Is this going to be like Halo 5 in that you have to be a story expert to get what’s going on? I literally do not remember anything of what you said, and I played the game four times through.

Nope. She is mentioned a few times in TLoU (if you check your pack during "Winter", you can even read a letter from her). You don't really know much about her beyond Marlene's recordings in the Hospital, so don't worry.

Okay cool. I generally don’t even listen to audio logs.

Please tell me you're listening to the audio logs and other lore stuff in H:ZD...?

Nope. Pausing to listen to logs completely kills the flow of the game. I’ll play them all after I finish.

You are soooooo wrong.

The flow of this game is so perfect because it ebbs and flows naturally - giving you time to take in the world and find out how it came to be -- NOT about running from one quest to the next. If you're skipping logs, then you are the one ruining the flow of the game!

I can't imagine what the experience would have been like if I didn't take the time to find audio logs and holograms on outcroppings and cliffs that revealed things like the Air Force Academy, for example.

If you could play them while traveling from place to place you’d have a point. I care less about how the world came to be while playing and more about what I am going to do next. Backstory can be taken in whenever.

You are soooooo wrong.

The flow of this game is so perfect because it ebbs and flows naturally - giving you time to take in the world and find out how it came to be -- NOT about running from one quest to the next. If you're skipping logs, then you are the one ruining the flow of the game!

i remember how... weird I felt after visiting Maker's End, The Grave Horde, the Zero Dawn Facility, and GAIA Prime. The stories told at each of those places were pretty much the point of even going there. My last playthrough, I tore through each area in about 10 or 15 minutes, skipping all of the audio and text logs, and while the story tells you the "why" of each area, you don't really pick up on the "who" "how" or "what it meant to each person".

Especially when you first walk into the Grave Hoard, and you later learn what it all really meant, and what it was all for...

Sure, it can be annoying that all of the logs are dumped into a single room at times, but I'd rather have that, where you can take it all in at once and piece together the gaps, rather than running into a piece of the story here, and finding part 2 long after you've forgotten part 1 (the Banuk figures did this, but they all told a single specific/contained story, rather than pieces of a bunch of different stories that you'd have to filter through).

The story of the Zero Dawn team is just as important as Aloy's quest (the game even makes it the very first thing that you start getting info on when you first control Aloy as a child), and missing out on it just because it's told through audiologs is a huge shame.

I can't imagine what the experience would have been like if I didn't take the time to find audio logs and holograms on outcroppings and cliffs that revealed things like the Air Force Academy, for example.

The viewpoints are really cool on several levels. They serve to show famous landmarks and such, but the narration and text that further elaborates on the rocky relationship that the narrator had with his and his mom and stepdad is something that you wouldn't really expect to see in a game like this.

Even the metal flowers can get to you when you realize what they are, and the fact that they're trying to say something...

The lore and stuff in that game is great, even if it wasn't quite presented in the best way (but hey, at least you don't have to venture outside of the game to get it, and you can always access it again once you've found it...).

THIS!!!:

...I wouldn't watch just the actions scenes of a great movie then go back and watch the slower dialogue portions, for instance!

At the very least, skipping logs especially in important set piece locations is arguably akin to ignoring the intended direction and editing of the game...

It's especially surprising to me that Cody (as a professional movie editor) doesn't realize that this is exactly what he's doing by skipping things -- especially in the bunkers and other relics of the past.

There is a difference between a finely crafted film with calm moments, and a game with a really clunky storytelling device.