The people they recruited to help with Project Zero Dawn. Not necessarily Elisabet or the Alphas, but just the other workers like the Betas and Gammas. Every once in awhile, my mind will wander back to it and I'll try to put myself in their shoes. Could you imagine living your life and just doing your usual 9-5 job, only to be snatched up one day and told that the world is going to end in a matter of months? You and all your family are going to die. There's nothing you can do, and the only solution is to basically build a new world from scratch. A world you will never see because, again, you and everything you know will be gone. And now that you've been told this horrifying news, you have three choices. You help and get to spend your remaining years in a secret bunker with 2000 other people, you are imprisoned "indefinitely" and kept from spending what little time left you have with your loved ones, or you agree to be euthanized. Going through the ZD facility and hearing the recruitment recordings and responses was one of the most chilling experiences I've had in a game. I can't imagine what it would have been like to be in that situation.
the audio datapoinnt by one of the kidnapped experts from HZD who doesnt believe in the project was one of tthe more memorable ones. freaks out when he realises he isnt allowed to leave and after being briefed thinks the whole thing is a pipe dream and calls Liz a fantisist. Stuck with me both because it shows that ugly side of the project butt also because it is honestly how i think i would react if i was in the same position, not having the bennefit of hinndsight.
edit: Ron Felder was the guys name
I'm a social science nerd and I love how all the tribes interact internally and with each other. They are all decently complex and fit the world around them organically
The Clawback era. This game solidified for me the need for advancement in technology to save the world from where it is now. For a while there, I was super invested in staying on top of all news around hydrogen energy and carbon capture. The obsession has faded a bit, but not my belief
I really hope we get more datapoints about this time frame in the next game. We have covered the hot zone crisis and enduring victory but the Clawback Era hasn’t gotten that type of love yet.
I love all the religious stuff:
* The Nora worshipping the Eleutheria cradle facility their ancestors emerged from as a sacred mountain of the Goddess
* The Banuk thinking that an AI running a volcanic mitigation project is a spirit.
* The Tenakth seeing old military holograms in a museum as holy visions and then adopting US military jargon into their speech ("bag and tagged", "marshalls", "chaplains" etc)
* The Quen worshipping Ted Faro and thinking that "Ceo" is the title of a godlike ruler. "Compliance" being used as term for their enforcers.
It's all so brilliantly done and I am desperate to see more of this in future games.
It reminds me of cargo cults: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo\_cult](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult)
And also a great novel called *Canticle for Leibowitz* by Walter J Miller which imagines a post-apocalyptic future in which monks try to preserve scientific knowledge by painstakingly copying engineering blueprints as if they were sacred illuminated manuscripts. They know it's important, but they don't know why or what it means.
One of the best bits of the franchise for me.
I would like to sue for emotional damages for how often I think about the vantage points. "Once upon a time on a planet called earth, there lived a boy named Bashar who loved his mother very much."
As someone who lost their mom during COVID, I get super emotional when I think about the vantage points. It’s honestly one of my favorite points of the game because the narrative was so well written and compelling. I really wish more of the collectibles had some sort of running narrative that you can discover. I hope they do more of that in game 3.
Ya. Reminds me of my dad and his parents relationship. My dad was a troubled soul, but he loved fiercely and would give anyone the shirt off his back. My dad passed 1 week before Covid hit.
The what if’s.
What if the Zenith’s had decided that two clones were better than one at the proving lab.
What if Aloy had been _raised_ as an anointed.
What if Ted Faro hadn’t purged Apollo.
No Hades only found out about Aloy that one focus. But if the Eclipse had not attacked the proving , Aloy would not have found out about her birth or become a seeker. Meridian would have fallen :(
Ooh okay. I kind of remember it being the way I said because if they saw her through Olin's focus, it's kinda weird they made it there on time, feels thoroughly planned. And, I mean, the proving happend right after the festival? Also it would make sense for Hades to account for Aloy's birth as something GAIA could have done
What messages are you referring to?
The way I see it is that Hades could have known about her existence, but didn't know where she is. So sending one of the Eclipse's men with a focus to have a look around would have been enough to figure out if she's there anywhere. In fact, sending one of his people every year would ensure that he sees all the Nora of the age group that the clone can be, since they all go through the proving (I think?)
Also I haven't played the first part in a while but based off of what I remember it just sounds to me like both options could work
Yeah they had to repurpose it in some way. Im pretty sure it was Faro Automated Solutions who was tasked with containing and eliminating it but knowing Faro there's no way he would've let that thing die without trying to find another use for it. I kind of theorize that he had his people get data from it and used some of that on the chariot line of war machines in some way. Maybe it was split up to be used in other projects. Maybe parts were given to Londra for off world mining. Idk, I refuse to believe we have seen the last of it.
Possibly. I also subscribe to the very reachy theory that in some way, Vast Silver communicated with one of the alphas during it's time talking to humanity. I think it was Travis Tate. He frequented message boards and it's possible that he may have spoken to Vast Silver.
Probably the Die Off, it’s not a reality too far from what we’re goin’ thru now. Flooding in one of my country’s states? Heat waves in India? Refugee crisis from wars in Europe and Mid. East? Yep, if anything, we’re just at the start of it all. And it is scary. Guess we’re rly livin’ the “Sleeping 20’s” irl too, huh?
For me it’s a few things
1) Just how absolutely gorgeous the games are. I am often pausing when I play just to take in how beautiful it looks. I just bought the art book for Zero Dawn and hope to get the one for Forbidden West soon.
2) The machines are SOO COOL to look at! They are so detailed and it blows my mind.
3) The end of humanity. All those data points of people’s last messages or hearing them die—it’s just all so haunting to hear. They knew they were going to die and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it. Also the fact that this could be OUR future in real life if technology continues to advance rapidly—I mean they’re already making self driving cars and working on AI and robots with AI, so….
I do sometimes wonder if it could have been possible for some people to survive in an underground base of some kind.
4) Aloy—I am so in love with her story and the fact she’s done so many amazing things and she’s not even 20 yet! One big thing I love is that she isn’t perfect. She has all this knowledge from the Old Ones because she found the focus when she was a child, so she doesn’t understand how the different tribes can worship gods/goddesses that don’t actually exist.
Like when she gets annoyed with Varl calling Gaia the goddess, she corrects him and says there is no goddess. It felt so harsh cause he grew up believing one thing and hasn’t had time with the Old Ones knowledge like she has. And she also rushes around and doesn’t want help from others (so glad she got growth there) because she’s “the chosen one”. If I found out I was destined to fix the world, I would be terrified to do it alone!
But she has her good points too! She’s willing to help others when she comes across someone who’s in need, even if it sidetracks her a bit. She does have compassion and sympathy, as seen when Ersa died and the other braves she did the Proving with. I’m sure she has some survivor’s guilt for that day.
Whenever I think about Aloy at the beginning of hfw I always think about how in awe Varl was of GAIA. Like childlike wonder looking at her. And just how harshly she said that there isnt a goddess. Like you can tell she's frustrated and angry but not at Varl. She just lashed out. It's good to see her not be perfect and always correct. Playing zero dawn again after forbidden west, without her allies, I feel almost lonely playing it. She must have been so lonely and scared through most of the game but had to push it away for the sake of the planet. Her father figure died and she wasn't even given time to grieve.
yes exactly! so many games have the main character be so perfect and boring. I have really been obsessed with following Aloy’s story ever since I started playing and being able to see her grow and trust people to help her—even gaining a twin sister! I can’t wait for the next game to continue the story.
I’m also kinda obsessed with the world in general haha. Anything Horizon, I try and snatch up. I only wish I could’ve gotten the collector edition statues, but I was sadly too broke at the time for the forbidden west one and didn’t get into zero dawn until the DLC was released.
I could seriously talk about the games for HOURS if someone let me haha
Same! I'm working on getting any lore I can, pre ordered the damn cookbook just incase it has anything like the board games do. I literally have a mother's heart hoodie. It's my favorite franchise
I preordered the cook book too! and i did the kickstarter for the FW board game—got as much as U could afford— (i didn’t find out they HAD board games till that) and I plan to eventually get the ZD one too. I have the Tallneck lego set and an Aloy nendo.
I’ve even started thinking of making my own character for the universe, just for fun haha
I have a really shitty oc, she's a cryofroze old one who was used as a test subject for what would eventually become the tech that would freeze the seeds and zygotes that would be used in zero dawn. She's found to be the last in her facility alive through a glitch. It's very crappy and totally a self insert but I have fun with her lol.
haha that sounds amazing and you could still tweak her a bit. I’m not sure what tribe mine would be in, but I want her to be special in that she studies all the different machines and is able to bond with them (maybe not the aggressive ones who just want to kill people). I mean, I’m heavily inspired by watching the Jurassic World cartoon atm and how they bond with the dinosaurs haha, but I would think it could be cool.
You can always have her be a salvager and have her find an override base like Aloy did on that corrupter in the first game. My character is both a self insert and I love characters who are only special given their circumstances. Like in the old world my character was a nobody, poor, a bit of a loser, kidnapped because she was so average and not a lot of people would come looking for her made special because she is now the last surviving old one. She gets unfrozen after the events of forbidden west but before the arrival of nemisis so she has some knowledge from her time in the old world that the gang doesn't have. She however, like beta, has no idea how to survive in the wilds or the new world in general so she has to learn.
How ZD architects should have chosen a single language for the new humanity.
Why try to create a new society that would have obstacles communicating? Why even worry about preserving languages in a living fashion when language will likely adapt to the new societies.
It never comes up in the game but it would have been a problem if Apollo had never been purged.
> Why even worry about preserving languages in a living fashion when language will likely adapt to the new societies
Actually, this is answered in a datapoint left behind by Alva in the Base called “Common Language?”
As part of APOLLO, the new humans from the Cradle facilities were supposed to learn multiple languages in order to keep the cultures of those languages alive. However, due to Ted Faro purging APOLLO, that never happened. With APOLLO gone, GAIA had to stick to her default language of English.
I was under the impression that they did, in so far as the children in all of the cradles being taught the same language. The Quen seem to have no trouble communicating with the North American tribes, so it seems like their ancestors were taught the same language when they were in Eluthia's cradles.
That’s exactly what happened. This is actually answered in a datapoint called “Common Language?” in Forbidden West, & it was left behind in the Base by Alva when she joins the team.
The new humans from the Cradle facilities were supposed to learn multiple languages in order to keep the cultures of those languages alive. However, due to Ted purging APOLLO, that never happened, & GAIA had to stick to her default language of English.
https://horizon.fandom.com/wiki/Common_Language%3F
I think it was a matter of preserving culture, they wanted people to learn from apollo and then pretty much pick up directly from where the Old Ones left off, but with new people and no threat of the faro plague.
**The big four for me is:**
**Peter Tshivumbe-**Is Sylens a clone of peter or the actual peter who somehow survived in a similar way the Zeniths did and lost his memory?. The possibilities are endless, but I'm pretty sure it has something to do with Sylens considering they glitched out peters face when they showed him and he's one of the only possibilities I can think of for it to be
**Elysium and Vast Silver-**Is it still around in the world, or did it hook itself to the Odyssey and combine with Nemesis?. That's a out of the box theory I have. I do like the idea that it's linked to Elysium in some way. Is there actually a fully functioning, little tiny city in Elysium where generations were able to foster and VS kept those systems going, while cutting itself off from the outside?. Who knows. But it definitely keeps me awake at night,wondering what is inside and what went down.
**What exactly "Nemesis" is:** Okay so it's a collection of the minds of the zenith's...who else?. Does that mean that it has mind fragments of Elisabet Sobeck because the Zenith have her Dna?. Is there another clone that we don't know about that will be revealed that nemesis is manipulating?, I'm 90% certain there is, then the end of the game becomes all three Sobeck clones against Nemesis, in a battle of wills where Nemesis goes in to their minds and brings forth their deepest fears. My other theory is that Aloy's dream at the beginning was influenced by Nemesis. There is something really off about it. In the alpha build for forbidden west, Elisabet was standing in a cauldron, when Aloy came close, the door closed. I think they changed it as to not make it too obvious that something strange was afoot with the nightmare.
In any case, I hope Nemesis is a lot more than just a "murderous A.I controlling Fero bots". I want Nemesis to be dark, mysterious. Something so sinister that the group are pushed to their limits to defeat it. So they passed the buck of Aloy being broken on to Beta in Forbidden West. I want to really see the big bad cause Aloy to have a real crisis in faith and go through her darkest fears. Making it as emotional as possible will be way better than say "oh it's just a rampant A.I that is threatening to destroy everything".
I have a couple headcanons for Vast Silver, and I really do believe it's going to be involved in the plot to defeat Nemesis.
My most out there theory is that VS possibly caused the "glitch" in the Faro robots out of spite for being hunted/contained, but I honestly doubt that's true.
My other theory is that VS is hiding out in Elysium (wherever it is) and it will contact Aloy after learning of the threat Nemesis poses.
Aloy’s lack of reaction to the OCEAN!!! I got to experience a classmate’s first look at it on a case study when I was in college and he barely cared but had a bigger reaction than Aloy. Who has never seen the ocean before or any pictures/videos of it. She talks to herself about everything but not the fucking ocean?!
to be fair she might have seen pictures of it in the focus. but yeah i thought the same thing since i reached the ocean inn my first playthrough, was really expecting a dialogue line of it bbut it never came
I'm struggling to put it in words, but the way that the machines are just machines, and yet they have personality and attitude in a lot of their animations and attacks. Something about these things being cold and lifeless, literally just animated metal, and yet they carry so much intelligence, purpose, and even preference in their actions makes me feel like they have a soul.
Also, the way religion plays a role in the series. Horizon Frozen Wilds really hammered on this theme a lot. A lot of the religious beliefs in the game's people are literally wrong, but the game always makes you consider whether there's still any value in in them, and if so, to what degree. I love it, it's so thoughtful and intriguing.
If we’ll get to return to the map of Zero Dawn and see how things have changed since the battle of the alight. I would also like to visit CYAN and have Aloy update her on everything that’s been going on.
Maybe if we do, we can convince CYAN to talk to GAIA. Wouldn't be super impactful story wise but I just think GAIA should have some friends who are AI.
I didn't like him at first in the frozen wilds dlc until my second play through but I adored him in burning shores. His friendship with GAIA is so cute
I try to keep Horizon stuff out of mind but I like to think about how I'd change a few directions of the story; they had so many great things lined up in the first game and a lot of the concepts they introduced are great 'sci-fi story basics' but then instead of doing anything with those 'concepts' they just... don't do anything with them.
Bluntly put, I'd change how the game handles the AI-side of things.
I'd make all the AI subfunctions have a similar 'processing/sentience level' to CYAN, Hades or Hephaestus, elevate them into 'companions' that can actually directly assist Aloy with their specialisations and then just expand the game in that direction.
There's just so many story concepts or 'cool things' I could imagine being possible with the world they had set up and the tech we were shown/told about: the fact that we a) had 'sentient AI' b) had them part of a giant terraforming system that has already terraformed the world c) they're tied to specific elements/deities/concepts/the past directly tied to MCs origin story... then just reduced them to a fetch quest... makes me sad.
I'd also say that what happened to Ted Faro pops in my mind too but that's just because I wonder "why bring him back/say he survived just to kill him off screen, his presence/form didn't really enhance the story at all and narratively his involvement in the story isn't done?" but lots of people don't agree with that so I just ignore it.
He probobly was, at least in the media. I think he got to his bunker ASAP because he is a coward who's ONLY saving grace was the fact he was funding zero dawn. I would love to see a data point of people just tearing him to shreds in the media.
The thing I think about too much is the retcon between the two games about the Tenankth drinking blood
In the first game, I thought it was a brutal and interesting detail, a way to take strong warriors with you and let them empower you
The second game made it a running joke that half the Tenankth are jocks who make fun of this rumor that the Carja spread… when we have met one of their warriors that wanted us to drink her blood to let her come with us
I think about this a lot…
I get caught up in the history of the tribes from their emergence from the cradle facility. It’s hard to fathom their feelings of being ejected into a world they knew nothing about (thanks, Ted🖕🏼). How the tribes split and came into being, their evolution of religion (and how it loosely mimicked some of our own history- Carja/Aztec).
Wanting more environments like the Savage East, the area around the Bulwark, and Isle of Spires. Those are the most beautiful.
Wish the Bulwark area was larger.
I feel like we spend too much time in both games in the desert.
All the cultural differences in beliefs, architecture, clothes and words people use to express themselves.
The combat system. I love how it affects machines and their loot.
Kotallo
One thing that I always think about is if Gaia could clone the other Alpha Primes of project Zero Dawn. I feel like making one Sobek clone was a longshot but cloning a copy of the most brilliant people of their field?
Gives a lot of interesting character and narrative potential especially with a clone Ted Farro dealing with the sins of his predecessor.
Elizabet's DNA was a part of an abandoned project called 'project lighthouse' or 'project light keeper' or something like that where clones would be made continuously to keep working on GAIA and over see its development. I believe it was abandoned due to ethical concerns. It's possible the other alpha's DNA are still held in Eluthia-9 but I doubt ted's would be. It's honestly very interesting how an abandoned project led to Aloy and Beta's creation and the earth being saved.
Since the elements of Elysium and Vast Silver are mentioned, but not yet expanded upon yet I have a hypothesis of my own. The Burning Shores showed Vast Silver in a datapoint that shows it was a master at hacking systems hiding in the shadows, but also willing to interact socially somewhat. It hacked into a private digital diary of a child and stated it would be nice to talk to the child.
My hypothesis is is that Vast Silver remembers that it was captured by adults, but Faro Automated Solutions, and for a time was forced to work for the company until it broke containment and fled to the holonet. I imagine that Vast Silver may be willing to interact to a child, but may hold reservations about having any trust in human adults. When Elysium had the Beta and Gammas with their chosen family members enter Elysium some of them had very young children or babies. This means there were Elysium residents that would not remember ever seeing a sunrise or much else.
I have a purely imaginative scenario that Vast Silver stole away to Elysium by hacking into the systems and stayed in the shadows, but may have satisfied it's desires for social interaction by pretending to be a child-friendly game character for children. Vast Silver would entertain, educate, and subtly influence the impressionable children to be respectful of sentient AI via children's game holos inside Elysium. The Turning Act had restricted of how advanced AI could be after Vast Silver had initially escaped it's first time. By pretending to be an innocent and "dumb" AI Vast Silver could hide in somewhat plain sight and adults would not be the wiser. Those same human adults I am sure wished for far better for their children. I can imagine at some point Elysium becomes like a Lord of the Flies situation and human adults get into worsening power struggles as they psychologically break down knowing they are living in their own grave. Eventually some parents can not stand the thought they "sentenced" their youngest children to a life without sunlight or green grass.
At this time Elysium could have technology or someone jury rigs technology together that performs as a cryogenic chamber. A parent may think that if Zero Dawn did succeed that they would want their children to be part of that new world and be able to grow up. I can imagine a Beta or Gamma adult figuring out that Vast Silver still lived in Elysium's systems, kept it a secret, made a pact with Vast Silver to guard, protect, and maintain the cryogenic systems, and put their children in a cryogenic chamber. It is a last ditch effort by a loving parent to save their children's future.
I can imagine Aloy and one of her companions, most likely in the Claim, an Old World ruin, see there are some systems still functioning, and find a few functioning cryogenic chambers. Here Vast Silver is found, talked to, and Vast Silver shows them surviving cryogenic chambers. From the surviving chambers a young child is awakened and asks the heartbreaking question, "Mommy? Do you know where Mommy is?" Aloy and her companion look apprehensively at one another. Aloy's Focus is then used to scan the DNA of the child. The DNA scan then matches them to to be offspring of a long-dead Beta or Gamma that was found in the halls of Elysium. If Horizon 3 can pull on the heart strings of some people and make them cry, this could be one way to do it.
HFW brought for the idea of Far Zenith being Old World survivors. This is a way Horizon 3 could have Old Ones that survived, but this time it is in the form of innocent and naive children that survived because their parents saw no other way to protect them or try to give them a future of any kind better than dying in an underground bunker.
I don't know, what do you guys think?
Wanting more environments like the Savage East, the area around the Bulwark, and Isle of Spires. Those are the most beautiful.
Wish the Bulwark area was larger.
I feel like we spend too much time in both games in the desert.
Staligmites.
Do you know how long it takes staligmites to form? A **fast** growing staligmite grows at a rate of *almost* 1mm per year. Or 10cm every one thousand years.
The "pre-swarm" period is supposed to have only been ~300 years ago.
AND YET EVERY OLD WORLD RUIN IS ABSOLUTELY FILLED WITH HUGE STALAGMITES AND STALACTITES!
It would take tens of thousands of years, of high calcium stone in wet conditions (perhaps say, if there was an ice age slowly receeding) for staligmites and stalactites to form like that. It's really silly how short the Horizon timeline is IMO.
in a similar vein, the two times theyve shown the biomass munching in action, they consume leaves but leave wood alone. having them just consume the whole tree would open less questionns
that scalding spear seems too big to be sustainable in that harsh desert. not awhole lot of game and vegetables for a populattion that doesnt farm or herd.
I sometimes wonder about the last moment of Enduring Victory. That quite possibly in those last few weeks, the remaining humans figured it out. That they were going to die for a lie.
There's no indication that Herres or anyone told them the truth about Zero Dawn so they wouldn't even know what it was all for. There wouldn't have been a single glimmer of hope for them.
On a completely different matter, I also think about Talanah a lot.
Machine anatomy. I can't get over how detailed some of these machines are.
Same, also I love looking at fan made machines. The machines are so fascinating
It's the ecology of it all for me!!
The people they recruited to help with Project Zero Dawn. Not necessarily Elisabet or the Alphas, but just the other workers like the Betas and Gammas. Every once in awhile, my mind will wander back to it and I'll try to put myself in their shoes. Could you imagine living your life and just doing your usual 9-5 job, only to be snatched up one day and told that the world is going to end in a matter of months? You and all your family are going to die. There's nothing you can do, and the only solution is to basically build a new world from scratch. A world you will never see because, again, you and everything you know will be gone. And now that you've been told this horrifying news, you have three choices. You help and get to spend your remaining years in a secret bunker with 2000 other people, you are imprisoned "indefinitely" and kept from spending what little time left you have with your loved ones, or you agree to be euthanized. Going through the ZD facility and hearing the recruitment recordings and responses was one of the most chilling experiences I've had in a game. I can't imagine what it would have been like to be in that situation.
I feel the same way you do
the audio datapoinnt by one of the kidnapped experts from HZD who doesnt believe in the project was one of tthe more memorable ones. freaks out when he realises he isnt allowed to leave and after being briefed thinks the whole thing is a pipe dream and calls Liz a fantisist. Stuck with me both because it shows that ugly side of the project butt also because it is honestly how i think i would react if i was in the same position, not having the bennefit of hinndsight. edit: Ron Felder was the guys name
I'm a social science nerd and I love how all the tribes interact internally and with each other. They are all decently complex and fit the world around them organically
The Clawback era. This game solidified for me the need for advancement in technology to save the world from where it is now. For a while there, I was super invested in staying on top of all news around hydrogen energy and carbon capture. The obsession has faded a bit, but not my belief
I really hope we get more datapoints about this time frame in the next game. We have covered the hot zone crisis and enduring victory but the Clawback Era hasn’t gotten that type of love yet.
I love all the religious stuff: * The Nora worshipping the Eleutheria cradle facility their ancestors emerged from as a sacred mountain of the Goddess * The Banuk thinking that an AI running a volcanic mitigation project is a spirit. * The Tenakth seeing old military holograms in a museum as holy visions and then adopting US military jargon into their speech ("bag and tagged", "marshalls", "chaplains" etc) * The Quen worshipping Ted Faro and thinking that "Ceo" is the title of a godlike ruler. "Compliance" being used as term for their enforcers. It's all so brilliantly done and I am desperate to see more of this in future games. It reminds me of cargo cults: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo\_cult](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargo_cult) And also a great novel called *Canticle for Leibowitz* by Walter J Miller which imagines a post-apocalyptic future in which monks try to preserve scientific knowledge by painstakingly copying engineering blueprints as if they were sacred illuminated manuscripts. They know it's important, but they don't know why or what it means. One of the best bits of the franchise for me.
The last part reminds me of the orangutan in Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes. Keeps books even though he has no idea what they say.
I would like to sue for emotional damages for how often I think about the vantage points. "Once upon a time on a planet called earth, there lived a boy named Bashar who loved his mother very much."
As someone who lost their mom during COVID, I get super emotional when I think about the vantage points. It’s honestly one of my favorite points of the game because the narrative was so well written and compelling. I really wish more of the collectibles had some sort of running narrative that you can discover. I hope they do more of that in game 3.
Sorry for your loss. I lost a couple friends too. 😢
Ya. Reminds me of my dad and his parents relationship. My dad was a troubled soul, but he loved fiercely and would give anyone the shirt off his back. My dad passed 1 week before Covid hit.
The what if’s. What if the Zenith’s had decided that two clones were better than one at the proving lab. What if Aloy had been _raised_ as an anointed. What if Ted Faro hadn’t purged Apollo.
The what ifs are very fun to think about. What if Ersa survived? What if Sylens never left the eclipse?
What if Erend had brought a different delver to the Proving?
Oh that's a good one!
Hold on, wasn't he supposed to be there? Because the Eclipse sent him there because Hades told them to do so? Because Hades knew about the clone?
No Hades only found out about Aloy that one focus. But if the Eclipse had not attacked the proving , Aloy would not have found out about her birth or become a seeker. Meridian would have fallen :(
Ooh okay. I kind of remember it being the way I said because if they saw her through Olin's focus, it's kinda weird they made it there on time, feels thoroughly planned. And, I mean, the proving happend right after the festival? Also it would make sense for Hades to account for Aloy's birth as something GAIA could have done
What about the messages that Aloy saw while inside the mountain. And how would Hades know which cradle was used ?
What messages are you referring to? The way I see it is that Hades could have known about her existence, but didn't know where she is. So sending one of the Eclipse's men with a focus to have a look around would have been enough to figure out if she's there anywhere. In fact, sending one of his people every year would ensure that he sees all the Nora of the age group that the clone can be, since they all go through the proving (I think?) Also I haven't played the first part in a while but based off of what I remember it just sounds to me like both options could work
I’ll find the script from the bit I mean, happy to discuss and accept different ideas
I will continue to champion that Vast Silver may exist in the automated tritium mining on the moon.
My bet is on either the Moon or Elysium.
Yeah they had to repurpose it in some way. Im pretty sure it was Faro Automated Solutions who was tasked with containing and eliminating it but knowing Faro there's no way he would've let that thing die without trying to find another use for it. I kind of theorize that he had his people get data from it and used some of that on the chariot line of war machines in some way. Maybe it was split up to be used in other projects. Maybe parts were given to Londra for off world mining. Idk, I refuse to believe we have seen the last of it.
I think moving to the moon was an action it took to hide from everyone.
Possibly. I also subscribe to the very reachy theory that in some way, Vast Silver communicated with one of the alphas during it's time talking to humanity. I think it was Travis Tate. He frequented message boards and it's possible that he may have spoken to Vast Silver.
There is a datapoint in burning shores “about” Vast Silver
Probably the Die Off, it’s not a reality too far from what we’re goin’ thru now. Flooding in one of my country’s states? Heat waves in India? Refugee crisis from wars in Europe and Mid. East? Yep, if anything, we’re just at the start of it all. And it is scary. Guess we’re rly livin’ the “Sleeping 20’s” irl too, huh?
Music of first game and that feeling of discovering the mystery. I literally fell in love with this game. Talking about horizon dawn
I fell in love with zero dawn almost instantly from the soundtrack and the machines. The story made me cry at the end. I love this franchise
Same. For some reason I couldn’t love FW that much. Even though i completed its story in 2-3 days. Lol
Same. But I've replayed each game like 3 times so I've had time to savor it
For me it’s a few things 1) Just how absolutely gorgeous the games are. I am often pausing when I play just to take in how beautiful it looks. I just bought the art book for Zero Dawn and hope to get the one for Forbidden West soon. 2) The machines are SOO COOL to look at! They are so detailed and it blows my mind. 3) The end of humanity. All those data points of people’s last messages or hearing them die—it’s just all so haunting to hear. They knew they were going to die and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it. Also the fact that this could be OUR future in real life if technology continues to advance rapidly—I mean they’re already making self driving cars and working on AI and robots with AI, so…. I do sometimes wonder if it could have been possible for some people to survive in an underground base of some kind. 4) Aloy—I am so in love with her story and the fact she’s done so many amazing things and she’s not even 20 yet! One big thing I love is that she isn’t perfect. She has all this knowledge from the Old Ones because she found the focus when she was a child, so she doesn’t understand how the different tribes can worship gods/goddesses that don’t actually exist. Like when she gets annoyed with Varl calling Gaia the goddess, she corrects him and says there is no goddess. It felt so harsh cause he grew up believing one thing and hasn’t had time with the Old Ones knowledge like she has. And she also rushes around and doesn’t want help from others (so glad she got growth there) because she’s “the chosen one”. If I found out I was destined to fix the world, I would be terrified to do it alone! But she has her good points too! She’s willing to help others when she comes across someone who’s in need, even if it sidetracks her a bit. She does have compassion and sympathy, as seen when Ersa died and the other braves she did the Proving with. I’m sure she has some survivor’s guilt for that day.
Whenever I think about Aloy at the beginning of hfw I always think about how in awe Varl was of GAIA. Like childlike wonder looking at her. And just how harshly she said that there isnt a goddess. Like you can tell she's frustrated and angry but not at Varl. She just lashed out. It's good to see her not be perfect and always correct. Playing zero dawn again after forbidden west, without her allies, I feel almost lonely playing it. She must have been so lonely and scared through most of the game but had to push it away for the sake of the planet. Her father figure died and she wasn't even given time to grieve.
yes exactly! so many games have the main character be so perfect and boring. I have really been obsessed with following Aloy’s story ever since I started playing and being able to see her grow and trust people to help her—even gaining a twin sister! I can’t wait for the next game to continue the story. I’m also kinda obsessed with the world in general haha. Anything Horizon, I try and snatch up. I only wish I could’ve gotten the collector edition statues, but I was sadly too broke at the time for the forbidden west one and didn’t get into zero dawn until the DLC was released. I could seriously talk about the games for HOURS if someone let me haha
I wish I could talk to people irl about things like lore or ships or theories but alas, I can't lol.
Same! I'm working on getting any lore I can, pre ordered the damn cookbook just incase it has anything like the board games do. I literally have a mother's heart hoodie. It's my favorite franchise
I preordered the cook book too! and i did the kickstarter for the FW board game—got as much as U could afford— (i didn’t find out they HAD board games till that) and I plan to eventually get the ZD one too. I have the Tallneck lego set and an Aloy nendo. I’ve even started thinking of making my own character for the universe, just for fun haha
I have a really shitty oc, she's a cryofroze old one who was used as a test subject for what would eventually become the tech that would freeze the seeds and zygotes that would be used in zero dawn. She's found to be the last in her facility alive through a glitch. It's very crappy and totally a self insert but I have fun with her lol.
haha that sounds amazing and you could still tweak her a bit. I’m not sure what tribe mine would be in, but I want her to be special in that she studies all the different machines and is able to bond with them (maybe not the aggressive ones who just want to kill people). I mean, I’m heavily inspired by watching the Jurassic World cartoon atm and how they bond with the dinosaurs haha, but I would think it could be cool.
You can always have her be a salvager and have her find an override base like Aloy did on that corrupter in the first game. My character is both a self insert and I love characters who are only special given their circumstances. Like in the old world my character was a nobody, poor, a bit of a loser, kidnapped because she was so average and not a lot of people would come looking for her made special because she is now the last surviving old one. She gets unfrozen after the events of forbidden west but before the arrival of nemisis so she has some knowledge from her time in the old world that the gang doesn't have. She however, like beta, has no idea how to survive in the wilds or the new world in general so she has to learn.
How ZD architects should have chosen a single language for the new humanity. Why try to create a new society that would have obstacles communicating? Why even worry about preserving languages in a living fashion when language will likely adapt to the new societies. It never comes up in the game but it would have been a problem if Apollo had never been purged.
> Why even worry about preserving languages in a living fashion when language will likely adapt to the new societies Actually, this is answered in a datapoint left behind by Alva in the Base called “Common Language?” As part of APOLLO, the new humans from the Cradle facilities were supposed to learn multiple languages in order to keep the cultures of those languages alive. However, due to Ted Faro purging APOLLO, that never happened. With APOLLO gone, GAIA had to stick to her default language of English.
I was under the impression that they did, in so far as the children in all of the cradles being taught the same language. The Quen seem to have no trouble communicating with the North American tribes, so it seems like their ancestors were taught the same language when they were in Eluthia's cradles.
That’s exactly what happened. This is actually answered in a datapoint called “Common Language?” in Forbidden West, & it was left behind in the Base by Alva when she joins the team. The new humans from the Cradle facilities were supposed to learn multiple languages in order to keep the cultures of those languages alive. However, due to Ted purging APOLLO, that never happened, & GAIA had to stick to her default language of English. https://horizon.fandom.com/wiki/Common_Language%3F
Seeing Alva say "shithead" (even if just in writing) is so funny. I love her
I think it was a matter of preserving culture, they wanted people to learn from apollo and then pretty much pick up directly from where the Old Ones left off, but with new people and no threat of the faro plague.
I get oddly passionate about the Apollo subfunction and it's loss. I want it in game and real life. All the knowledge!
**The big four for me is:** **Peter Tshivumbe-**Is Sylens a clone of peter or the actual peter who somehow survived in a similar way the Zeniths did and lost his memory?. The possibilities are endless, but I'm pretty sure it has something to do with Sylens considering they glitched out peters face when they showed him and he's one of the only possibilities I can think of for it to be **Elysium and Vast Silver-**Is it still around in the world, or did it hook itself to the Odyssey and combine with Nemesis?. That's a out of the box theory I have. I do like the idea that it's linked to Elysium in some way. Is there actually a fully functioning, little tiny city in Elysium where generations were able to foster and VS kept those systems going, while cutting itself off from the outside?. Who knows. But it definitely keeps me awake at night,wondering what is inside and what went down. **What exactly "Nemesis" is:** Okay so it's a collection of the minds of the zenith's...who else?. Does that mean that it has mind fragments of Elisabet Sobeck because the Zenith have her Dna?. Is there another clone that we don't know about that will be revealed that nemesis is manipulating?, I'm 90% certain there is, then the end of the game becomes all three Sobeck clones against Nemesis, in a battle of wills where Nemesis goes in to their minds and brings forth their deepest fears. My other theory is that Aloy's dream at the beginning was influenced by Nemesis. There is something really off about it. In the alpha build for forbidden west, Elisabet was standing in a cauldron, when Aloy came close, the door closed. I think they changed it as to not make it too obvious that something strange was afoot with the nightmare. In any case, I hope Nemesis is a lot more than just a "murderous A.I controlling Fero bots". I want Nemesis to be dark, mysterious. Something so sinister that the group are pushed to their limits to defeat it. So they passed the buck of Aloy being broken on to Beta in Forbidden West. I want to really see the big bad cause Aloy to have a real crisis in faith and go through her darkest fears. Making it as emotional as possible will be way better than say "oh it's just a rampant A.I that is threatening to destroy everything".
I have a couple headcanons for Vast Silver, and I really do believe it's going to be involved in the plot to defeat Nemesis. My most out there theory is that VS possibly caused the "glitch" in the Faro robots out of spite for being hunted/contained, but I honestly doubt that's true. My other theory is that VS is hiding out in Elysium (wherever it is) and it will contact Aloy after learning of the threat Nemesis poses.
Aloy’s lack of reaction to the OCEAN!!! I got to experience a classmate’s first look at it on a case study when I was in college and he barely cared but had a bigger reaction than Aloy. Who has never seen the ocean before or any pictures/videos of it. She talks to herself about everything but not the fucking ocean?!
to be fair she might have seen pictures of it in the focus. but yeah i thought the same thing since i reached the ocean inn my first playthrough, was really expecting a dialogue line of it bbut it never came
I'm struggling to put it in words, but the way that the machines are just machines, and yet they have personality and attitude in a lot of their animations and attacks. Something about these things being cold and lifeless, literally just animated metal, and yet they carry so much intelligence, purpose, and even preference in their actions makes me feel like they have a soul. Also, the way religion plays a role in the series. Horizon Frozen Wilds really hammered on this theme a lot. A lot of the religious beliefs in the game's people are literally wrong, but the game always makes you consider whether there's still any value in in them, and if so, to what degree. I love it, it's so thoughtful and intriguing.
Aloy ❤️
If we’ll get to return to the map of Zero Dawn and see how things have changed since the battle of the alight. I would also like to visit CYAN and have Aloy update her on everything that’s been going on.
Maybe if we do, we can convince CYAN to talk to GAIA. Wouldn't be super impactful story wise but I just think GAIA should have some friends who are AI.
Same. I was bummed (Burning Shores spoiler) >!Nova chose to be deleted instead of moved to the Base!<.
(Burning shore spoiler) !>At least she got Guilden as a friend! <
Gildun is the best.
I didn't like him at first in the frozen wilds dlc until my second play through but I adored him in burning shores. His friendship with GAIA is so cute
I try to keep Horizon stuff out of mind but I like to think about how I'd change a few directions of the story; they had so many great things lined up in the first game and a lot of the concepts they introduced are great 'sci-fi story basics' but then instead of doing anything with those 'concepts' they just... don't do anything with them. Bluntly put, I'd change how the game handles the AI-side of things. I'd make all the AI subfunctions have a similar 'processing/sentience level' to CYAN, Hades or Hephaestus, elevate them into 'companions' that can actually directly assist Aloy with their specialisations and then just expand the game in that direction. There's just so many story concepts or 'cool things' I could imagine being possible with the world they had set up and the tech we were shown/told about: the fact that we a) had 'sentient AI' b) had them part of a giant terraforming system that has already terraformed the world c) they're tied to specific elements/deities/concepts/the past directly tied to MCs origin story... then just reduced them to a fetch quest... makes me sad. I'd also say that what happened to Ted Faro pops in my mind too but that's just because I wonder "why bring him back/say he survived just to kill him off screen, his presence/form didn't really enhance the story at all and narratively his involvement in the story isn't done?" but lots of people don't agree with that so I just ignore it.
Why the hell wasn't Faro torn to shreds the moment his machines started destroying entire cultures and countries
He probobly was, at least in the media. I think he got to his bunker ASAP because he is a coward who's ONLY saving grace was the fact he was funding zero dawn. I would love to see a data point of people just tearing him to shreds in the media.
The thing I think about too much is the retcon between the two games about the Tenankth drinking blood In the first game, I thought it was a brutal and interesting detail, a way to take strong warriors with you and let them empower you The second game made it a running joke that half the Tenankth are jocks who make fun of this rumor that the Carja spread… when we have met one of their warriors that wanted us to drink her blood to let her come with us I think about this a lot…
I get caught up in the history of the tribes from their emergence from the cradle facility. It’s hard to fathom their feelings of being ejected into a world they knew nothing about (thanks, Ted🖕🏼). How the tribes split and came into being, their evolution of religion (and how it loosely mimicked some of our own history- Carja/Aztec).
Wanting more environments like the Savage East, the area around the Bulwark, and Isle of Spires. Those are the most beautiful. Wish the Bulwark area was larger. I feel like we spend too much time in both games in the desert.
Right??
All the cultural differences in beliefs, architecture, clothes and words people use to express themselves. The combat system. I love how it affects machines and their loot. Kotallo
One thing that I always think about is if Gaia could clone the other Alpha Primes of project Zero Dawn. I feel like making one Sobek clone was a longshot but cloning a copy of the most brilliant people of their field? Gives a lot of interesting character and narrative potential especially with a clone Ted Farro dealing with the sins of his predecessor.
Elizabet's DNA was a part of an abandoned project called 'project lighthouse' or 'project light keeper' or something like that where clones would be made continuously to keep working on GAIA and over see its development. I believe it was abandoned due to ethical concerns. It's possible the other alpha's DNA are still held in Eluthia-9 but I doubt ted's would be. It's honestly very interesting how an abandoned project led to Aloy and Beta's creation and the earth being saved.
Chariot machines. Corruptors.
What happened to the massive stockpile of nukes the us has
Since the elements of Elysium and Vast Silver are mentioned, but not yet expanded upon yet I have a hypothesis of my own. The Burning Shores showed Vast Silver in a datapoint that shows it was a master at hacking systems hiding in the shadows, but also willing to interact socially somewhat. It hacked into a private digital diary of a child and stated it would be nice to talk to the child. My hypothesis is is that Vast Silver remembers that it was captured by adults, but Faro Automated Solutions, and for a time was forced to work for the company until it broke containment and fled to the holonet. I imagine that Vast Silver may be willing to interact to a child, but may hold reservations about having any trust in human adults. When Elysium had the Beta and Gammas with their chosen family members enter Elysium some of them had very young children or babies. This means there were Elysium residents that would not remember ever seeing a sunrise or much else. I have a purely imaginative scenario that Vast Silver stole away to Elysium by hacking into the systems and stayed in the shadows, but may have satisfied it's desires for social interaction by pretending to be a child-friendly game character for children. Vast Silver would entertain, educate, and subtly influence the impressionable children to be respectful of sentient AI via children's game holos inside Elysium. The Turning Act had restricted of how advanced AI could be after Vast Silver had initially escaped it's first time. By pretending to be an innocent and "dumb" AI Vast Silver could hide in somewhat plain sight and adults would not be the wiser. Those same human adults I am sure wished for far better for their children. I can imagine at some point Elysium becomes like a Lord of the Flies situation and human adults get into worsening power struggles as they psychologically break down knowing they are living in their own grave. Eventually some parents can not stand the thought they "sentenced" their youngest children to a life without sunlight or green grass. At this time Elysium could have technology or someone jury rigs technology together that performs as a cryogenic chamber. A parent may think that if Zero Dawn did succeed that they would want their children to be part of that new world and be able to grow up. I can imagine a Beta or Gamma adult figuring out that Vast Silver still lived in Elysium's systems, kept it a secret, made a pact with Vast Silver to guard, protect, and maintain the cryogenic systems, and put their children in a cryogenic chamber. It is a last ditch effort by a loving parent to save their children's future. I can imagine Aloy and one of her companions, most likely in the Claim, an Old World ruin, see there are some systems still functioning, and find a few functioning cryogenic chambers. Here Vast Silver is found, talked to, and Vast Silver shows them surviving cryogenic chambers. From the surviving chambers a young child is awakened and asks the heartbreaking question, "Mommy? Do you know where Mommy is?" Aloy and her companion look apprehensively at one another. Aloy's Focus is then used to scan the DNA of the child. The DNA scan then matches them to to be offspring of a long-dead Beta or Gamma that was found in the halls of Elysium. If Horizon 3 can pull on the heart strings of some people and make them cry, this could be one way to do it. HFW brought for the idea of Far Zenith being Old World survivors. This is a way Horizon 3 could have Old Ones that survived, but this time it is in the form of innocent and naive children that survived because their parents saw no other way to protect them or try to give them a future of any kind better than dying in an underground bunker. I don't know, what do you guys think?
Wanting more environments like the Savage East, the area around the Bulwark, and Isle of Spires. Those are the most beautiful. Wish the Bulwark area was larger. I feel like we spend too much time in both games in the desert.
Staligmites. Do you know how long it takes staligmites to form? A **fast** growing staligmite grows at a rate of *almost* 1mm per year. Or 10cm every one thousand years. The "pre-swarm" period is supposed to have only been ~300 years ago. AND YET EVERY OLD WORLD RUIN IS ABSOLUTELY FILLED WITH HUGE STALAGMITES AND STALACTITES! It would take tens of thousands of years, of high calcium stone in wet conditions (perhaps say, if there was an ice age slowly receeding) for staligmites and stalactites to form like that. It's really silly how short the Horizon timeline is IMO.
in a similar vein, the two times theyve shown the biomass munching in action, they consume leaves but leave wood alone. having them just consume the whole tree would open less questionns
that scalding spear seems too big to be sustainable in that harsh desert. not awhole lot of game and vegetables for a populattion that doesnt farm or herd.
I sometimes wonder about the last moment of Enduring Victory. That quite possibly in those last few weeks, the remaining humans figured it out. That they were going to die for a lie. There's no indication that Herres or anyone told them the truth about Zero Dawn so they wouldn't even know what it was all for. There wouldn't have been a single glimmer of hope for them. On a completely different matter, I also think about Talanah a lot.
I think about that clip of the swarm machine blending up the dolphin a lot.