Horizon Forbidden West is a considerable step-up from its 2017 predecessor Zero Dawn by just about every measure. Its namesake, the Forbidden West, is bigger and more detailed than the areas Aloy previously explored; likewise she has more ways to explore thanks to her grappling hook Pullcaster and gliding Shieldwing. Horizon Forbidden West also updates Aloy's climbing and gives players multiple skill trees to examine while preparing to fight machines and appease Tenakth tribes.
This expansion, combined with extra horsepower from Sony's PlayStation 5, makes the Guerrilla Games sequel is an early Game of the Year contender for many - even if its release was unfortunately close to FromSoftware's Elden Ring. Another element more robustly packed into the Forbidden West are collectibles and obstacles that Aloy will need to be further along her journey to overcome. While there are a lot of positives to this Metroidvania-inspired approach of returning to older areas, it may leave a sour taste in some Zero Dawn fans' mouths during Forbidden West's early hours.
Collectibles in Horizon Zero Dawn
Aloy had a few goals in Horizon Zero Dawn: initially discovering the truth about her past and why she was an outcast from birth; eventually using her knowledge of the Ancient Ones to stop an invasion of Meridian that smokescreens rogue AI HADES' attempt to destroy the Earth's biosphere. Much of Aloy's understanding comes from exploring ruins and Cauldrons scattered around Zero Dawn's relatively compact open world. Along the way to each location, she can hunt a variety of machines based on real-world animals and help tribes with issues caused by those machines' growing derangement.
During this journey Aloy can find all the collectibles scattered around her world. The three main collectibles are Metal Flowers, which contain lines of poetry that are suggested to be an inclusion of rogue AI DEMETER; Banuk Figures, which tell the story of a banished man named Arnak; and Ancient Vessels, which are modern-day coffee mugs emblazoned with logos from in-universe companies.
Players can purchase maps to point out the general locations of each collectible, which become easier to find when an area is exposed thanks to the environmental data provided by Tallnecks. Horizon Zero Dawn's Frozen Wilds DLC adds even more in The Cut, a Banuk territory. These include passive lore items such as Animal Figurines, which display informational holograms; and the useful currency Bluegleam to trade for powerful weapons. Like most everything in the base game, all players need to do is find these collectibles for Aloy to add them into her inventory.
Collectibles and Obstacles in Horizon Forbidden West
Collectibles in the same vein as Zero Dawn do return in Forbidden West, such as Signal Lenses that can be found at the top of abandoned Carja signal towers in The Daunt. These encourage exploration in the purest sense, often just rewarding Aloy for checking out every corner of the world not otherwise filled with Hunting Grounds, Rebel Camps, and so on. Gathering them is tied to PlayStation Trophies and usually corresponds with optional quests.
Relic Ruins are a step-up as far as collectibles go, with each dilapidated building left by the Ancient Ones containing an Ornament. Unlike Signal Lenses that test Aloy's climbing abilities, these Ornaments are locked behind puzzles akin to Zelda-like Dungeons. More accurately they are reminiscent of Breath of the Wild's Shrines, being one-off puzzles that require a particular skill or some game design knowledge. Larger objectives scattered across the world like Cauldrons are perhaps more akin to Dungeons, ending off with boss fights before Aloy gains the ability to override new machines.
Something new to Horizon Forbidden West is collectibles that act more like obstacles. Players will come across blocked paths that take the form of foliage growing out of Metal Flowers, Firegleam crystals growing in patches out of walls, and sunken caverns too deep for Aloy to best without a breathing implement. Whereas some new collectibles like Survey Drones can be captured with enough ingenuity to find vantage points, these blocked paths are completely inaccessible without new tools - akin to a Metroidvania. However, the format is far less successful within the context of Forbidden West.
Metroidvania Backtracking Versus Open-World Exploration
The Metroidvania genre, named as a portmanteau of its best early examples from the Metroid and Castlevania series, is chiefly about characters accomplishing more as they grow stronger. They are full of collectibles and new traversal items that allow people to backtrack and find something new in older areas. For example, only certain walls can be broken with Samus Aran's Screw Attack, and acid lakes cannot be crossed without Isma's Tear in Hollow Knight (speedrunning tricks aside).
Metroidvania components work well in 2D and 3D, shown by the success of both Super Metroid and Metroid Prime. Thus, it's easy to see why Guerrilla Games would take elements of this design and apply it to Horizon Forbidden West. Being able to access something new in an old area signifies progression, and it typically gives players an excuse to comb over the developer's expansive world multiple times. However, the difference between finding a progression item in Hollow Knight and building the Firegleam Igniter in Forbidden West is that Aloy often doesn't gain a new means of progression.
There are certainly "dungeons" in Forbidden West requiring items like the Igniter, but the open-world environment as a whole is not made more open when Aloy builds it. Instead, she primarily gains access to outcroppings with materials or the solution to Relic Ruin puzzles. In practice, this disincentivizes players from exploring the world as they did in Zero Dawn, where every collectible provided instant gratification. Someone may be less likely to explore the "unknown" object on their map if they know it's likely to be a Metal Flower they can't open for another 15 hours.
That being said, it is possible those unknowns are something immediately useful. Aloy also gains her new tools as part of the main story, so the blocked paths are not an inconvenience forever - in fact the Igniter appears relatively early into her trek through the Forbidden West. Yet on the whole tying collectibles or materials to progression tools, rather than new areas to explore, is a knock against the sense of wonder and exploration in Forbidden West. Hopefully Guerrilla finds a different solution in future titles that's less likely to frustrate players coming across yet another blocked path early into Aloy's otherwise expanded journey.
Horizon Forbidden West is available now on PS4 and PS5.