Everything We Know About Aloy’s New Abilities in Horizon Forbidden West

Horizon Forbidden West has been one of the most hotly anticipated games since before it was even announced, and now that we’re a few months out from the February 2022 release date, fans are eager for details about Aloy’s next adventure. And we finally have some, thanks to a Playstation blog by developers Guerrilla Games.

The blog gave us a sneak peak at some of Aloy’s new abilities and how Guerrilla is building on the best parts of the first game in the series, Horizon Zero Dawn.

Here’s what we learned about Aloy’s new abilities in Horizon Forbidden West.

Improved climbing

Horizon Zero Dawn was known for its lush open world full of treacherous terrain which was heavily signposted by bright yellow markers telling you where you could climb. Forbidden West has done away with the markers in favour of a more open free-climbing system.

“The free climbing system in Horizon Forbidden West is a huge feature we are extremely excited about, as it has allowed us to make large sections of the terrain climbable (where it makes sense visually and narratively) in a way not previously possible in Horizon Zero Dawn,” said David McMullen, Lead Systems Designer at Guerrilla.

New weapons

Guerrilla has made Aloy’s bow and spear more versatile in Forbidden West and given you more opportunities to use them together.

“A new example of a skill that does this is the Resonator Blast, where you charge up the spear with melee hits,” said Dennis Zopfi, Guerrilla’s Lead Combat Designer.

“When fully powered up, the energy can be placed on enemies (humans and machines alike) and followed up with a projectile – resulting in a big damaging explosion!”

New tools

The Horizon Forbidden West gameplay trailer showed off the new Pullcaster and Shieldwing tools, which will help Aloy explore and use the environment to her advantage in combat.

The Pullcaster has two functions: a grapple mechanic that will let you cover long distances quickly, and a winch that will let you pull things out of place to reach hidden objects and open up new paths.

The Shieldwing is a glider that will let you explore by air, access hard to reach places and pull off devastating aerial attacks.

Mounted combat

In Zero Dawn, Aloy could hack machines to tame and ride them, but she’s not the only one who can charge into battle on the back of a ferocious beast this time around.

“The world has changed in Horizon Forbidden West, with more danger, more enemy factions, and more machines – and they can now fight together in groups, which poses a real challenge for our hero, and the player,” said Zopfi.

Mounted combat will add a new challenge to the game, with players having to prioritise human enemies or their mounts, who each pose a significant threat.

Upgrade your gear

To give players more options for combat, Guerrilla has added a workbench to Forbidden West where you can upgrade your weapons.

“This unlocks new perks, mod slots, skills, and offers a bigger degree of customisation, resistances, and new abilities for players,” said Zopfi.

They’ve also completely redesigned the skill tree and added additional tracks and skills so you can play Aloy any way you like.

“We put a lot of effort into creating more choice and depth for the players, and are super excited to see how people will play as Aloy with so many new possibilities of skills, weapons and gear she can obtain throughout the mysterious Forbidden West,” said Zopfi.

“We had a lot of fun creating cool and powerful combinations for players to discover, and we hope people will enjoy the game when it launches!”