When Guerrilla Games revealed that Horizon Forbidden West would have underwater gameplay, I was not excited. I was in the minority with this feeling, but I have a ridiculous, lifelong fear of large things in deep bodies of water, and games in these settings genuinely freak me out. I’m still recovering from the shark scene in Batman Arkham Asylum.
However, Forbidden West has won me over, thalassophobia and all. The underwater environments are terrifying and filled with gigantic robot monsters, but they’re also beautiful and rich, inviting Aloy to explore new layers of her world. From the submerged ruins of Las Vegas to a volcanic hot spring buried under a mountain, swimming is shockingly one of my favorite activities in Forbidden West. That, and overriding Tallnecks.
Forbidden West takes place right after the events of Horizon Zero Dawn, and Aloy is once again on a quest to save the world. She has to restore GAIA, a planet-wide AI system that will rid the lands of a devastating disease, and also investigate waves of murderous machines that are appearing across the continent. She has a Focus, which allows her to scan enemies and environments for information, unlocking the secrets of past civilizations.
Aloy travels to the southwest and west coast of the former United States, crossing snowy mountaintops and sand dunes dotted with Joshua trees before arriving at the ruins of the Golden Gate Bridge. Here, it has to be said: Forbidden West is gorgeous. I played on PlayStation 5, and some of the landscapes in the game left me breathless. There’s something special about sunsets in the southwest; they burn brilliant reds and purples in the thin desert air, and Forbidden West captures this essence beautifully. I should note that the game’s Photo Mode tends to blow out nighttime scenes, so it’s harder to save those moments as they appear during play.
As Aloy heads west, hostile tribes and violent machines regularly appear in her path, providing ample opportunities to level up, test new skills, collect special valuables and override some robots to make them rideable — yes, even the flying Sunwing that's heavily featured in the game's marketing.
My personal favorite mount is the Bristleback: It’s a big warthog-like machine with a plump booty and the ability to harvest metal shards as it waits for Aloy to finish a mission. Returning to piles of sparking Bristleback salvage is a necessary perk of saving the world, as far as I’m concerned.
Plenty of familiar faces join Aloy on her journey, including Varl and Erend, and she ends up collecting new companions like Pokemon at her west coast base. There are also new threats in this world, and without spoiling any story points, the game’s narrative arc covers class warfare on an extreme scale, with egocentric trillionaire technology leaders at its core.
The new friendly characters have distinct personalities, backgrounds and skills, and they’re incredibly charming. By the final missions, it feels like Aloy has her own little Scooby-Doo gang, Bristleback included.
However, Aloy is often on her own – and this is especially true when it comes to underwater levels. Aloy ends up crafting a breathing apparatus that allows her to dive infinitely, and with the whole oxygen problem out of the way, she’s free to investigate a series of vast underwater landscapes, slinking among massive Snapmaws in the process. Her Focus behaves differently beneath the surface, pinging like submarine radar when it’s left on. Underwater, it feels like Aloy is flying around an alien planet, and these moments are so quietly engaging I almost forget to be scared of the giant, murderous dinosaur robots that are also swimming around.
Almost.
The most memorable underwater environment is Las Vegas. It’s submerged but still soaked in neon coral, with crumbling escalators leading nowhere and buildings cracked through with algae and seaweed. The base of the replica Eiffel Tower grounds the entire scene in a twisted kind of reality, and it makes Aloy’s fight to save the world feel more urgent. Once the water drains out of this space and Aloy has to fight off a contingent of amphibious robots, a new battlefield emerges with opportunities for parkour, sniping and sneaking on the ground. Water adds versatility to Forbidden West, not just terror.
