Ok so, just beat it last night, short version, really enjoyed it. It's got some flaws, but seeing as a lot of the general design is cribbed from other games, I can't really say the flaws are unique to GOT. Overall, fun game, and I'm starting my "Honor" playthrough today, to see if anything fundamentally changes. Don't think so, but we'll see.
So, things I didn't like. Pretty much all of these can include the preface "But it's the same as another open world sandbox that it took this mechanic from"
1. The horse mechanics. I can't stand trying to use a horse in these games. Horizon Zero dawn (the game GOT most reminds me of on the negative points), Assassin's Creed Origins and Odyssey, pretty much all of them have terrible horse physics, that just annoy me. The triggers that make your horse stop dead because you can't proceed are weird when compared to on foot, and you will find yourself being stopped on terrain that on foot, you could sort of hop over and keep going. Plus with all the verticality of the game, trying to actually ride around on horseback is an effort in frustration, as you have to stop, try and find an alternate route down/up the sheer cliff in front of you....or just jump down/climb up on foot. Then you resummon the horse and ride for maybe 100 meters and then have to do it again. The wandering patrols of mongols also cause this to be an issue, as horse combat is terrible, so you might as well just hop off the horse and run around. The fact that the game has a fast travel system, and almost zero load time (which was amazing the entire game), it's just far less hassle to run everywhere. If it's 200 meters away, you can run there in like 20 seconds. If it's farther away than that, odds are good you can fast travel to somewhere closer, and just run the rest.
2. The linear climbing/mantling system. Again, this is almost identical to H:ZD. Where you can only climb/parkour/mantle where the devs have deemed you worthy to climb. I find this annoying, especially when they give me a rope and hook, with the idea that it is going to free up my ability to traverse, when the reality is it just opens up the specific lanes that require the hook. Also, the fact that the game mandates a single path when scaling obstacles, makes the fact that it doesn't magnetize you to the various points annoying as shit. I mean, I'm climbing along a wall, there is NO choice on which way I go, because the devs made it that way. And it requires an input of direction stick and jump button to progress. But, apparently I had the stick pointed a few degrees too far down instead of right, so instead of just jumping to the ONLY FREAKING THING OF INTEREST TO THE RIGHT OF ME...the game decides "oh, you want to LEAP OFF TO YOUR DEATH by jumping back? Okie doke! " And Jin goes flying off at a 90 degree angle to where I wanted to go. If you're going to remove all ability for me to choose my own path when climbing, don't have room for failure by having the inputs be variable. I mean you've got me on this climbing railroad, why give me the option to derail it?
3. The hook is basically useless. Aside from the above mentioned linear climbing paths that require the hook to proceed, the hook is basically useless for just random traversing of a location. You would think it would allow you the opportunity to scale buildings to get a higher elevation vantage point when assaulting a mongol base right? Wrong. Very often, the buildings have no such hook points, or if they do, it's so high up, that you literally can't get to them from the ground. They're designed, I think, to allow you a way back down from the roof, but....I don't want back DOWN, I'm already down, it's where I started on this map. Let me use it to quickly get up on this building from this side damnit! It would be the ideal angle to get an ambush strike on that guard below. But no, the only way up for that building is on the other side....right next to the guy I want to kill...making it where I have to kill him to safely get on the roof....which removes the point of me getting on the roof in the first place.
4. The currency system revolving around supplies really irked me, given how often the drama of a particular encounter with the people was they were starving. And I'm sitting on literally 1000+ supplies (which are depicted as bundles of food), and I can't provide it to them. And I'm just standing there going "I've got enough food for a village for a year, and you guys are fighting over a squirrel? Why can't I just give them this food?!" I'd rather they'd had the currency be something other than food, if famine was going to be a narrative element. Just a bit of...I guess it would be ludonarrative dissonance? *shrugs* Broke immersion for me a bit.
5. The gear/charm system. Again, hello there Horizon: Zero Dawn! I can't stand the idea of having like 20 outfits, all with different power sets, and also various charms for different situations. It's incredibly silly to me, to be constantly going through a wardrobe change, based on the moment, and also having to switch out charms accordingly. The fact that the game doesn't let you record sets to quickly switch between (something Odyssey did that was very nice), makes it extra annoying. I'm sneaking along, so I put on my Sneaky Pants, and spend 2 minutes on the menu, changing out my charms to maximize my sneakiness. Then the mission changes to an open conflict, or I fluff the stealth and get detected, so I pause the screen, quickly change out of armor mid combat (while the mongols ogle me I suppose), to my Fighty Pants, and then again switch out the charms to my loud set. I hate this in games. It interrupts the flow of the game so much, and scrolling through 30+ charms for each of the 6 slots, becomes somewhat mind numbing. I hated doing it in H:ZD, hate doing it here. Odyssey made it less annoying with preset armor builds, but it's still mood breaking to change out my clothes mid combat. I literally describe it as changing to my *Insert Name* Pants. Because it happens so much it just because a farce.
6. The skill progression was super quick. Others have commented on this, and they're right. If you are even remotely trying to do the majority of the side missions, you will find yourself maxing out the skills very quickly. Roughly in Act 2 I think, is where I basically bought everything I wanted/needed, and then just spent my new technique points on filling out the other trees. But seeing as I rarely used those things, it was basically just filler. I maxed out my level, and still had a technique point left over? Exactly one point, which I found strange. Again, this is a common issue I've seen with openworld sandboxes, where you eventually have bought all you want, and the rest just really doesn't apply to your style. Odyssey had a slight improvement on this, in that you could invest your extra points into incremental percent increases to your base stats and combats, making it at least still productive.
7. The combat could be a bit loose. I found I'd often be doing some charged strike with Triangle, to attack an enemy and break their guard...but instead Jin does the attack like 5 degrees to the left or right of the target. And the mongol didn't dodge or anything, Jin was just drunk apparently. I don't really understand why this is, because it's obvious the game can "lock on" with the melee attacks, as later in the game, you unlock 2 abilities that do exactly that. When triggered they straight up zip you over to the nearest enemy, and pretty much just Apply Death as the effect. So the game CAN do a lock on system, without actually locking on. Just interpreting that you want to hit this guy, because he's the nearest target in the direction you pointed. But no, sometimes it's REALLY picky about that, and demands precise angle pointing at the target...even when it's literally a 1v1 duel, so who else would I be trying to cut?
8. Day/Night cycle is very short. Again, not unique to GOT, but I've never understood why these cycles have to be like 10 minutes? I mean it's just stupid. Let me have longer day/night cycles damnit! It made for a really goofy mongol base assault, that technically took me 3 days to complete, going by the day/night cycles as I took my time to stealth all of it.
9. Little variation on how to resolve missions. I found one...ONE mission, that the ultimate conclusion to the problem didn't involve "Find Problem, Insert Katana Until Resolved" If you are sneaky enough to steal something back for a person, you can complete it without any deaths. That's pretty much the only time. I get it's a samurai/war game, but some variation would've been nice.
10. The cosmetics. I don't need 300 headbands that are only slightly different, 300 masks, and 300 hats.
Those are the key negatives I have about the game. And despite going into detail about why I didn't like them, for me at least, they weren't any major hindrance to my enjoyment of the game. They would make for brief moments of frustration if I had a cascade failure of little things, but overall, they didn't detract from my enjoyment.
And this damn forum seems to dislike my full post, so I had to cut it in half to make it accept it.
