Hunting the giant machines and unloading the entire kitchen sink of weapons 'n' shit is like the biggest allure to me in these games. I hate comparing it to Monster Hunter, but it's the closest thing I can compare the combat to conceptually. The open world is alright. It's pretty much generic AAA chorefest. I doubt it even took the devs that long to design the open world since pretty much every biome except for the beach area is ripped straight from Horizon 1.

The story and character writing is solid enough for me to be engaged for most of it, but I think they get to self indulgent on the lore of the world that they forget to tell an actually cohesive and understandable plot. The first Act was a slow burn, the second Act was pretty good, and then the third just was all over the place and ended really abruptly. It's crazy how they got so caught up in setting up an even bigger conflict for the sequel that they forgot to write an actual ending for the game.

EDIT: I'm trying not to gas this game up too much or else I'll get flamed by some people, but I actually grew to really like the main cast of characters in this game. Especially Sylens. I'm a bit sad though as this will probably be the last time I'll ever get to see Lance play that role. He absolutely killed it here man.

RIP Lance Reddick