Horizon Zero Dawn

Of all the past decade's many PlayStation exclusives, Horizon Zero Dawn, a vibrant third person action-adventure game, was the one I wanted to play the most -- well, until replaced by the slightly more recent God of War (2018). Unfortunately Zero Dawn failed to meet my expectations spectacularly. By now, the game's first release was over 7 years ago, so the game is pretty old, but I didn't expect it to feel so much worse than Tomb Raider (2013), which I had just been replaying for its multiplayer achievements. General movement is considerably slower, mantling less universal.

Days Gone

Sony's exclusive first-party console games from the late 2010s started making their way to PC at the turn of the decade. Days Gone was not the first of them but it was the first to make it onto my backlog. The game's reception was lukewarm and maybe that's why Sony declined the pitch for a sequel by Bend Studio. Overall Days Gone is an extremely solid production; its weakness lies in its plot premise and writing. The game does however cast a delicious sequel hook at the end, and people who've gotten that far do seem to want to see where a second game would go.