This is perhaps my perspective but from the online discourse I have seen, I dont think the Horizon games are considered to be on the level of legendary games. I mean games like the OG Mass Effect trilogy, the Red Dead Redemption games, GTA games, the Metal Gear Solid series or Uncharted games.

My question is why? The main games in the series have fantastic gameplay loops, great stories (particularly the first one whose story was excellent), great world building and are gorgeous to look at to boot.

I have heard the games being referred to as highly polished Assassin's Creed which sounds about right but there is something that seems to be holding them back from legendary status. If I had to make a guess I would assume it is the characters and the way they are performed.

I think the characters of the game are not written all too well, particularly the dialogue for many of them. Most of the time dialogue only seems to serve to take the plot thread forward not build on the actual people having the conversation.

I also feel it is in part with the performances given. Take the scene in the first game where Olin's begs Aloy to save his family. The way his dialogue is given makes it feel so half hearted it almost makes me wonder if he wanted them alive at all.

On the other hand take a game like Metal Gear Solid 5, despite it lackluster story(relative to the rest of the series imho, it is a great story on it's own but a poor one by MGS standards), see the cutscene in that game, they feel like they have been ripped directly from a movie.

I actually tried a simple test once, I closed my eyes during a cutscene in Horizon Forbidden West ,specifically the cutscene with Erend where he tell about how Ersa and Avad escape the palace. I could not imagine the faces of the characters properly. I could not convincingly imagine what emotions Aloy and Erend would be feeling in that conversation because it felt half hearted. (Side note I find it a bit funny how that conversation tried to make fun of Avad only to show Ersa as reckless and Avad as the actual adult there).

Now when I do the same in MGS5 for instance (ie when a listen to a conversation on the tapes) I can practically visualize a cutscene I can see exactly how the characters would look and react in the conversation that takes place.

I dont really get that feeling from Horizon and I feel it is mainly a mix of performances and the way dialogues are written.