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Guerrilla Games have finally shared some delicious-looking gameplay for the highly anticipated Horizon Forbidden West.
On Sony’s latest State of Play, they showed off 14 minutes of eye-melting goodness running on PlayStation 5. It’s a real feast for the eyes. It begins with Aloy and her amazing hair making their way through a dense jungle. Eventually, she stumbles out onto an oceanside settlement. Sandy beaches, deep blue water, and rock spires on the horizon combine to create a unique landscape and show off the power of PlayStation 5. These ruins are the remnants of San Francisco, 1000 years into the future. Aloy then encounters machine-riding raiders. After getting down to business with some nimble fisticuffs she decides to escape their attack.
Aloy then swims through stunning coral reefs and exotic fauna, all while fighting the current as she goes. Once back on dry land she once again encounters the raiders. This time we treated to some stealth action, in Horizon: Zero Dawn stealth combat and clearing camps could easily become tedious. In what we saw of the sequel it looks like Guerrilla Games will remedy this with a whole host of new moves.
New Moves
With the raiders out the picture, she returns once more to the jungle, scrambling up into the canopy for a better view. We then get a glimpse of Aloy’s glider-like Shieldwing, which is more than a little reminiscent of Batman’s gliding in the Arkham Trilogy. After a quick sprint on the back of a hijacked machine, which just so happens to be a robot velociraptor... with chainsaws for teeth. This culminates in a boss fight with a gigantic metal mammoth that even Legolas would struggle with.
Although it was a lovely 14-minute vertical slice of the game there was little time to take everything in. Thankfully, Sony opted to round off its State of Play Livestream by inviting Guerrilla Games to break down the action a little further.
Guerrilla Games in the Spotlight
Story-wise, Horizon Forbidden West sees Aloy dealing with the usual wild machines, whose designs are even more creative than the original. Deadly rebel factions are around to complicate things. And to round everything off, a strange red blight threatens to devastate humanity. Aloy is going to be very busy. Luckily ‘stealth grass’ makes a welcome return, which will help no end.
Aloy also comes armed with a range of new gadgets for her newest adventure. There’s the aforementioned Shieldwing. A Focus Scanner, which can be used to highlight free-climbing spots around the environments.
The Pullcaster, a grapple that can latch onto scenery before quickly retracting, enabling Aloy to rocket across long distances or zip-up walls like a certain PlayStation exclusive web crawler. Then there’s a Diving Mask that lets players stay submerged in water indefinitely.
All in the Combat
Combat has also received several improvements and additions. The spear can be used in close-range combat and grants access to a range of combos as well as a high-damage charge attack.
As if that wasn’t enough Aloy’s slingshot now has adhesive grenades that can temporarily stall machines. She also has access to spikes that can be thrown and explode on impact. She even has smoke bombs to aid a quick escape. The ability to knock weapons off of machines and use those to your advantage also returns... because you can never have enough weapons. All of these delightful toys can be upgraded at workbenches.
Guerrilla stated they will share more details and gameplay closer to Horizon Forbidden West’s launch on PS4 and PS5.