Still, there is a difference between a day 1 patch fixing a lot of things, vs the game not even installing (e.g. I remember in 2019 when COD NW xbox disc was just a few gigs, and everything needed to be downloaded)
Edit: now I actually read the article, for me this seems like online validation is needed (not a complete online install). When I got Horizon FW a few days earlier, I managed to install and play it without any issues before the release date.
Still, there is a difference between a day 1 patch fixing a lot of things, vs the game not even installing (e.g. I remember in 2019 when COD NW xbox disc was just a few gigs, and everything needed to be downloaded)
Edit: now I actually read the article, for me this seems like online validation is needed (not a complete online install). When I got Horizon FW a few days earlier, I managed to install and play it without any issues before the release date.