There's at least three noteworthy characters whose extraordinary success on the PS4 lives on through the PS5. Marvel's Spider-Man has already received a worthy heir in Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and it's known that longtime video game icon Kratos will come back to the PS5 in an upcoming God of War game. However, there's one much fresher face making her mark in recent years, and that's Aloy.
This post-apocalyptic genius and her adventures will soon continue in Horizon Forbidden West, the impending sequel to Horizon Zero Dawn. Her youth maker her unique as a successful representative of the PlayStation, but that's not all.
Zero Dawn's Aloy: New Kid on the Block
Horizon Forbidden West isn't a surprising sequel. The first game was a resounding success and something of a flagship considering the big names that Horizon Zero Dawn was contending with. For one thing, there was God of War, the game delivering a rebirth of an action-adventure franchise that took the PlayStation by storm in the 2000s and early 2010s. Kratos remains a beloved, complicated character whose new encounters with Norse mythology are well received. Meanwhile, Spider-Man may not be a character solely known through gaming, but he's such a crucial Marvel superhero that the highly successful Marvel's Spider-Man on the PS4 strongly tied his identity into the Sony brand.
With these two icons in mind, it's no small feat for a totally new character to root themselves in Sony's current roster of instantly recognizable characters. Kratos and Spider-Man have been around for years and have a dedicated fanbase happy to follow them wherever new games take them. In spite of that, Aloy's name has broken through to become synonymous with top of the line titles for the PlayStation. It's an extraordinary achievement to become such a famous and popular figure on a console that already has a lot of characters who could contest for the role of poster child.
PlayStation Camaraderie - Aloy, Kratos, Spider-Man
Aloy has a lot in common with her fellow honorary PlayStation mascots. She, Kratos, and Spider-Man are all troubled but talented fighters struggling with new challenges cropping up all around them. Aloy might be a fresher face than the others, but she can easily keep pace with them, never faltering in her quest throughout Horizon Zero Dawn. When a new game breaks through the market like Horizon Zero Dawn did, a sequel was inevitable, and Horizon Forbidden West looks like such an ambitious chapter in Aloy's life that it signals another thing she might have in common with Kratos and Spidey: longevity.
For all the vastness of the world of Horizon, there's a lot of world that could still be explored, even as Horizon Forbidden West takes Aloy into new lands. Just like how players have seen Kratos age and experience years of struggle with the Greek gods, Aloy might be taking players on journeys through the ruins of America for many years to come. When a new game breaks out from the crowd, there's always the risk that whatever follows it fails to make a splash again. Not so for Guerrilla Games' crown jewel, Aloy deserves her place at the table of PlayStation giants, and it looks like she'll be seated there for a long time.
Horizon Forbidden West releases in late 2021 for PS4 and PS5.