Horizon Zero Dawn™ Complete Edition Review Summary

Gorgeous visuals and a strong Aloy anchor worthwhile side quests, though the story feels uneven and technical bugs and crashes can disrupt the experience.

Stunning graphics and visuals: Graphics are consistently described as excellent, beautiful, and technically impressive, with stunning environments and visual effects that hold up well over time.

Brilliant and engaging story: The narrative is widely praised as captivating, well-written, and emotionally gripping, keeping players hooked from start to finish. Many reviewers consider it one of the best stories in recent memory.

Aloy is a strong protagonist: Players love Aloy for being compelling, smart, and realistically imperfect, with strong writing that balances strength and vulnerability. She is often cited as one of the best female protagonists in gaming.

Abundant and worthwhile side quests: There is a huge amount of side quests that are genuinely fun and worthwhile, adding depth to the world with engaging stories and memorable characters.

Excellent worldbuilding and lore: The game features impressively crafted worldbuilding with coherent lore and a convincing setting. The world feels beautiful, immersive, and full of detail.

Technical bugs and crashes: The game suffers from various bugs, including hard crashes, audio issues, and minor glitches. These problems persist even in the remaster.

Unengaging story: The story is considered uninteresting, shallow, and predictable. It starts well but deteriorates, with a rushed ending.

Repetitive combat: Combat becomes repetitive over time, with melee being particularly limited and boring. The repetitiveness extends to the endgame, making it tiresome.

Stiff facial animations: Facial animations and lip syncing appear outdated, resembling games from the early 2010s. This issue is noted in both main and side content.

Repetitive side missions: Side missions and quests are often repetitive, tedious, and formulaic. Some feel out of context and lack variety.

Open-world exploration and freedom: The game features a vast open world with diverse environments and activities, allowing players to roam freely and discover secrets.

Hunting robotic machines: Combat revolves around hunting and fighting metallic animal-like machines using strategic methods.

Abundant side quests: Numerous optional side quests with their own stories are available, enriching the main narrative.

Multiple difficulty settings: The game offers various difficulty levels, including Story, Normal, Hard, Very Hard, and Ultra Hard, catering to different player preferences.

New Game+ mode: A New Game+ option allows players to replay the game with carried-over abilities and access to ultra-hard difficulty.

Well-optimized PC performance: Many reviewers report smooth performance, no stutters, and good optimization across various hardware configurations, including medium settings on laptops and high-end PCs.

Optimization flaws and demands: A few reviewers felt the game could be better optimized, with some parts unoptimized and the game being demanding on hardware.

Visual glitches and bugs: Occasional visual flickering, texture errors, cutscene glitches, anti-aliasing issues on foliage, and bugs in boss fights were reported.

Minor crash occurrences: Some players encountered one or two hard crashes, often with progress saved, and occasional crashes during specific missions or when alt-tabbing.

Frequent crashes and stability issues: Several users experienced frequent crashes on PC, sometimes at startup or during gameplay, with some noting crashes every 20 minutes or over 20 times in 22 hours.

Strongly recommended game overall: Many reviewers give a general positive recommendation, calling the game great, worth playing, and a must-try.

Best purchased on sale: A common theme is that the game is highly recommended only when discounted, with many advising to wait for a sale.

Worth the price or purchase: Reviewers frequently state the game is worth buying, worth the money, and worth every cent.

Appeals to open-world fans: Reviewers recommend the game specifically to players who enjoy open-world exploration and action.

Some negative or cautious reviews: A minority do not recommend the game, calling it not worth it or the worst they have played.

Community fair range: $20.00 - $40.00.

Game completion: 93.0h.

Story completion: 16.0h.

Endgame: 40.0h.

Many players find the opening hours, story hook, and hunting loop immediately enjoyable, but a recurring pattern is that repetitive side content and combat make the game less fun over time.

Friction: Long tutorial before fun may begin; Slow opening pacing before the game opens up; Repetitive side quests and map-clearing tasks; Tedious inventory management and resource gathering; Damage-sponge enemies and repetitive combat over time; Unskippable cutscenes and heavy HUD/hand-holding.

Unlock drivers: Skill trees unlock abilities such as a time-slowing leap; Tearing off machine weapons and using them against enemies; Different armor types and skills enable varied play; Learning enemy weak points and matching weapons to encounters.

Story-Driven World Explorer: Story-first open-world exploration with tactical machine encounters and optional completionist content. Motivation: Uncovering the game’s mystery and lore while exploring a distinctive post-apocalyptic world. Stance: buy.

Hardcore Challenge and Platinum Hunter: Plays Very Hard or Ultra Hard New Game+, optimizes gear and tactics, and chases full achievement completion. Motivation: Mastering combat on the highest difficulties and completing achievements or platinum. Stance: buy.

Deal-Conscious PC Buyer: Waits for sales, checks performance settings and GPU compatibility, and is cautious about remaster value. Motivation: Getting a stable PC experience at a fair price while avoiding technical headaches and launch-price premiums. Stance: sale.

Windows cohorts generally report playable-to-good performance, especially on lower and mid VRAM systems; the high-VRAM cohort shows strong visuals but more stuttering, frame drops, and crash complaints.

Windows 12-15GB VRAM: positive. Most report decent optimization and stable playable performance, with occasional frame drops and one black-screen failure across both monitors.

Windows <8GB VRAM / <16GB RAM: positive. Most low-VRAM systems run smoothly, with reports of high settings at 1080p and 100+ FPS with DLSS; one complaint focuses on gameplay rather than performance.

Windows 8-11GB VRAM: positive. Reports near-flawless performance and high frame rates at 1440p and 4K, with only isolated hard crashes mentioned.

Steam Deck: Steam Deck feedback is predominantly seamless: multiple users report out-of-box launch without Proton, no external launcher friction, and playable 30-60 fps performance on low-to-mid settings. Minor friction comes from optional performance tuning and controller aiming comfort. Isolated crash and black-screen reports are severe but not explicitly tied to Steam Deck, so they do not override the Deck-specific positive evidence; no small-text or battery-drain issue is supported by the sampled reviews.

Linux and Proton: The available Linux/Proton evidence is positive. Users report that the game runs out of the box on native Linux without Proton and works perfectly on Steam Linux. The remaining negative comments concern a generic GPU/driver issue and narrative content, neither of which is explicitly tied to Linux, Proton, SteamOS, Wine, or a native Linux build. No Linux-specific launch, anti-cheat, DRM, or workaround blockers are reported.

Monetization: The reviews contain no direct evidence of microtransactions, real-money gacha, paid power, paid convenience, loot boxes, battle passes, or a cash shop. The monitored comments concern optional DLC value and in-game resource management, which fall under traditional expansion content and normal gameplay. Under the audit criteria, no predatory monetization pattern is established.

DLC and Complete Edition: The game has DLC content, including The Frozen Wilds expansion, which is included in the Complete Edition along with additional outfits and weapons. The DLC adds substantial content such as new territory, characters, and mechanics.

PC and PlayStation availability: The game is available on both PC and PlayStation, with a PC port bringing the former Sony exclusive to a wider audience. This accessibility is frequently mentioned by reviewers.

Sequel Forbidden West: The game has a sequel titled Horizon Forbidden West, which continues the story. Reviewers often mention it, and some express anticipation to play it.

Varied playtime reports: Reviewers report a wide range of playtimes, from about 10 hours for the main story to over 100 hours for completionist runs. This indicates different playstyles and content engagement.

Remaster and original versions: A remastered version exists and is considered better with fixed bugs, but some reviews specifically pertain to the original non-remastered version. This distinction is noted by players.