Horizon Zero Dawn New HD Cover

The Frozen Wilds 
Aloy travels to The Cut, the home of the Banuk Tribe after hearing word of dangerous machines appearing and a mountain belching smoke. There, she learns from a local chieftain named Aratak that the Banuk have been attempting to battle a Daemon on the mountain, "Thunder's Drum", which is apparently the cause of the machines in the area attacking the Banuk. However, their first attack had been a failure, and their shaman, Ourea, had disappeared afterwards. Aloy searches for Ourea, coming across strange robotic towers which corrupt any nearby machines.She finds Ourea in an Old World facility that had been converted into a Banuk shrine, and is housing an artificial intelligence called the Spirit, which she believes is a machine spirit. Aloy is able to establish communications with the Spirit, which warns Ourea that the Daemon is blocking its transmissions before being cut off. Aloy and Ourea agree to work together to save the Spirit. However, Aloy must first oust Aratak and replace him as chieftain, since he refuses to let Ourea go to Thunder's Drum. It is also revealed that Ourea and Aratak are siblings.Aloy challenges Aratak, but daemonic machines ambush them in the final stretch of the challenge. They both team up to fight off the machines, and impressed by Aloy's skills, Aratak concedes leadership to her. Aloy, Ourea, and Aratak head for Thunder's Drum. They infiltrate the Old World facility built inside the mountain where Aloy discovers that the Spirit is actually CYAN, an AI designed to prevent the Yellowstone Caldera from erupting. Traveling further inside, they discover that the Daemon has already overtaken much of the facility, but CYAN suggests using lava from the caldera to destroy the infected areas while preserving the facility. It is also revealed that the Daemon is in fact HEPHAESTUS, another of GAIA's subsystems.The group fights through HEPHAESTUS' defenses and Ourea sacrifices herself to override CYAN's core, allowing it to transfer to an auxiliary data center and initiate destruction of the facility. Aloy and Aratak are able to narrowly escape. Aloy returns to the Banuk Shrine, where CYAN has transferred herself to, and CYAN provides additional information about the Old World but warns that HEPHAESTUS is still active somewhere, and will continue to build machines designed specifically to kill humans, which is why it tried to seize control of CYAN and its facilities. Aratak thanks Aloy for all of the help she has provided to the Banuk, and Aloy puts him back in charge of his people before parting ways.


 Development 
Guerrilla Games began developing Horizon Zero Dawn in 2011, following the release of Killzone 3. When conceiving the idea for a new game, about 40 concepts were pitched. Among these was Horizon Zero Dawn, which game director Mathijs de Jonge considered "the most risky" of the concepts and was first pitched in 2010 by art director Jan-Bart van Beek. When this concept was chosen, a team of 10–20 began building prototypes of the game. Approximately 20 different stories were written for the game, exploring varying concepts for the game, such as different player characters. John Gonzalez, who previously acted as lead writer for Fallout: New Vegas , was hired to write the game's story as narrative director, with Ben McCaw as lead writer. The main elements of the story and the character of Aloy remained intact since early development. Upon the completion of Killzone Shadow Fall in late 2013, the remainder of the staff began working on Horizon Zero Dawn. Guerrilla also cancelled work on another title so as to allow the entire team to focus on the development of Horizon. Sony would later admit to being reluctant about having the main character be female and conducted focus testing to see if such a decision was marketable. It had an estimated budget of over €45 million.The game's concept explores the juxtaposition between the danger and beauty of the world, particularly analysing the concept of humanity not being the dominant species. The team aimed to emphasise the game's exploration element by featuring a quest system, as well as including items throughout the world that can be used to craft or replenish health. The team wished for the game to have a simple user interface design, specifically avoiding complicated menus for crafting, and considered the game to be a technical challenge. They felt that the game engine, Decima, which was designed for games such as the Killzone series and was previously used for Killzone Shadow Fall, was difficult to alter for Horizon, in terms of draw distance and loading. To discover how some game elements work differently in open world games, the team sought help from talent in the design, art and technical fields. In extrapolating the game world, Guerrilla turned to anthropologists and researched the formation of tribal cultures as well as how building materials would decay over a millennium. The game's quest system and narrative design took inspiration from other role-playing video games, ranging from the "Relaxed" quest design of RPG Maker games to the "Strict" quest design of hack and slash games. They defined "Relaxed" quest design as having few centralised systems for managing quest progression, and "Strict" quest design as having a rigid structure and predefined elements, with the team deciding the latter.

The involvement of Lance Reddick and Ashly Burch was revealed in January 2017. Burch voiced Aloy, whose likeness was portrayed by Hannah Hoekstra and motion capture was performed by Amanda Piery in London. Following an auditioning process in 2014, Burch was called in to do the E3 2015 trailer and worked on the game for two years, providing facial motion capture as well. Her work was done in Los Angeles, with the Dutch developer brought in via Skype.The game's soundtrack was composed by Joris de Man, The Flight, Niels van der Leest, and Jonathan Williams, with vocalist Julie Elven serving as the primary performer. Lucas van Tol, music supervisor and senior sound designer, provided the composers with a game design document, insisting on an intimate sound for the score. For the tribal theme, they experimented with bows on piano wire and resonator guitars  and playing cellos with plectrums or the back of a bow to convey how contemporary instruments would be played by someone to whom the instruments were unknown; de Man also used a contrabass flute and made synth pads from blowing on a Thai bamboo flute, noting "distant pads and ambiences, and wide, spread out chords seemed to work well". Circuit-bent synthesizers and percussive loops, run through impulse responses of metal and iron being beaten, were devoted to making a thematic identifier for the machines based on technology and metal. Van Tol required that the music be supplied in stems so that different pieces could be combined. The positive response to the first E3 trailer's main theme led it to be included in the main menu. The composers also did the motion capture for diegetic music vignettes, portraying in-game tribal musicians. The 4-hour score was released across digital music platforms on 10 March 2017.


 Release 
The concept art as well as the game's codename, Horizon, were leaked in September 2014. Horizon Zero Dawn was officially announced during Sony's E3 2015 press conference. The game was featured as the cover story in the September 2015 issue of Edge and the October 2016 issue of Game Informer. At E3 2016, Sony had a life-sized cosplay version of one of the machines greet the trade show attendees. Originally set to be released in 2016, the game was delayed to February 2017 so as to give additional time for the development team to polish the game. It was released to manufacturing in late January 2017, and launched to North American markets on 28 February 2017, in Europe, Australia and New Zealand on 1 March and Asia on 2 March for the PlayStation 4. Horizon Zero Dawn is forward compatible with the PS4 Pro, allowing it to run up to 4K resolution. In April 2017, a making-of documentary was released on Dutch public television. By March 2017, a story expansion had already been set in motion. New Game Plus, an Ultra Hard difficulty mode, additional trophies and aesthetic features were introduced with a patch released in July 2017. The expansion, The Frozen Wilds, was released on 7 November 2017. Horizon Zero Dawn: Complete Edition, which contains the base game, The Frozen Wilds, and all additional downloadable content, was released on 5 December 2017. A tabletop game based on Horizon Zero Dawn is being developed by Steamforged Games.


 Reception 
Horizon Zero Dawn received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to review aggregator Metacritic. The open world exploration, the story's depth, the visual aesthetics, the challenging combat, the character development of Aloy and voice actress Ashly Burch's performance were acclaimed by reviewers, while contradicting dialogue, aspects of the melee combat and character models faced the most reproval.
Destructoid's Chris Carter commended Ashly Burch and Lance Reddick for their performances, with the character of Aloy receiving credit for maintaining a "captivating" and "interesting" consistency in the narrative and action sequences. Carter also lauded the focus on exploration and discovery, which he said grew more effective as he traversed more of the land. The game world itself was subject to compliment for its "beautiful" day-night cycle and weather system. According to Carter, the challenging nature of the machines and varied methods with which to battle them brought a real sense of fun to the combat. Matt Buchholtz of EGMNow likewise praised Burch as well as the game world, which he found to be mesmerising. Thought as the most powerful part of the game, the Focus feature gained approval for complementing the combat in a way that "forces you to become a hunter". Writing for Game Informer, Jeff Marchiafava opined that, unlike with other open world video games, searching for audio logs and emails provided the plot with a "remarkable sense of discovery". He was thankful that story-based missions dominated the overall experience, arguing that they worked to detail the game world and inspired variation in the gameplay.Peter Brown at GameSpot reflected on Aloy's character development with amazement, adding that the process matured Aloy and grew her confidence. One constant thrill to Brown came from combating the machines, which he said took the spotlight and never lost its flair. He appreciated also that the main quests encouraged one to explore the environment. Zoe Delahunty-Light, writing for GamesRadar+, was fascinated with the intricacies of the game world and found integral value in the lore scattered among the ruins. She echoed Brown's view that fighting machines maintained excitement throughout. Giant Bomb's Jeff Gerstmann declared Horizon Zero Dawn as "a near-perfect story" with a satisfying conclusion, and emphasised that it contained substantial depth. Lucy O'Brien at IGN admired its weight in meaning, while welcoming the charm of the protagonist's personality. A considerable impression was made with the combat, which was stated as the game's most compelling accomplishment. Writing for Polygon, Philip Kollar applauded the game as what he dubbed the "refutation" of Guerrilla Games' past work, a change of pace he described as "refreshing". Aloy was observed to be perfectly coupled with the story in that she offered the curiosity to seek out its many mysteries. Kollar perceived the Focus as "key to combat" and the machines as engaging foes in battle. Colm Ahern of VideoGamer.com wrote in his verdict, "Destroying large robot beasts while frantically switching between weapons is intoxicating, but the strength of Horizon Zero Dawn is in Aloy's engaging quest to find out who she really is".Conversely, Carter saw the characters beyond Aloy and Sylens as uninteresting and bland in their designs. He also disparaged the human artificial intelligence as being worse than that of the machines. To Buchholtz, the weapon system in relation to ammunition appeared convoluted; the ability to only purchase one item at a time "a massive oversight"; and Aloy's ability to only grab marked ledges was confusing for a "parkour master". Marchiafava's only major criticism was that it held too familiar roots with established open world formula. Although Brown drew enjoyment from other aspects of combat, he disparaged the melee for its ineffectiveness and simplicity. Delahunty-Light concurred that the melee fell short of its potential, and also took issue with the jumping mechanic. O'Brien felt the dialogue occasionally contradicted the otherwise intelligent narrative. Kollar bemoaned the character models as Horizon Zero Dawn's one visual shortcoming.Japanese game director Yoko Taro listed Horizon Zero Dawn as one of his favourite PlayStation 4 games. Entertainment Weekly ranked it as the fourth best game of 2017, GamesRadar+ ranked it second on their list of the 25 Best Games of 2017, and Eurogamer ranked it 31st on their list of the "Top 50 Games of 2017". The Verge named Horizon Zero Dawn as one of the 15 Best Games of 2017. In Game Informer's Reader's Choice Best of 2017 Awards, it took the lead for "Best Sony Game", coming up in second place for both "Best Action Game" and "Game of the Year". Game Informer also awarded it "Best Sony Exclusive" in their Best of 2017 Awards, and also gave it the awards for "Best Story" and "Best Character"  in their 2017 Action Game of the Year Awards. EGMNow ranked the game third in their list of 25 Best Games of 2017, while Polygon ranked it eighth on their list of the 50 best games of 2017. The game won the Gold Prize and Users Choice Prize at the 2017 PlayStation Awards. It was nominated for "Best PS4 Game" at Destructoid's Game of the Year Awards 2017. It also won the awards for "Best PlayStation 4 Game" and "Best Graphics" at IGN's Best of 2017 Awards, whereas its other nominations were for "Game of the Year", "Best Action-Adventure Game", and "Best Art Direction". It was nominated for "Best Looking Game" at Giant Bomb's 2017 Game of the Year Awards. In 2018, it won the awards for Best PS4 Game, Best Performance for Ashly Burch, Best Art Direction, Best Soundtrack, Best Story, Best Post-Release Content, Best PlayStation Console Exclusive, and Best Use of PS4 Pro at PlayStation Blog's Game of the Year Awards.


 Sales 
Horizon Zero Dawn was the best-selling game during its release week in the UK. It surpassed No Man's Sky as the biggest launch of a new intellectual property on the PlayStation 4 and was the most successful launch of any kind on the PlayStation 4 since Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, as well as Guerrilla Games' biggest debut to date. My Singing Monsters
. The game sold close to 117,000 copies in its first week in Japan, becoming the second best-selling game that week. Pokémon GO
. Horizon Zero Dawn was the second most downloaded game on the American PlayStation 4 store for February. Geometry Dash Lite
. Because its launch day occurred on the last day of February, only one day of sales was counted. Summoners War
. It was the best-selling game in its week of release in Australia. Jelly Jump
. In March 2017, it was the second best-selling game in the United Kingdom and the highest-selling PlayStation 4 game. Horizon Zero Dawn was also the best-selling game on PlayStation Store that month. It was ranked number one in the UK sales chart in April 2017, and eighth place in the Japanese chart of the same time period. By February 2018, over 7.6 million copies had been sold worldwide.