The Future is Bright
Horizon Zero Dawn took the gaming world by storm when it was first released in 2017. The action-RPG sees protagonist Aloy exploring the vast wilderness of post-apocalyptic Utah, which is home to a largely robotic ecosystem. The sequel, Horizon Forbidden West, takes her adventures… well, west, all the way to California, and promises a bigger, more diverse map, as well as all manner of new robotic nasties to deal with.
Even better, we’re getting more to explore, from ruined cityscapes to underwater areas as Aloy tries to uncover the origins of a deadly plague, and fans couldn’t be more excited – and that includes Aloy’s voice actor, Ashly Burch, who told Gameinformer that the new game takes everything fans loved about the original and makes it better.
I can’t say a lot… But, um, I will say that I really do think that all of the things that people loved about Zero Dawn – the gorgeous world, the immersive story, the awesome gameplay – Forbidden West is just more and better,” Burch said. “The new areas that Aloy is traveling to, the tribes that she’s meeting, and the story that unfolds… I got a primer on it all before recording for the game, where the writing team took me through the arc of the story and it was like being a kid at a campfire.”
There’s no release date for the game quite yet, but we do know that Burch is still in the process of recording Aloy’s dialogue – and that means it’s likely the same for at least some other characters, such as Aloy’s antiheroic “ally” Sylens, played by Lance Reddick.
It’s true that Burch could just be talking a big game about Horizon Forbidden West – we’ve seen actors promote games that ended up bombing before – but given the sheer quality level of the prequel on all levels, there’s a lot of reason to be optimistic about the future of the series – Burch’s words are just one of them.