Before, Sony has given us the release date window in 2021 for Horizon Forbidden West, the anticipated sequel to the critically acclaimed dystopian action game Horizon Zero Dawn. The reveal of the sequel to the popular Sony exclusive has been greeted with eagerness and excitement by the gaming community, however, we may have to wait a bit longer than thought at first – likely until the year 2022.
In the recent PlayStation blog post, the head of the studio, Herman Hulst, shared his thoughts on the upcoming release and the possibility of delay concerning the project.
“For Horizon, we think we are on track to release this holiday season, but that isn’t quite certain yet, and we’re working as hard as we can to confirm that to you as soon as we can.” He adds that “we’re not going to risk the quality. We want to ship extremely high-quality games, finished games, and we have to do that obviously without pushing our teams to the breaking point.”
We salute this approach and will gladly choose a delay over a poor-quality game received solely because the team behind the development lacked time. And based on the gameplay trailer, the game is gonna look breathtaking.
Horizon Forbidden West made its first appearance during Sony’s PS5 games event in June. We are excited that Aloy’s story is not yet laid to rest, and in fact, grand adventures await us in the open-world reminiscent of outstanding moments. The real surprise came from the fact that the game is coming not only to PS5 but also to PS4 consoles. Yup, you read that right. Of course, by no means are we complaining about that bit.
Game director Mathijs de Jonge shares some comments on the development of Horizon Forbidden West release in regards to it being cross-gen.
“I don’t think the cross-generation development was limiting in any way. I think that the big delta between these two consoles, apart from the 3D audio, quick loading and DualSense of course, is on the graphical side of things. On the PlayStation 5, we can add so much more detail graphically. We can see the tiny hairs on Aloy’s face, for example. You can also see a ton of detail from far away.”
Well, although there is the possibility of another Horizon: Forbidden West release date delay, we received the quite good news that the game will be available for both PS4 and PS5. And, of course, we appreciate that Sony takes the development process seriously.
While Horizon Forbidden West is brewing, be sure to jump back into the adventures with Aloy or try out the Horizon Zero Dawn game if you haven’t yet.
