Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores
2023 expansion pack
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Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is a 2023 expansion pack for the 2022 action role-playing video game Horizon Forbidden West, developed by Guerrilla Games and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Serving as a direct epilogue to the main campaign, the expansion is set in a post-apocalyptic volcanic archipelago constructed from the seismically fractured ruins of Los Angeles. The narrative follows the hunter Aloy as she travels south to pursue Walter Londra, a rogue member of the highly advanced Far Zenith faction, before he can execute a disastrous plan to flee the planet. Along the way, she allies with Seyka, an adept marine from the seafaring Quen tribe.
| Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores | |
|---|---|
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| Developer | Guerrilla Games |
| Publisher | Sony Interactive Entertainment |
| Director | Mathijs de Jonge |
| Producer | Joel Eschler |
| Programmer | Michiel van der Leeuw |
| Artists |
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| Writer | Annie Kitain |
| Composers |
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| Engine | Decima |
| Platforms | |
| Release |
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| Genre | Action role-playing |
| Mode | Single-player |
Accessible exclusively to players who have completed the main campaign, the expansion introduces an explorable map roughly one-third the size of the base game. It raises the level cap to 60 and implements a specialised economy using a rare crystalline resource called Brimshine to acquire and upgrade high-tier equipment. The flooded archipelago environment heavily emphasises water-based and aerial exploration, introducing a motorised skiff, dynamic thermal geysers for gliding, and the Waterwing, a flying machine that can be used as a mount capable of seamlessly diving underwater. The player gains access to new combat abilities, alongside new weaponry like the highly accurate Specter Gauntlet. The campaign places a greater emphasis on cooperative encounters, frequently pairing Aloy with Seyka to assist in combat and puzzle-solving.
Developed as a direct epilogue to the main game, Burning Shores's narrative was designed to shift the focus toward Aloy's emotional growth and her ability to open up to others. To realise the dense city environments, high-speed aerial traversal, and highly detailed voxel-based cloud formations, Guerrilla significantly enhanced the proprietary Decima engine to exclusively leverage the hardware capabilities of the PlayStation 5. Burning Shores was released as downloadable content for the PlayStation 5 on 19 April 2023. It was later ported, along with the base game, to Windows by Nixxes Software on 21 March 2024 as part of the Horizon Forbidden West Complete Edition. The expansion received generally favourable reviews from critics, who praised its visual presentation, technical achievements, and the evolving dynamic between Aloy and Seyka. However, opinions were more divided on the storyline of its primary antagonist and the mechanical execution of the final boss encounter against a reanimated Horus war machine. The expansion was also recognised for its authentic representation, highlighting an optional, player-determined same-sex romance that earned it a nomination at the 35th GLAAD Media Awards.
Gameplay
Building upon the action role-playing mechanics of Horizon Forbidden West (2022), Burning Shores adds a substantial new region that is accessible only to players who have completed the base game's main campaign.[1] The expansion is set in a volcanic archipelago constructed from the seismically fractured ruins of Los Angeles, introducing an explorable map roughly one-third the size of the base game that provides around eight to ten hours of new gameplay.[2][3] This flooded landscape heavily emphasises water-based traversal, introducing a motorised boat known as a skiff alongside dynamic traversal mechanics, such as thermal geysers that allow Aloy to use her glider to rapidly launch into the air.[1][4] To improve accessibility, Guerrilla released a patch alongside the expansion introducing a thalassophobia mode to assist players with a fear of deep water.[5] The feature alters underwater environments by illuminating the seabed with a pink pulse and increasing ambient visibility, which prevents enemies from appearing suddenly.[6][7] It also disables the risk of drowning, allowing Aloy to remain submerged indefinitely.[6]
Combat and progression mechanics are expanded through an increased level cap of 60 and the introduction of new abilities within Aloy's skill trees. These additions include new Valor Surges, healing smoke bombs, and the "Machine Grapple Strike", an acrobatic ability allowing Aloy to use her pullcaster to launch towards a downed enemy for a critical blow.[3] New high-tier legendary weapons, armour, coils, and weaves are introduced alongside the Specter Gauntlet, a highly accurate Far Zenith weapon.[4] The expansion also reduces the material requirements for upgrading legendary tier equipment, significantly lessening the grind for rare machine components compared to the base game.[8] The acquisition and upgrading of this new arsenal relies on "Brimshine", a rare yellow crystalline resource scattered throughout the archipelago that functions as a new currency.[9] During the main campaign, there is a greater emphasis on cooperative encounters; Aloy is frequently joined by Seyka, an allied artificial intelligence companion programmed to tactically assist in combat by distracting and damaging enemy machines. The duo also engage in cooperative puzzle-solving, such as operating a siege weapon to fire metal handholds into walls to create makeshift climbing paths.[4][10]
Burning Shores introduces four new machine types: the Waterwing, the hostile Bilegut and Stingspawn, and the colossal Horus boss. The Waterwing can be used as a mount and is a flying machine similar to the base game's Sunwing, but with the added ability to seamlessly dive beneath the water's surface to increase the speed of underwater navigation.[4] The Bilegut is an acid-spewing mechanical toad, while the Stingspawn are small, flying insect-like machines that swarm in groups.[1][4] The expansion's climax features a multi-stage boss fight against a fully active Horus "Metal Devil", an insectoid war machine that appeared only as dormant scenery previously. Rather than relying solely on standard combat, the encounter functions as a large-scale set piece requiring environmental navigation and platforming to dismantle the machine.[11] Alongside the main campaign, the expansion introduces new optional activities, including hostile outposts populated by Quen Devotees, a puzzle-focused Relic Ruin, and a new Cauldron that grants the ability to override the Bilegut.[12][13] The player can also find new categories of collectibles that require exploring the environment and solving puzzles,[14] such as "Aerial Captures" traced through the sky,[15] Delvers' Trinkets,[16] and Pangea Figurines.[17]
Synopsis
Setting
Burning Shores is set in a treacherous volcanic archipelago of the same name, formed from the submerged and seismically fractured ruins of Los Angeles. The region is characterised by intense volcanic activity, flowing lava, and a tropical climate. It is predominantly occupied by a splinter group of the seafaring Quen tribe, who were shipwrecked in the region after a catastrophic storm separated them from their main fleet. The narrative is set immediately after the conclusion of the base game, with Aloy (Ashly Burch) seeking to eliminate the final surviving member of the antagonistic Far Zenith organisation before he can enact his own plans to escape the planet.
Plot
Following the defeat of the Far Zeniths, Sylens (Lance Reddick) informs Aloy that a thirteenth member of the group, aerospace magnate Walter Londra (Sam Witwer), survived the assault and fled south to the Burning Shores. Aloy travels to the archipelago to track him down, but her flying machine is shot out of the sky by an active anti-air tower. Grounded, she encounters Seyka (Kylie Liya Page), an adept marine from the Quen tribe. Seyka guides Aloy to her settlement, Fleet's End, explaining that her people have been stranded since a catastrophic storm separated them from their main expedition. The two agree to work together to disable the tower and locate a missing Quen scouting party. Their search is sanctioned by Admiral Gerrit (Mark Noble) because one of the missing crew members is Seyka's sister, Kina (Xanthe Huynh), who serves as the fleet's last remaining navigator.
Their investigation leads them to Londra's former headquarters at Starlight Rise (Griffith Observatory). They discover that Londra is building a rocket to flee Earth and the impending arrival of the world-destroying entity Nemesis, salvaging experimental nuclear boosters that will inevitably irradiate the entire archipelago upon launch. Following his trail to a crumbling dinosaur theme park in Hollywood, they learn Londra has used his charismatic Old World persona alongside ancient brainwashing technology, known as the Mutiny Suppression Protocol, to manipulate the missing Quen into worshipping him as a living god. He intends to take these loyal followers, particularly the navigator Kina, with him to found a new colony as a subservient workforce.
Aloy and Seyka infiltrate Londra's Ascension Hall, where they encounter Nova (Cia Court), Londra's disgruntled artificial intelligence (AI). Weary of Londra's mistreatment, Nova disables the compound's security measures in exchange for Aloy deleting her code. With the defences down, the duo defeats Londra's loyalist enforcer, Zeth (Dylan Saunders), and rescues the captive Quen. Enraged, Londra retreats to his bunker beneath the Hollywood Sign and reactivates a massive Old World Horus "Metal Devil" war machine to eradicate them. Aloy and Seyka engage the mobile Horus in a prolonged battle along the coast. When the massive machine begins to overheat, Aloy sabotages its cooling system, forcing it to retreat into the sea. She then breaches its hull and kills Londra, permanently deactivating the Horus. Afterwards, Aloy helps the Quen at Fleet's End make contact with Alva (Alison Jaye) to coordinate the reunification of their fleets. Aloy has the opportunity to start a romantic relationship with Seyka before parting ways. Aloy returns to her base and meets with Sylens, who has decrypted the data from Londra's Focus. The data contains a list of twenty-first-century companies that were developing experimental weaponry that may be key to defeating Nemesis.
Development
Concept and characters
Unlike the previous game's expansion, The Frozen Wilds, the developers designed Burning Shores to act as a direct epilogue to the main campaign rather than an optional side story.[3][14] Narrative director Ben McCaw stated that the team had always envisioned Los Angeles as the setting for an expansion, having briefly considered including the location in the base game. Lead writer Annie Kitain explained that the visual of a dormant Horus perched over the Hollywood Sign was an early piece of concept art that the team felt they had to include in the final game.[18] Setting the expansion after the main campaign allowed the team to continue Aloy's character arc, shifting her from bearing the burden of saving the world alone to exploring her emotions and opening up to others.[10][18] McCaw explained this was a deliberate shift in the studio's DLC strategy; whereas Aloy did not experience significant personal growth during The Frozen Wilds, the developers viewed Burning Shores as an opportunity to push her character forward and serve as a developmental "swan song" for the Forbidden West production cycle.[19] Kitain added that the narrative heavily focuses on the Quen tribe, whose limited Old World technology caused them to misinterpret ancient data and revere 21st-century corporate executives as a pantheon of gods.[10]
The character of Seyka was designed to be an equal match for Aloy; her shared use of a Focus device was intended to act as a reflection of Aloy's own past and development.[10][18] The narrative culminates in an optional dialogue choice where the player determines whether Aloy reciprocates Seyka's romantic feelings. Kitain and McCaw explained that regardless of the player's choice, Aloy's underlying feelings for Seyka remain canon. The decision simply reflects her ongoing struggles with social intimacy, her isolated upbringing, and her readiness for a relationship amidst the immense weight of her mission.[18] Seyka is portrayed by Kylie Liya Page in her video game motion capture debut, while the antagonist, Walter Londra, is voiced by Sam Witwer.[20][21] Following the death of Lance Reddick in March 2023, who provided the voice and likeness for Sylens, an in-game memorial was added in a post-launch update.[22]
Technology and design
Developed exclusively for the PlayStation 5, the expansion features significant technical enhancements to the proprietary Decima engine. Game director Mathijs de Jonge said that dropping previous-generation hardware constraints allowed the team to "charge forward" with the dense Los Angeles cityscape. The console's enhanced processing power and solid-state drive (SSD) permitted highly detailed environments that render smoothly even at high flying speeds, and enabled developers to keep a specialised, high-quality lighting setup on Aloy active during all standard gameplay, a feature previously restricted exclusively to cinematic cutscenes.[23] This fast streaming technology also allowed settlements like Fleet's End to showcase a massive step up in geometric density, cramming high-poly meshes into the frame at a scale unseen in the base game's towns. Furthermore, Guerrilla implemented a voxel-based cloud rendering system that generates highly detailed, physicalised 3D volumetric cloud formations. The transition to this advanced simulation allowed for realistic lighting interactions, such as water vapour occluding sunlight and light penetrating ragged cloud edges with a minimal impact on frame time.[24] Principal FX artist Andrew Schneider and tech programmer Nathan Vos expanded on previous cloud systems so players could seamlessly fly through "Frankencloudscapes", large formations that act as both background elements and explorable environments featuring accurate white-out conditions and visibility changes.[25] To render these clouds, volumetric data was heavily compressed for faster memory access, and low-level code optimisations specifically tailored to the console were implemented to handle the immense lighting calculations at high frame rates.[23]
The terrain was deliberately sculpted to be highly vertical, featuring roiling seas nestled between mountainous borders to make the environment more readable and visually striking from a distance during flight, contrasting with the flatter terrain of the base game.[24] Concept artist Adriaan Stam designed the region's Quen settlements to reflect the tribe's strict hierarchy and reliance on Old World data, using salvaged shipwrecks seamlessly integrated into the ruined Los Angeles geography.[26] The final boss encounter against the Horus became the most complex machine the studio had ever developed. Senior creature animator David Vince detailed that it featured over a thousand more joints than the base game's most complex machine, the Slitherfang.[11] Animating the colossal entity created a severe processing bottleneck; to ensure the sequence remained performant, the developers implemented extensive job system optimisations to efficiently distribute the workload across the console's CPU.[27] Due to the machine being unnaturally reanimated after a millennium, its animations were designed to evoke a "zombie" theme. Furthermore, the studio developed entirely new climbing technology to ensure Aloy's character model aligned naturally with the machine's constantly moving legs. Principal game designer Arne Oehme explained the multi-stage encounter was deliberately structured to test all of Aloy's core mechanics while emphasising the machine's massive scale before entering close-quarters combat.[11]
Audio and release
For the expansion's audio, PlayStation Studios Senior Foley Artist Joanna Fang and the sound team focused on diegetic sound design, breaking down the Foley work into fundamental, granular sounds to increase player immersion and give weight to the new volcanic environments and character movements.[28] The expansion's original score was a collaborative effort, with returning composers Joris de Man, Niels van der Leest, and the duo The Flight joined by Oleksa Lozowchuk to build out the soundscape. Lozowchuk composed specific encounter tracks such as "Steel Snare" and "Titan's Wake," featuring guest vocals by Melissa R. Kaplan, while vocalist Julie Elven returned to provide vocals for atmospheric tracks like "To the Burning Shores" and "The Idea of Home".[29][30] Burning Shores was announced at The Game Awards 2022 and released on 19 April 2023 only for the PlayStation 5.[31] Sony bundled the main game with the Burning Shores and re-released them for PlayStation 5 on 6 October 2023 as Horizon Forbidden West Complete Edition.[32] The Complete Edition was later ported to Windows by Nixxes Software, and released on 21 March 2024.[33]
Reception
Critical response
| Aggregator | Score |
|---|---|
| Metacritic | 81/100[34] |
| OpenCritic | 88% recommend[35] |
| Publication | Score |
|---|---|
| Game Informer | 8/10[4] |
| GameSpot | 7/10[3] |
| IGN | 8/10[1] |
| Push Square | 8/10[9] |
| RPGFan | 85/100[36] |
| Video Games Chronicle | 4/5[21] |
| Hardcore Gamer | 4/5[37] |
| Inverse | 8/10[38] |
Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores received "generally favourable" reception according to the review aggregator website Metacritic,[34] and according to OpenCritic, 88% of critics recommended the expansion.[35] Critics highlighted the narrative focus and the introduction of Seyka, stating that the condensed format benefited the storytelling compared to the base game.[21][39] Reviewers described the evolving dynamic between Aloy and Seyka as a genuine addition that provided a necessary emotional core, calling it a meaningful expansion of the franchise's overarching narrative.[4][14] However, the overarching plot concerning the primary antagonist, Walter Londra, was met with mixed reactions. While some reviewers described his charismatic persona as entertaining, others argued his motivations were clichéd and the storyline predictable;[36][40] The A.V. Club's William Hughes criticized the narrative as "Horizon-by-numbers", arguing it relied heavily on predictable franchise tropes.[41]
The transition to PlayStation 5-exclusive hardware drew attention for its technical achievements.[9][24][36][42] Digital Foundry's Oliver Mackenzie called the expansion a visual showcase, specifically highlighting the enhanced geometric density and the voxel-based cloud rendering technology.[24] Reviewers similarly emphasised the world-building and visual presentation, describing the Los Angeles archipelago as an impressive environment to explore.[9][36][42] Eurogamer's Vikki Blake wrote that the transformation of the ruined city into a sun-soaked oasis provided opportunities for the game's photo mode.[40]
Regarding combat and exploration, reviewers drew attention to the island topography for creating contained, action-filled arenas. Critics responded positively to the design of the new machines, such as the Bilegut, and the integration of environmental hazards like thermal geysers into tactical combat.[1][36] Despite the positive response to these additions, several reviewers argued that the gameplay suffered from returning issues and underutilised features. They cited the persistence of mechanical frustrations from the base game, such as excessive puzzle hand-holding, irregular climbing mechanics, and errand-like quest design.[4][40][41] Critics also wrote that certain areas of the map felt empty due to a relative lack of side content, and described the aerial exploration as sluggish.[9][38][36]
The climax of the expansion was a frequent focal point of critiques. Reviewers highlighted the massive scale and scope of the multi-stage final boss encounter against the awakened Horus.[3][36] GameSpot's Steve Watts described the encounter as a graphical and mechanical showpiece, writing that its grandiose set-piece design made the ending of the base game feel humble by comparison.[3] Conversely, critics argued the sequence abandoned the franchise's core combat loop in favour of spectacle.[1][40] Highlighting this, Kevin Dunsmore of Hardcore Gamer called the fight a "fantastic spectacle and engineering feat" but felt it ultimately fell flat due to a lack of "imagination and emergent gameplay".[37]
Following its release, the expansion was subjected to a coordinated review bombing campaign on Metacritic by users objecting to the inclusion of LGBTQ+ themes, specifically the optional same-sex kiss between Aloy and Seyka.[43] In response, Metacritic issued a statement condemning the "abusive and disrespectful" user reviews and promised to implement stricter moderation tools.[44] The LGBTQ+ media advocacy group GLAAD responded positively to the expansion for explicitly confirming Aloy's queer identity, calling the romance an important milestone for authentic representation in blockbuster gaming.[45]
Accolades
Burning Shores was nominated for the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Video Game at the 35th GLAAD Media Awards.[46] At the 2024 Game Developers Choice Awards, it received honorable mentions for Best Narrative, Best Technology, and the Social Impact Award.[47] The expansion was also nominated for the NYC GWB Award for Best DLC at the 2024 New York Game Awards.[48]
