Horizon: Zero Dawn - The Frozen Wilds

When you think about it, Aloy came to the end of his Horizon Zero Dawn adventure too easily, and The Frozen Wilds is proof of that. This important extension is a splendid challenge of fifteen hours, enriched with clever side quests, a solid story, and with the best fights that we have experienced so far in the company of the heroine. .

Its storyline integrates with that of the main game, and can be played after completing the original adventure, so it's suitable for both those who want to complete everything, as well as those who have never completed the quests of the history. You can then travel to a new and gigantic area - which is added to the main map, as soon as you install this DLC (even if the objective does not immediately appear in your quest log) - and therefore risk yourself with courage or stupidity in dangerous places if you are not at least level 30. In these places you will explore the mysteries surrounding a nomadic tribe, the Banuk - which are already at the heart of one of the most memorable side quests by Zero Dawn. The Frozen Wilds will nevertheless dig even deeper into the fascinating complexity of their structure and spirituality.

Specifically, this DLC takes a look at the fascinating idea of gods and demons, and how the apocalypse has befallen this world, now populated by dinosaur-like robots. Although its story sometimes turns strange with evolutionary jargon that's hard to understand - speak French, damn it! - when it comes to its conclusion, I was able to ask myself interesting (and no less provocative) questions about the place of faith in such a brutal world.

For his part, Aloy remains the endearing and warm character that we have already met previously. At this point in the story, she's strong and competent enough to find her place when the situation calls for it, and her personality fits that role well. She's also the voice of reason, and whenever The Frozen Wilds falls for the sill, Aloy is there to point it out with his scathing jokes, worn by actress Ashly Burch in their original version.

She fits quite well with the other characters, the most interesting of which, like the most eccentric, appear in the many side quests that run through this expansion. These adventures are among the best that I have been given to do, with a special emphasis on platform phases like an Uncharted or a Tomb Raider, with its sinister cliffs, its breathtaking battles , and his particularly funny jokes.

Survival instinct

These quests are worth it on a practical level, as you're going to want to keep upgrading your character (if you're not already level 50) in order to get more powerful weapons and gear. Although they are all from Zero Dawn, the monsters wandering in The Frozen Wilds are not here for fun. If you're not careful, expect to face a formidable opponent. Guerrilla justifies the boost in the difficulty by the arrival of a "demonic" force having infiltrated the internal systems of the robots. Fighting a demonic Thunderjaw is thus much more frightening than fighting its usual counterpart. It is nevertheless just as tall and imposing, while also proving to be more deadly, reinstating the fear that you may have abandoned until then.

These fights are the funniest I have had in Horizon. Between levels 40 and 50 in Zero Dawn, I could see that fighting, especially being equipped with the shield allowing Aloy to regenerate his protection, was a little too easy, but The Forzen Wilds gave me back the taste for risk. Even with the best gear, I was able to find myself overwhelmed by a group of demonic machines (the only reason I didn't die indefinitely was possession of an absurd number of healing potions and pieces of metal that I I was able to collect during my 40 hours of play on Zero Dawn), and a certain number of new machines in the bestiary allowed me to test my reflexes to avoid their attacks at the last second. I liked feeling like I was genuinely fighting for my own life, even with a skill tree at the max.

To make the fights more frantic, The Frozen Wilds introduces in its new zone a machine called Control Towers (in original version). It's a sprawling machine projecting energy in the form of purple pulses, which reduces your shield resistance, while healing nearby enemy machines. Getting around or destroying them takes concentration and time, creating extreme tension as you try to kill them before they tear you apart.

All of this gives a real sense of danger as soon as you start to explore the world. If Zero Dawn was akin to a stroll through Jurassic Park, The Frozen Wild is a bit like discovering The Lost World: indomitable and unregulated. Because even a Demonic Watcher proves that he can be a significant threat from the first few minutes of the campaign, I found myself jerked by certain noises in the thickets, or by nearby roars, especially during disturbing times. nocturnal.

It's winter

It's also a good thing that The Frozen Wilds looks amazingly beautiful. Its snow-covered mountains, ravines and fields are dotted with frozen lakes, flown over by sublime blue-red sunsets. It might sound like anecdotal, but considering how much time you'll spend on it if you play to the end, it's important that the snow in Frozen Wilds is realistic and crisp under your feet. When Aloy comments on the cold, I feel like I can feel it too.

The other big point of divergence of Frozen Wilds, compared to Zero Dawn, is the addition of a new branch in Aloy's skill tree, called “The Traveler” which emphasizes facilitated movements. when you're riding an overloaded machine, while getting the most out of your inventory. This tree, however, is not essential for the expansion, but rather for the long term of Horizon. Being able to scavenge resources off the back of a machine or grab 50% of the value of a resource or mod that you shell out is something that makes sense, and I'm happy to see Guerrilla has it. finally understood.

The game's first and only DLC, The Frozen Wilds, offers yet another chance to explore this spectacular scenario, and does so by inserting itself into the main plot of the base game, with a new secondary adventure and other additional activities, to be experienced in a unpublished territory. For the review of The Frozen Wilds, Sony and Guerrilla have provided us with a code with the possibility of directly accessing the expansion in a new game, with Aloy already leveled and with suitable equipment to face the pitfalls of the new territory. I avoided this option and chose to take on the new adventure in my game of Horizon Zero Dawn, with the level 50 character and the base game completed.

In this case, once the DLC has been downloaded and installed, it is possible to access the new missions thanks to some secondary characters scattered throughout the territory of the base game, which will be available after completing the mission "A Seeker at the Gates". In particular, north of the Mound (at the top right of the world map) you will meet Yariki, a Banuk who is exactly coming out of the Gash, warning you that the place where she comes from is not exactly the most comfortable place in the world to survive (it is recommended to venture here only from level 30). Lo Squarcio, in fact, which represents the new explorable territory of The Frozen Wilds, is first of all a cold place and almost completely covered by snow. Some Banuk reside there, scattered in a few important villages, which will not fail to involve Aloy in a new adventure, broken down into four "main" missions. I use the quotes because the missions in question are still cataloged as secondary in the appropriate menus of the game, together with other real secondary ones, which it will be possible to trace around the Gash, in addition to some important commissions.

The Gash extends, by eye, for about a seventh of the global map of Horizon Zero Dawn and the "main" missions of the expansion will bring you good or bad to explore almost everything. All the activities of The Frozen Wild are well distributed within the new territories, which in addition to the new missions also offer new hunting challenges, a new field of bandits to "convert", a new Collolungo to climb (complete with a preventive mission to reactivate it) and are obviously populated by three new types of machines never seen before. Scattered around the Gash there are also some points where the machines are protected by control towers, which must be deactivated (an activity that in fact replaces the corrupt areas of the base game). There are obviously interesting new weapons to be obtained, some of which are linked to a series of useful commissions to enhance them and a new precious currency (the Blubagliore) to be exchanged with the merchants to receive good quality objects.

Also interesting are the news related to the development of the character, who can now finally return to accumulating experience points in order to rise to level 60, also unlocking a new set of skills that will add to the existing ones. Also this time, unlike what happened in the base game, in which I had reached the maximum level (at the time the 50) even before completing all the activities, the leveling of Aloy accompanied me throughout the life of the expansion, which lasted me a dozen hours, and I have not yet collected all the collectibles. If you focus only on the main storyline, the expansion can fly away in 4-5 hours, but it would be a shame to miss the exploration of the Gash and its secondary activities.

Horizon: Zero Dawn was by no means a revolutionary work. Guerrilla Games employees did not try to change the industry or forge new paths, instead - by carefully examining the competition - they took the best from it and packed it in a stunning setting. It was enough to create a production immediately hailed as one of the main candidates for the title of the game of the year.

It is not surprising then that the first story expansion did not look for new ideas to diversify the world dominated by mechanical dinosaurs. The Frozen Wilds is even more of the same, prepared in such a way as to provide a several-hour challenge to players who have already discovered the secrets of the New Dawn project.

For the frozen backwoods

The add-on has been directly integrated into the basic version of Zero Dawn . After its installation, the world map enlarges by a small, but filled to the brim with attractions area, located in the frosty north, just behind the Mound. There we get to know the customs of the Banuk tribe, we help him in solving local problems and - or rather above all - we fight the most powerful machines .

The Banukahs quickly turn out to be similar to the Burrow - maybe not so religious, but also distrustful of strangers and tradition-oriented. At the same time, they are more warlike than Aloy's countrymen, living according to the principle that survival is the most important virtue. As the red-haired protagonist is good at both, she quickly manages to gain enough reputation to learn about local problems.

The tasks are, unfortunately, not very absorbing, mainly due to the excessive recycling of ideas. The writers followed the line of least resistance by taking one of Horizon's leading themes , modifying it gently and presenting it to the world once again as the core storyline of The Frozen Wilds . In the course of several main missions, we can easily find an analogy to the conflict between Gaia and Hades, only fought at a smaller stakes. In Zero Dawn itself, the authors they may not have told a particularly touching story, but it was interesting and intriguing enough to encourage further play. Meanwhile, due to the aforementioned "tracing", the main thread of the enlargement failed to interest me in any way.

The stories from smaller orders are slightly better - but only slightly -. There, too, we will not see emotions or surprises similar to the third Witcher , but at least we have the opportunity to meet a few memorable characters. However, this is not enough to save the storyline of the game.

20% more seaweed

While in the narrative layer, repetition is a problem, in the case of gameplay, sticking to the marked paths works very well. The new mechanics in The Frozen Wilds mainly come down to the eight new skills that Aloy can acquire as part of increasing the experience limit to level sixty.

Most of these abilities are related to the machines we dominate - by investing a few points, we gain the ability to heal allied units, and by riding on mounts, we can perform an effective jump attack or collect resources without having to slide off the horse's back. Unfortunately, it is still impossible to ride the biggest beasts, so my dreams of sowing destruction while riding a mechanical tyrannosaurus remained unfulfilled. As a collector of all kinds of iron, I appreciated the possibility of increasing the capacity of the heroine's pocket by 20%, thanks to which I could reduce the frequency of courses to the closest traders.

Demonic mechanical dinosaurs

The extended range of skills does not significantly affect the gameplay itself, the foundations of which remain unchanged and are based primarily on fights with mechanical opponents. The country of Banuków is an extremely dangerous land in which we have to face particularly dangerous robots. The machines known from other areas appear here in a much more powerful, "demonic" form, and in addition, several new beasts await you to defeat - each one that will challenge even the most experienced hunters.

Although "my" Aloy was well-equipped and had already completed the base game with most of the side quests it contained, The Frozen Wilds still managed to get me to figure it out. Usually, the traps against larger opponents in clashes with new machines turned out to be ineffective, so I had to look for other tactics, and even let myself be persuaded to abandon my favorite types of weapons and test new ones.

Also, "old acquaintances" under the influence of the "demon" became much more annoying - although only in the context of strength and endurance, maintaining the old patterns of behavior, it was enough to force me to double my attention and remember what a nuisance even harassers can be . Dodging, keeping enemies at bay, and choosing the right weapons has become more essential than ever. A lot of problems can also be caused by special towers, which send an impulse to heal nearby enemies - without eliminating them, it turns out that you cannot defeat some of them.

Ice, cold and frost

The biggest attraction of The Frozen Wilds are the title frozen backwoods. Although in the basic version of the game it was hard to complain about the scarcity of snowy areas, the designers of Guerrilla Games studio made sure that the new area, despite the white presence almost everywhere, was filled with various attractions . Thanks to this, exploring on foot and ignoring the option of fast travel (I strongly recommend this approach to fun) remain a very pleasant experience.

Among the mountain peaks and the ubiquitous trees, we can find the cover lake shimmering with the colors of the rainbow or a network of active geysers, and the northern lights will make the night trips more attractive. Plunging into the snow, Aloy leaves deep troughs behind her, and goats and squirrels turn out to be the heroine's inseparable companions in forests and on mountain trails. Here and there are ruins of an ancient civilization, including an imposing dam.