The Blog of pravesh0

This is Part 2 of the Let's Play Horizon Zero Dawn series. To read Part 1, click here.

Let's start from where we left off. Little Aloy saves the stranded boy by sneaking past the dangerous machines with the help of her little device. This was her first small victory. But it turned a bit sour as, instead of being thanked, they were looked down on by a tribesman for trying to contact the boy. After all, Aloy and her caretaker Rost are outcasts.

A kid from the tribe throws a rock at Aloy just because she is an outcast. When Aloy tries to hit back, Rost diffuses the situation. But this leaves Aloy with a lot of questions. Why are they outcasts? Why are they treated like this? Who is she?

Rost tells her that only the High Matriarchs know the answers to these questions, but being an outcast, no one is going to talk to them. However, Aloy can become a member of the tribe again.

There is a ceremony each year called The Proving, where every Nora who wants to become accepted as a member of the tribe must pass this trial. Those who win it are granted a boon. This is her way back in.

Upon hearing this, she felt motivated and excited. But The Proving was not going to be easy, so she had to train a lot. We see Rost training Aloy in a cutscene, and in the same cutscene, she grows up.

It is almost time for The Proving as Rost prepares her for a final lesson. This is where we truly get the sense of this vast open world.

I happened to have a few skill points available, which I spent on 'Gatherer' so I could collect more natural resources, good for making more bows. I used one more skill point to unlock "Lure Call"—this helps me lure one enemy toward me so I can silently kill it. That Silent Kill is also a skill, too.

I liked the Skill Tree presentation—skills were organised in different sections. Some of them were locked at the start, too. But the skill costs increase up to 3 points. That might take a long time to complete all these skills.

I explored the world and saw some settlements whose gates were closed to us. There were many people outside who wouldn't talk to us because we were outcasts. I tried to shoot them with my arrow, but they are immune to it.

I killed a few Watcher machines to test my newly gained skills. They worked well together. Luring them and sneakily killing them was fun.

These tall grasses work really well for these hunts. I was enjoying those hunts. Once the other machines saw the dead bodies, they got alerted and started looking for hunters. Their detection and AI systems are not too bad.

I wasn't too keen on starting the main story mission. While I was exploring, I saw an injured man who told us that he was hurt while fighting a machine and used a spear that his wife made before she died. To retrieve that spear, his daughter went after the dangerous machines, and now she might be in danger. He wanted our help.

She was standing on a high tower while four Watchers were waiting for her on the ground. We reached there in time and killed all of them. But the spear wasn't with her. We had to go further and look for it.

Our 'Focus' helped in tracking down the animal. It was a Scrapper machine, a much more powerful machine than what I had been hunting nearby.

I got a bit distracted when I found more Watchers on my track. Could have easily ignored them, but I was feeling a bit adventurous and killed them.

Not only machines, but I also hunted a lot of wild animals, including foxes, boars, and turkeys. They were everywhere, even in the snowy biomes. There is no shortage of those animals here. They were used to upgrade my ammo capacity.

The Scrapper I was after was with a group. There were a couple of them with some Watchers. Killing them with my basic bow took me some time. The information about the machine helped me to locate the weak points on its body.

I retrieved the spear and went back to the injured man—but not before stopping to hunt the animals. I was taking some nice shots of this beautiful world too.

The injured man was grateful to see the spear, which was the only memory of his wife that remained in this world now. They didn't want to lose it. Even though they were part of the tribe, they still asked for help from an outcast. This just shows—a parent would break any law of society to help their child.

Aloy has to prepare for The Proving, and we will see how much trouble she will have before that. Will she be able to win it and get accepted into the tribe? Will she find her origin story? Stay tuned to find out.

Thanks for reading