In a new developer video, Guerrilla Games details the process of how many of the animal and dinosaur inspired machine enemies in Horizon: Zero Dawn came to be.

After the surprising new gameplay featured during the PlayStation Pro event last month, the team at Guerrilla Games is giving fans a closer look at the world of Horizon: Zero Dawn. As seen in previous trailers, some major event has managed to push humanity to the brink, forcing the survivors into smaller nomadic tribes, while machine like animals have taken over a landscape reclaimed by nature. In a brand new developer diary, the developer gives fans a closer look at how these monstrosities came to be.

Even early on in the concept phase of Horizon: Zero Dawn, Guerrilla Games knew it absolutely wanted a natural looking landscape, a female lead that would eventually become known as Aloy, and a dominant race of machines. While the designers went through a number of evolutions of what these machines should look like, they eventually settled on a prehistoric meets nature sort of concept. Part of this design choice was to give gamers better insight into each creature by observing how it behaves, giving the player a better understanding of what kind of attack style it has and how to prepare for it.

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With many different machine animal types in the game, the trailer focused on the Shellwalker, a slower, more methodical machine that fiercely protects the valuable loot on its back, and the Snapmaw, a machine clearly inspired by alligators and crocodiles. The creative process for the Shellwalker began with the design of the machine. Using crabs and shrimp for inspiration, the team began to imagine the way this machine would defend itself, carry out normal tasks, and even gather food. From there, the artists applied the Horizon aesthetic, added armored plating, and finally pieced together the animations.

The Snapmaw, on the other hand, is a completely different beast, opting to move in packs near bodies of water and posing a real threat to anything that gets too close. While players will have options to better fight these creatures, the developer won't provide a skill or ability that completely neutralizes the threat, so players will need to tread lightly near water.

While recent trailers have focused more on the struggle between Aloy and a tribal looking group of warriors, earlier footage revealed a number of machines including the Tyrannosaurus Rex looking Thunderjaw. No matter how fearsome these creatures may look, each has a specific weakness that can be exploited, though finding it while trying to stay alive long enough is part of the challenge.

What do you think of these two new machine creatures? Tell us your thoughts below in the comments.

Horizon: Zero Dawn launches exclusively for the PlayStation 4 on February 28, 2017.

Source: PlayStation EU YouTube Channel