Horizon Series has sold 38 million copies (25 million are Zero Dawn)

Spiderman 2 is not better than the previous entries
According to what?


 
Sells well when bundled with consoles.
Haha... Yeah.

 
Doubt. Seems too high for a single player game. Unless they are including the free copies that they gave away at one point. I have a free copy of the first game on my PS4.
 
Forbidden chest I never finished. Overstays its welcome big time and aside from a visual lift there was nothing advanced or special about the gameplay.

It's what ghost of T will have to struggle with on its sequel. Did you do enough to make it an actual sequel or are we just updating visuals?

Metal gear solid changed its visuals and improved its gameplay every single game. This is what people expect in sequels. Steps forward to advance the "vision" of the franchise.

Most sequels this day and age don't do that because the vision is achieved in the first game or the director doesn't have one themselves.

This franchise needed a longer break for more innovative ideas to sprout forward and instead revisit Killzone.
 
Nobody really cares about this franchise. Horizon is one of those games you finish playing and just think, 'Eh, I guess it was alright' then move on with your life. Outside of its impressive tech and visuals, not much to talk about it.
Imagine claiming that no one cares about a franchise that has sold 38 million copies in 8 years. This is the kind of delusional shit you see only on GAF lol.
 
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I bought my wife a copy of Zero Dawn on sale, and she got bored of it very quickly and never went back to it. I tried to watch her play it, but it was pretty bland. I'm sure the first game moved a lot of units because it was graphically very pleasing and had an interesting concept with the robot dinosaurs. The second game landed at a time when people wanted a showcase for their PS5s, and from everything I've seen, it delivered the visuals people were after. But, frankly, if it wasn't for the games pushing visuals, I'm not sure I'd even remember these titles existed.

I'm not sure I'd call it a problem, but there's definitely a pattern with Sony's big single player sequels: they sell well, but reception seems to cool off quickly. There's very little innovation in any of them unrelated to their presentations. Not sure it's a recipe for long-term IP success, but if people are still buying them, I'm sure they'll keep making them.
 
Definitely curious but i have some thoughts.

1) The originals were a bit overrated and while people checked them out, they didnt feel compelled to buy the sequels.
2) The sequels sold faster than the originals (Spiderman 2, GOW2, HFW, TLOU2) all sold faster but then stopped selling because of PS+ and the potential for future PC releases.
3) The sequels are all samey with a very DLC feel to them.
4) PS5 has only gotten MORE expensive since launch unlike the PS4 which was selling for just $299 around this time with sales going as low as $250.
5) Games are not going on sales like they used to. A LOT of those TLOU1 and Horizon sales were when they would go on sale at around $15 on PSN. I remember buying TLOU1 remastered for just $7.99 in 2016 or 2017. been waiting to buy GT7 for 3+ years now and the lowest ive seen it go is $40. Literally bought a retail copy for $25 this one time and walmart straight up cancelled the order after saying it was a price mistake.

In short, $70 games, devaluing your games by putting them on PS+, devaluing your brand by porting everything to PC, samey sequels and expensive consoles 5 years into the gen. Console gaming is supposed to be literally subsidized by the console maker who are supposed to make money off of royalties and now subs. But sony no longer believes in selling consoles at a loss which means fewer parents buying their kids an expensive $500+ toy. It is really bad for the growth of the industry which has to fend off F2P games on mobile like fortnite, cod and robolox.

They were all worse games .
Last of us 2 ? Dogshit woke story couldnt finish .... (I know is ps4 but it started the dogshir sequel trend)
Horizon FW ? Couldn't pass the 2 hours mark witht that insufferable MC
Spider man 2 ? Couldn't pass the 1 hour mark... To much walking and talking bullshit, genz writing and woke exposition.

Didnt play Ragnarok but its highly divisive and I wont even try it.


They are pretty reflective of the transformation of sony studios in DEI/woke environments and shift priorities.

I highly doubt GoY will scape the trend... looks at the actress chose for the MC .. yep. It wont.


Sure you can put a lot of other motivations.. but in the end they sold less because they are all worse games than their previous installments.
 
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It's a bit like James Cameron's Avatar, or the Disney live action remakes: financially enormously successful, but zero lasting cultural impact.
The lasting cultural impact is the total erosion of the PlayStation brand that was painstakingly built from the PS1 through the PS3 consoles.
PlayStation has always been the game console aimed at young adults through very old adults.
With the PS4 PS became a platform with mostly kid-friendly 1st party games and the odd outliers like TLOU or the remake of PS2's Silent Hill 2.
This shift only serves to strengthen Windows position as the 'grownup's platform' and the only platform with AO games made for adults.
 
Funny how I got told the sales drop on sony sequels that I claimed wasn't true, and here we are.

People are just fed up with mediocre slop covered up with shiny graphics.
 
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The world building of the first game is one of the best I've experienced in years. First time I tried to get every piece of information I could get. When you hear the screams of the survivors, trying to defend themselves against an army of unstoppable robots, knowing that they are supposed to fail - chills!

People also tend to forget that Alloy grew up as an outsider, having only one person to talk to until she matured. Of course she's a bit strange. First game is about finding her roots, second about trusting the people around her. With all of its consequences. It's not rocket science, but there are lots of games and movies that do a worse job and are higher praised.
 
Not surprised by any of the numbers. The first one was massively bundled and had huge discounts. You could find the complete edition for less than $20 new everywhere before the game was even a year old.

Forbidden West on the other hand was not massively bundled nor as heavily discounted. It's also a worse game in pretty much every aspect except visuals.
 
Both God of War 2018 and ZD sold crazy numbers, but I saw them offered for 10 bucks at various retail stores, and they were bundled for ages. Another factor is that one might be fed up after playing such bloated games. Personally I wasn't really looking forward to either of them.
 
It doesn't really compare to how HZD was bundled in the later years of PS4.
Yes, but that doesn't really speak well for the popuarity of Forbidden West. People who bought the PS4 bundles actually wanted Zero Dawn, while many who bought the PS5 bundles only wanted the console but were forced to get Forbidden West as well.
 
I sank more than twenty hours into Forbidden West before I realized that the moment the world opened up it felt less like discovery and more like a second job – all those side quests and collectibles quickly became tedious chores instead of exciting finds. The plot and characters never grabbed me the way Zero Dawn's did; without a central mystery or fresh hook, the story plods along and feels clichéd and hollow.

Climbing a cliff only to run into an invisible barrier feels like a slap in the face rather than a design choice, and being forced to backtrack through menus to unlock abilities or gear feels like busywork rather than meaningful progression. Combat, which should be the game's standout feature, is weighed down by a tangle of radial menus, double-assigned buttons and overly complex loadouts – at its core you're still dodging and shooting, but with constant friction.

I can't shake the sense that Guerrilla chased a blockbuster open‑world formula at the expense of focus and fun. Forbidden West looks stunning on PS5 and still sold around ten to eleven million copies, but after the lean, mysterious thrill of Zero Dawn it simply doesn't compel players to stay in its world the way its predecessor did.

Also H:FW-Aloy is the most annoying brat in a game I ever had to witness.
 
Sony's sequels are selling less because they have been mostly lazy sequels. Reusing significant gameplay and assets, adding significant and pointless bloat, make characters less likeable due to a more woke agenda bullshit. I loved Zero Dawn, but Forbidden West was more of the same with excessive grinding for parts to upgrade way too much gear and Aloy was far less likeable. Not to mention far more side quests with voice acting from a mid tier game. Spider-Man 2 was a total dumpster fire with the devs not listening to fans in regards to MJ segments, mostly the same city, making me not want to play as Miles due to all his woke ass shit missions, terrible voice acting for side quests. God of War Ragnarok, barely felt like they did anything with the PS5 version in regard to visuals, plus some areas tweaked and resused, lots of gameplay and animation resused (this is applicable to most Sony sequels this gen), playing as BOY. At least Gran Turismo 7 was a good sequel. The only future Sony game I'm looking forward to right now is Stellar Blade 2 and that many years away. Sure as hell ain't looking forward to intergalactic, it will be a miracle if that game isn't a a total wokefest (already hate the main character). Damn, that was a hell of a rant but I'm pissed at the state of Sony's first party output this gen (being a Sony fan losing faith).
 
Theres nothing wrong with enjoying mass market products, no need to get defensive
It's not defensive to simply state reality lol.

Horizon is gaming's answer to Avatar, its a sales phenomenon that is squarely fueled by pure normies who don't care about internet forums or Twitter debates.

This means you will see a moment like this every few months where people cope about it being slop or whatever to distract themselves from the fact that they are no longer gaming's primary audience.

It also happens every time we get a GAAS hit too btw.
 
How is it that people loved horizon years ago but despise it now? Like there's a genuine hatred of this franchise now here on gaf. What did I miss? Didn't play forbidden West but from what I've seen, it looks like a high quality game.
 
the story idea was great in the first one, but it went Terminator 3 in the second one already. It wasn't really bad, but the justification to be told and experienced felt forced and kinda pointless. Imho the only way a new game might be interesting again might be by handling the downfall timeline, so a prequel, without Aloy, maybe various characters doing different tasks to prepare for Zero Dawn event... So a rather different gameplay style. There is a lot of story that they barely adequately told in flashback projections and text logs.
 
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How is it that people loved horizon years ago but despise it now? Like there's a genuine hatred of this franchise now here on gaf. What did I miss? Didn't play forbidden West but from what I've seen, it looks like a high quality game.
The first Horizon had its flaws, but it offered a partly compelling story driven by a strong central mystery the "why" and "how" of the world. That sense of discovery was a major part of its appeal. In Forbidden West, with the core mystery already resolved, the sequel needed to stand out through stronger character development and meaningful gameplay improvements. While still visually stunning, the gameplay felt repetitive and insufficiently evolved to many players and Aloy's writing in Forbidden West rubbed some fans the wrong way, with criticisms that she feels overly perfect or emotionally flat.
 
How is it that people loved horizon years ago but despise it now? Like there's a genuine hatred of this franchise now here on gaf. What did I miss? Didn't play forbidden West but from what I've seen, it looks like a high quality game.
I can only speak for myself, but even back then, 6 months after release when I first played the game, I already felt the same way.

Sony simply overdid it again and tried to milk this franchise dry in no time, even though it doesn't really have the substance for that.

Yes, HZD was good. It was new, told an exciting story, and had an interesting and captivating art style and world-building. Everything after that was or is more of the same, and many people find it boring.

H:FW is a good-looking facade for mediocre content, and even that mediocrity suffers from flaws.

EDIT:

Oh and I can't say it often enough, Aloy's character became a major reason why you don't even feel like playing the game. She is annoying, has a bitchy attitude, is arrogant, and simply unlikable.

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Additionally, during the game's promotional phase, the devs lied to their player base by claiming that the game wouldn't suffer from also releasing on PS4. They said this decision would have no impact on the game design. A few months later, the DLC was released - and surprise, it's PS5-only because the PS4 was supposedly too weak.
 
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How is it that people loved horizon years ago but despise it now? Like there's a genuine hatred of this franchise now here on gaf. What did I miss? Didn't play forbidden West but from what I've seen, it looks like a high quality game.
I never liked that game even back then….i skipped DLC and sequel exactly because of my experience with first game.
 
I play Monster Boy right now and at least the MC there shuts the fuck up when needed. Its also an infinitely superior adventure with a better gameplay hook and more fun exploration.

All that budget into Horizon 2. Just give me fucking Monster Boy 2. Keep those great graphics and animations. Now try to make a fun game.

TL;DR; Monster Boy > Horizon
 
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I play Monster Boy right now and at least the MC there shuts the fuck up when needed. Its also an infinitely superior adventure with a better gameplay hook and more fun exploration.

All that budget into Horizon 2. Just give me fucking Monster Boy 2. Keep those great graphics and animations. Now try to make a fun game.

TL;DR; Monster Boy > Horizon
Now I want to play Monster Boy!
 
LOL, STFU, meanwhile you loved Hellblade 2.
There's always post
Hellblade 2 is good. I enjoyed it easily as much as the first. Haters gotta hate.

But I am not derailing, over that.

I preordered this game within minutes of the pre orders go live. No one could satiate my excitement for this game. I am just trying to point out that can't we just love astrobot. Why must we do these hyperbolic claims of how it destroys nintendo and mario. Becuase now I have to sit down and have that in my head while I play and many others will. So queue 3 months down the line when everyone is making insane hyperbolic claims that the game is no where near as good as mario. People bring this shit on and it sucks.
 
LOL, STFU, meanwhile you loved Hellblade 2.

I enjoyed Hellblade II.

I would rather play hellblade II, 3 times through than play Horizon Forbidden West.

I bought Horizon Forbidden west for £15 from Tesco, not even 9 months after it launched. played it for 2 hours and it was just completely unappealing to me and sold it.

I know its tough for you guys to accept but its ok.
 
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Curious how most of Sony's sequels are selling significantly less than the original games.
No decent promos for the games, Forbidden West was a case study for Sony and only game they released on PS Plus a single year after release and it was the game that confirmed to them that sales fall down a cliff after releasing on a subscription service (this was confirmed on that Insomniac leak i think...and the data was...impossible to refute).

Sony isn't going for more consoles and games sold. They are going for the most money they can make and sometimes that means not selling as much copies.

At this point the first Horizon was at like 10 bucks lmao.
 
I enjoyed Hellblade II.

I would rather play hellblade II, 3 times through than play Horizon Forbidden West.

I bought Horizon Forbidden west for £15 from Tesco, not even 9 months after it launched. played it for 2 hours and it was just completely unappealing to me and sold it.

I know its tough for you guys to accept but its ok.
You're not a serious person.
 
I enjoyed Hellblade II.

I would rather play hellblade II, 3 times through than play Horizon Forbidden West.

I bought Horizon Forbidden west for £15 from Tesco, not even 9 months after it launched. played it for 2 hours and it was just completely unappealing to me and sold it.

I know its tough for you guys to accept but its ok.
Can you even say you play Hellblade II? Don't you need gameplay for that?
 
I loved the first one with all the lore. The second game was like a Seattle simulator of constantly having to virtue signal and listen to retards. Killed the series for me, but the first was quite amazing with everything going on.

Won't be playing the third one or the seconds DLC.
I've only played Forbidden West and I was almost disgusted by how inoffensive and safe the sidecharacters were. It was like drinking lukewarm water. They barely felt like characters and I kept wondering who even wrote them.

I had a lot of fun with the gameplay, but eventually I lost interest with the story and the characters, the world didn't feel alive. Not to mention how Aloy spoiled every single puzzle by thinking aloud.
 
Lol at people pretending that selling this much with just two games is nothing short of a major success and people thinking that 5 years of extra sales and deals do not matter when comparing sales of the sequel to the original.
Denying reality just because you dont like it won't get you very far in the real world.
 
The first one was OK. I would say a 6 or 6.5/10 game. First two open world Assassin's Creed games were more fun. Can't even rate the second one, because I was bored so much I bailed as soon as I realised it will be a waste of time. So, I am not surprised the sequel didn't sell anywhere as much.
 
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