and a selection of external devices. I followed all the instructions to the letter, and tried guides from several different enthusiast websites. It just isn't for me, I suppose. Maybe my eyes are broken.
But hey, regardless, it still screws up Photo Modes!
@Uromastryx No but similar. an old world facility that you need to clear out, occupied by a group from the original game.
@RogerRoger That's unfortunate, since HDR scenes on an OLED display are a significant step up from even the best LCD/LED screens. Blacks are true blacks, since the pixels turn off completely. And hence bright colors pop out due to the infinite contrast.
Do you have an phone with an OLED display? All top-of-the-line iPhone and Android phones made in the past couple of years use OLED displays. If you watch a Netflix video with HDR (also called Dolby Vision on Netflix) and see the difference in quality, we can rest assured knowing your eyes aren't the problem.
@Darian_Lambert Yep, my phone is OLED and automatically changes the display settings for HDR signals... and it drives me up the freakin' wall every single time. Makes everything way too dark.
I mean, I'm a creature of habit. Maybe it does look "better" but it doesn't look like what I'm used to, so I think it looks "worse" instead?
@themightyant
the director literally just had an interview where they said they got the ps5 super early in development and did develop it for ps5 from the ground up and scaled it for ps4.
@Medic_Alert you've obviously never played a big budget game before if you don't think this is. it's your fault you have such a high standard.
@BleedingDreamer
are you sure it isn't a glitch on your end? this seems like if it was an issue for everyone. there would had been more people in reviews saying it.
@RogerRoger It definitely can be screen dependent, but I still suspect you just have a configuration issue somewhere, not an actual bad screen, especially if it's an OLED. My screen for the record is a monitor, which isn't know to do so well with HDR because they lack the extreme brightness/contract difference that makes HDR shine (because that much brightness beaming from 12" away from your eyes would seriously hurt...) Nothing too fancy, and monitors are way behind in TV tech. And the HDR definitely improves vibrance and boldness of the contract/colors and adds to the "pop" of the image. I could be wrong, but I suspect you have all the right hardware you need for it to work right....I think there's something in the settings that's not set right. Or something. It's definitely strange, and I doubt especially an OLED would fail to impress if you're after vibrance. But it does seem like across multiple devices it's not doing it for you. That's interesting.
The whole point of HDR is that on SDR, you can't have a high contrast between brightness and dark, so dark is washed out to bring the base level up near the bright, and bright is dimmed too much to make dark scenes dark. So everything has this sort of "back glow" to the shadows that makes it look flat and gray during bright scenes and dim during dark scenes. HDR fixes that by making bright things bright and dark things dark which tends to make things much more vivid without artificially dimming them. If everything is too dark, it definitely sounds way out of calibration, but....on a phone....I haven't heard of that.
@everynowandben
what was innovative about the first game lol.
@Medic_Alert says there are loading screens...proceeds to say it's very short and disappear within an instance. you are clearly a troll and I hope no one falls for your bot trolling because you clearly just here to hate on this game and find every little thing you can to complain about. it's sad really.
what does ps4 games having to work on ps5 have to do with anything lol. you reaching hard.
it is a different game. you just had your expectations so high...it's ruining your experience. shame. nothing wrong with 4k lol...are you high? it is not a ps4 game...if you're not gonna listen then this conversation is over. I told you it has confirmed huge differences. go watch digital foundry...actual professionals before spewing nonsense.
@middyone “the director literally just had an interview where they said they got the ps5 super early in development”
Do you have a link to that? Because timing seems super unlikely. Horizon 1 released in Feb 2017. They said development on Horizon 2 started shortly after. While some of the team made Frozen Wilds others got started on Horizon 2. PS5 dev kits were rumoured to come out in 2019. That’s a 2+ year gap.
To be clear as I said at the top, it was always planned to be a PS5 game too, but development definitely started on PS4.
@NEStalgia Yeah, maybe it is just me being me. I'm grateful for you talking the whole thing through, though. Out of all my screens, my phone will be the next upgrade in due course, so perhaps I'll see a difference with a new model. Or perhaps I should just live with HDR and my brain will re-wire itself over time. I'm sure it'll eventually become standard anyway, removing any uncertainty about screen types, capabilities, and whatnot.
The bottom line is, I'm still amazed at how beautiful PS5 games look, and can't wait to start Forbidden West regardless!
@themightyant yes i do https://www.engadget.com/horizon-forbidden-west-guerrilla-games-developer-interview-143036984.html?guccounter=1
you can't say what the timing is. this isn't just some studio...this is a studio owned by sony that made them over a billion dollars with a new ip. they will give them super early access and a way bigger budget for the sequel. they treat them like first class. no they said development started after the frozen wilds dlc that released in december of 2017. rumored is the key word.
@Medic_Alert Mate you literally said a game loads instantly but that millisecond on the ps5 in between means it's a ps4 game. if that isn't trolling I don't know what is. I don't even care if you like the game or not but i'm not about to let you lie.
the fact you think it's about brand loyalty just shows you are a bot.
your original point is idiotic and you should think before tying. a freaking 2 second load time doesn't prove anything about your justification of why this is a ps4 game. it isn't a fact...it's just your flawed uneducated opinion that frankly is severely in the minority.
you don't know what i've done and I don't have to prove anything to a bot like you.
I can only see the cons you said because you didn't say anything good about it at all.
there you go again lol. a big budget game feels and looks good bot. that's just your unpopular opinion that it feels bad or not AAA. it's ok to have bad taste. I don't mind lol.
I had planned to play Horizon first and then Elden Ring on PC, my theory being that the latter might be subject to more quirks/bugs upon initial release. I may now do the opposite; seems like they’re going to aggressively address the various issues with Horizon, so may as well wait til that happens rather than plowing ahead (I’m only a couple hours into the game). To be clear, none of the issues I’ve experienced make it anything close to unplayable and I’m enjoying it overall; but I figure I’ll get the most enjoyment by waiting for all of the fixes/improvements.
@Medic_Alert unlike you I can admit when i'm wrong and you're right. I take back that part but everything else I said I meant and think you need to address.
run away like a coward because a human made a mistake lol. Idc. Iol i'm calm and civil...I only get irritated when i see somebody such as yourself that has no idea what they're talking about.
why are you apologizing to others that aren't in the conversation lol.
@middyone that article seems to confirm much of what I said.
“well aware of the PS5 and much of its capabilities when it started working on Forbidden West in 2018”, i.e. they didn’t have dev kits till later they just had a broad understanding of how the PS5 would perform when they started development, aiming for both PS4 & PS5. Dev kits and full PS5 specs didn’t arrive till later as I said.
The only thing it seems to disagree on was the 2017 start date for development, here it says 2018. But I’ve seen this stated as 2017 elsewhere, this is likely the difference between a core team working on pre-production and the full team working on H:FW.
@themightyant nah “So we're very happy that we knew about the PS5’s capabilities very early on, because that meant we could plan for how we're going to make this distinction.” you completely skimmed over this lol. they never said the kits didn't arrive till later lol. pretty sure wherever you got that from they were wrong. they started working on it after december 2017 hence 2018
So why do they want us to preorder and play day one when this always happens? I haven't bought this yet and at this point I think I might just wait for the PC port. I have so much to play anyhow, and it seems this still needs some work.
@middyone
Compared to Uncharted 4 (last iteration I played) it feels rushed. It's like they didn't put enough time to make it fluid. Sometimes when you develop something it may look ok, but doesn't necessarily play ok.
Am getting more used to it and it's a little better now, but still at some points I know what I need to do, yet still kinda hesitant to perform the action because I don't want miss the jump. If I succeed I feel relieved, something that shouldn't be happening for completing a traversal jump.
Just know these occurrences are occasional and not the norm.
Usually, most traversing goes ok.
That said, gameplay aside, some traversal movements feel weird. Seemingly small traversal jumps she lunges, taking a second or 2 (3) to hand me back control.
At other bigger traversal jumps it goes much smoother (faster too) and I get the control back after a small second.
This is purely animation time.
Needless to say, the game's awesome!
I'm pretty confident with some more time into the game the traversing grows on me and I'll be able to avoid (most of) these traversal mishaps.
This game deserves lots of praise because I truly enjoy my time with it. 😉
I still can’t believe how fast this game loads through activity cards, it’s incredible
@lolwhatno I had a ps4 since day 1 launch and the day the Xbox one x came out I jumped on it and it retired my ps4. Got ps5 and series x day 1 and play my series x more than my ps5 and I have tons of games. Although I have been playing my ps5 right now a bit more because of HFW and GT7. I have a returnal and a bunch of great games on ps5 but that game pass is a beast. I have a lot of games that aren't on gamepass on physical disk. At the end of the day I've bmnever been the kind of person to spread nonsensical console war crap. Both consoles are great and both consoles suck in their own ways. I say play all consoles or u can be a PC robotic zombie 🤣😂
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