Horizon Forbidden West

Exploration

Like its predecessor, players can freely explore the game world of Forbidden West. The game offers two modes of exploration: Guided mode highlights key items and locations of interest, while Explorer mode has a more minimalistic user interface, requiring the player to reach locations with the help of a compass.^[11] Players will discover campfires in the wild, allowing players to travel to other locations instantaneously.^[12] and visiting shelters enables the player to change the time of day.^[13] The player will meet different non-playable characters (NPCs) and complete side quests for them.^[14] While conversing with other NPCs, the player can sometimes choose from one of three dialogue options, with each representing Aloy's tone and attitude towards a scenario or a character, though they will not affect the game's narrative.^[15] The player can identify locations of interest by overriding a Tallneck (a giraffe-like machine).^[16] They can also venture into underground dungeons, which are a series of platforming challenges culminating in a challenging fight against a machine.^[17] There are a large assortment of side activities the player can complete in Forbidden West, including finding remnants of the old civilization,^[18][19] clearing rebel camps and outposts,^[20] completing salvage contracts and timed hunting challenges,^[21][22] competing in fight pits against humans or machines,^[21] and participating in races riding overridden machines. At major settlements, the player can also play an in-game board game named "Machine Strike".^[23]

Aloy's Focus allows her to highlight climbable surfaces.^[5] As the player progresses, they will unlock additional tools allowing her to pull down obstacles and grapple onto difficult-to-reach areas.^[24] She will also unlock a diving mask that enables underwater exploration, and a glider that allows her to glide through the air.^[23] Players can tame certain machines and use them as mounts to travel great distances or turn them against other machines, with the player being able to adjust the aggressiveness of their artificial intelligence.^[17] As the player explores the world, they will also collect resources, such as medicinal berries to restore Aloy's health and other crafting components necessary for upgrading Aloy's weapons and outfits at workbenches.^[25][26] Both weapons and outfits are divided into different levels of rarity, with the rarer weapons providing stronger perks.^[27] Ingredients can also be brought to a village chef, who will cook a meal for Aloy to briefly improve her combat efficiency.^[12] While Aloy can only carry a limited amount of items, extra items collected in the wilds will be directly transferred to a cache found in major outposts or settlements. Accessing the cache allows Aloy to restock necessary items.^[5]

Gameplay design

The goal for Guerrilla for the sequel was to retain the core qualities of the original game. As with the original game, the team identified three main pillars for development: having strong and memorable characters, exploration emphasizing the majesty of nature and ancient ruins, and strategic combat.^[33] The team wanted to ensure that "there is always a mystery" for Aloy to discover, and "always more for her to explore".^[34] As a result, underwater and aerial exploration were added to the game, though the development of both were noted to be challenging from a technical perspective.^[35] Quest designer Samantha Schoonen described underwater exploration as a "natural extension to traverse long-lost unknown places", and the team intentionally avoided the oppressive tone typically found in these levels in other video games and instead focused on agile traversal and stealth gameplay.^[36] The gameplay was designed to promote the player's choices. For instance, new tools were introduced to aid transversal and exploration as well as provide multiple ways to solve environmental puzzles; various playstyles were supported, enabling players to choose how they engage with enemies and switch between playstyles at will;^[37] and skill trees were also overhauled completely.^[10] The game's underground dungeons (known in-game as Cauldrons) had more varied design to upset the player's expectations. Some cauldrons were also tied to larger and more extensive set pieces.^[38]

The gameplay team identified Aloy as a "smart, fast, agile, precise, and resourceful" character and had to translate these personal qualities into gameplay mechanics. Melee and ranged combat were more interweaved together, with special abilities allowing players to quickly change from melee to ranged combat.^[37] The team introduced more variety to human enemies, such as armored enemies; their artificial intelligence was also designed to be more aggressive.^[34] Whereas in Zero Dawn, human and machine enemies were two disparate groups, Forbidden West integrates the two together by having Aloy fight against human enemies commandeering machines.^[37] A number of new machines were introduced in Forbidden West, including the Sunwing (inspired by flying reptiles and primitive birds) and the Tremortusk (inspired by mammoths and war elephants). Zero Dawn establishes the machines in the game as caretakers of the world, and the team programmed each machine type to exhibit behaviors that would match their roles in an ecosystem.^[39] Additional textures were added to each machine so the player could better identify their weak points visually, and more audio cues were introduced to better signal their actions to the player.^[40] Machine hunting is more vital in Forbidden West, as it was made a more integral part of crafting.^[41]

The world in Forbidden West is slightly larger than that in Zero Dawn, though the studio focused on increasing its density to ensure that it was filled with content.^[34] NPCs encountered in side quests may reappear as the player progresses further, and completing side quests are rewarded with better gameplay perks and narrative payoffs, as some of them are tied to the overarching narrative.^[4] After evaluating player feedback on Zero Dawn, the team decided to make each settlement more dynamic with improved animations and better NPC AI patterns and schedules.^[4] An improved crowd system was introduced, with a more diverse range of audio, so that each area within a settlement would sound different.^[41] As Aloy heads west, she encounters members of different tribes. According to the team, the Oseram are "social and historically patriarchal", the Utaru are "agrarian" and more laid-back in nature, while the Tenakth are more militant and combat-focused. The team created various animations and outfits distinct to each tribe, highlighting the differences in their ways of life.^[4] This also allowed the player to identify tribe members from afar visually and enabled them to get a bearing of where they are in the world.^[42]

Story and characters

Carrie-Anne Moss

Angela Bassett

Moss and Bassett are newcomers to the franchise, providing voice work for Far Zenith member Tilda and rebel leader Regalla, respectively.^[28]

Aloy returned as the game's protagonist. In Forbidden West, she had to deal with another catastrophic extinction-level event, live up to the legacy of Elizebeth Sobeck, an esteemed scientist whom she was a clone of (as depicted in Zero Dawn),^[43] and prove herself again in a foreign land.^[44] Writer Benjamin McCaw added that the overwhelming amount of pressure Aloy had to face was a significant part of her character arc.^[45] Ashly Burch returned to provide voice and motion capture for Aloy, along with Lance Reddick as Sylens, John Hopkins as Erend, and John Macmillan as Varl. Newcomers include Alison Jaye as Alva, Noshir Dalal as Kotallo, Carrie-Anne Moss as Tilda, and Angela Bassett as Regalla.^[28] Guerrilla invested more resources into creating the game's cinematics. Advanced motion capture tools allowed the team to record dynamic movement and character expressions more extensively, enabling the team to create character-centric scenes across main quests and side objectives, though travel restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic forced the team to recruit local talents in Amsterdam to substitute certain cast members.^[46]

According to McCaw, Aloy's dynamics with other characters were difficult to write, as her unique upbringing and aspiration meant that she often pushed away her friends as she felt she had to accomplish the mission alone. Aloy had to learn to integrate into society and accept help, ultimately understanding that instead of saving the world in the abstract, it was the people in the world who are worth saving. The team spent more time developing character-driven side quests in order to deepen Aloy's relationships with them.^[43] Varl was killed in the game, as the team felt that he was the most important character in Aloy's journey and that his death created an emotional low point for the narrative.^[47] Writing Aloy’s relationship with Beta was the most challenging part of the script. As both are clones of Elisabet Sobeck, the team described their contrasting ways of handling the immense pressure and responsibility thrust upon them as the "heart and soul" of the narrative.^[48][43] According to the game's writer, Beta served as a dark reflection of Aloy and embodied "all of Aloy's conflicts about wanting to be like Elisabet, wanting to connect to others, but feeling isolated."^[43] Beta was initially written to be an "optimistic" character, though her personalty was changed to that of "a sullen teenager" in order to fit the story.^[47]

Far Zeniths were an important part of the story, and their role was envisioned by the team during the development of Zero Dawn.^[49] They were chosen as the game's main enemies as the team felt that the story needed to have a different direction when compared with that of Zero Dawn.^[47] Having long achieved self preservation, Far Zeniths were egotistical and had little regard for the rest of human life.^[49] Tilda, one of the surviving members of the Far Zenith, was created as a "Dutch technologist, authentication expert, and art collector", and the team collaborated with the Rijksmuseum to select 10 art pieces and recreate them inside Tilda's mansion in the game.^[50] Ted Faro, the billionaire who doomed the world in Zero Dawn, also returned in Forbidden West. According to McCaw, he has become a "human cancer, a massive cancerous growth" due to the unnatural techniques used to extend his lifespan. The team made an intentional decision not to show Faro's face because Forbidden West was not intended to be a horror game, and the team felt that by only showing his silhouette, it left room for players to imagine what he would have looked like, making the encounter more frightening.^[51] As with the previous game, Sylens and Aloy shared an "adversarial" relationship, but the two learn to collaborate despite their mutual disdain for each other.^[52]

Technology

Horizon Forbidden West was the first video game by Guerrilla since Shellshock: Nam '67 (2004) to not be released exclusively for a single console. The studio focused on pushing the game's visuals for the PlayStation 5 during the first half of the game's development, then pivoted to work on the PlayStation 4 version to ensure there would not be significant disparity. The goal for the studio was to ensure that Forbidden West was one of the best-looking PlayStation 4 games while ensuring that the PlayStation 5 version would look even better with easily observable differences. Aerial exploration was nearly scrapped as the team felt that the PlayStation 4 version could not support this feature.^[33] The PlayStation 5's increased processing power, custom solid-state drive storage, Tempest Engine, and DualSense controller provide the game with advanced haptic feedback, 3D spatial audio, enhanced lighting, special water rendering, improved visual effects, and reduced loading times.^[53][54][55] This version has an optional "performance mode" at 60 frames per second with a lower base resolution^[56] and an updated version of the Decima engine supporting high dynamic range.^[57]

Critical reception

Horizon Forbidden West received "generally favorable" reviews upon release, according to review aggregator website Metacritic.^[86][88] Critics generally agreed that it was a bigger and more improved experience when compared with its predecessor.^[97]

Sam Loveridge from GamesRadar remarked that the game's focus on developing its characters is an improvement over its predecessor. He praised the game's diverse cast of characters and wrote that each of them has a distinct personality and backstory. He also liked the improved animations for making characters appear more lifelike and, therefore, helping players connect with them more.^[91] While critics praised Aloy as a character and found her struggles to be compelling and relatable,^[91][95] Hornshaw felt that she was often brooding and generally not as interesting as the surrounding cast,^[90] and Matt Minotti from VentureBeat remarked that Aloy's reluctance to accept help during the game's beginning was "illogically extreme" sometimes.^[98] Melindy Hetfield, writing for Eurogamer, described Aloy's character as a disappointment and went on to describe her as "obnoxious" and "unbearable."^[7] Some critics remarked that Aloy often ceaselessly provided hints to players about the solution to environmental puzzles,^[93][7] with Hetfield concluding that it robbed players of all agency to explore and chart their own course.^[7]

Simon Cardy from IGN praised the use of cinematics to convey important parts of the story. He remarked that despite an uneven start, it was able to pick up its pace and added that the story was at its best when it was about the cast's personal dramas and the social and political conflicts surrounding the tribes.^[92] He also compared the side quests favorably to those of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, as players are often rewarded with standalone but satisfying narratives by completing them.^[92] Several reviewers remarked that newcomers to the franchise may not be fully engaged in the game's narrative due to its constant callbacks to the events depicted in the first game.^[92][99] Dom Peppiatt from VG247 compared the game's structure to Mass Effect and wrote that "the flirtations with BioWare-style story ideas shows just how much of a future this series has."^[96] The game's cast performance and its motion capture technology were also praised by Hornshaw for enhancing the game's storytelling.^[90] The direction of the story received some criticism from reviewers.^[94] Hetfield wrote that the story went "fully off the rails into wild, nonsensical sci-fi" and criticized the ending and its antagonists.^[7] Ben Rayner from Digital Spy, likewise, felt that Forbidden West's pivot to "hard sci-fi" was a baffling choice that missed the point of the franchise.^[100]

The game's world received praise from critics. Kimberly Wallace from Game Informer enjoyed the visual design of various locales, and praised the world for evoking a "constant sense of discovery".^[91] The underwater location set in Las Vegas was singled out by some reviewers as one of the game's best locations.^[89][101] Simon Cardy from IGN praised the settlements for how lively they were and remarked that each tribe had their own unique characteristics.^[92] Phil Hornshaw, writing for GameSpot, wrote that the open-world activities in the game were diverse and well worth the player's time.^[90] Some critics were unimpressed by the game's lack of ambition.^[90] James Tucker from NME wrote that Forbidden West would have been a fairly middling open-world game if it were not elevated by its narrative.^[93] Writing for Vice, Matthew Gault noted that it was not a revolutionary experience as it merely repeated "what open world games have been doing for years".^[102] Critics had mixed opinions on the game's climbing mechanics, which were found to be inconsistent.^{[91][92][93][94]} The game's visuals received critical acclaim from critics, with Wallace describing the game as a "technical marvel"^[89] and Lavoy describing the visuals as "breathtaking".^[95]

The gameplay received generally positive reviews. Wallace described combat as "adrenaline-pumping" and appreciated the sequel's expanded destructibility and more elaborate setpieces. While she liked the quality-of-life improvements Forbidden West introduced, she was unimpressed by the progression system for only offering unexciting upgrades.^[89] Bill Lavoy from Shacknews, however, called gameplay the game's greatest strength, praising its new gameplay additions and the diverse skill tree options.^[95] Loveridge wrote that taking down large machines was always challenging but rewarding, and she liked the more varied design of its side activities, including Tallnecks and Cauldrons.^[91] Cardy praised the enemy variety and noted that challenging combat prompted players to make full use of Aloy's arsenal and skills.^[92] Critics generally liked how the game gave players more options in combat and exploration when compared with Zero Dawn,^[92][89] though some remarked that the new additions could be overwhelming and that the game struggled to introduce these mechanics to players.^[91][103][7]

Sales

In the United Kingdom, Horizon Forbidden West was the best-selling game during the week of release and became the second biggest launch for a PlayStation 5 game at the time, behind only Spider-Man: Miles Morales (2020).^[104] By the end of 2022, the game had sold over 530,000 units in the UK.^[105] It went on to become the fourth best-selling physical video game in the UK.^[106] In the US, it was the second-best-selling video game in February 2022, only behind Elden Ring.^[107] It went on to become the ninth-best-selling game of 2022 in the US.^[108]

In Japan, the PlayStation 4 version was the third best-selling retail game during its first week of release, with over 48,000 physical units being sold. The PlayStation 5 version sold about 43,000 physical units throughout the same week, making it the fourth best-selling retail game of the week in the country.^[109] By 26 March 2023, the game had sold over 155,000 units in Japan.^[110] In Germany, the game sold over 200,000 units during its launch month.^[111]

In May 2023, Sony announced that the game had sold over 8.4 million units by 16 April 2023.^[112] Following the game's launch on Windows, it became the publisher's sixth biggest launch on Steam,^[113] though it was unable to surpass the concurrent player peak of Zero Dawn.^[114]

Accolades