Na kar Chandoo, I am probably one of the biggest fans of HZD on this forum but this game is more about combat than world building.
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TheGoldenTouch, I played the game on the highest difficulty at launch ( I think it was very hard) and honestly for me it was the perfect mix. I usually do not play games on higher difficulty but this was one game that i loved playing on the hardest mode. Once the NG+ mode came out, i tried the ULTRA difficulty but it was a bit too hard for me so i would recommend Very Hard or Hard for this game. Also forget that lousy melee combat and instead try to use the ranged combat every time to enjoy the game at its best.