Horizon Zero Dawn broke boundaries in open-world gaming, and its sequel Horizon Forbidden West has continued on that trajectory. Players were treated to many quality-of-life improvements, like freedom in climbing and gliding, new and inventive ways for Aloy to hunt machines, a massive map to explore, and an increasingly deepening lore with new characters for Aloy to meet along the way.
There’s more of this in the Horizon Forbidden West expansion Burning Shores. It introduces additional mechanics to improve gameplay, specifically in the new area and the Forbidden West. Players can look forward to advanced combat mechanics, even more traversal capabilities, and new Valor Surges and skills.
7 The Skiff
After Aloy makes her crash landing onto the Burning Shores, she’s met by Sekya. After a heated battle, Sekya takes Aloy back to the Quen settlement of Fleet’s End on her Skiff, a boat modified with machine parts that can be propelled through the water rather than rowed.
Sekya lets Aloy use the boat whenever she needs, adding another fantastic traversal option to her quest in the Burning Shores. The Skiff is easy to operate by pressing R2 to accelerate, L2 to decelerate, and the right analog stick to move.
6 Thermal Updrafts
The volcanic environment of Los Angeles has created fissures and geysers in the land, which players can use to boost Aloy to hard-to-reach climbing holds. Known as Thermal Updrafts, they appear in certain areas of the map to help with traversal.
Players will remember geysers from The Frozen Wilds, but those were just for show. In the Burning Shores, the Thermal Updrafts can aid Aloy in battle by lending players some air time or glide to safety to restock and think of their next move.
5 Drop Shields
Burning Shores adds six new Valor Surges and 12 skills to Horizon Forbidden West. One of these abilities is the Shield Drop, which can be found under the Survivor skill tree. At the end of Horizon Zero Dawn, players received the incredible Shield-Weaver armor set, which had a rechargeable force shield. And while Aloy is wearing it at the beginning of Horizon Forbidden West, the power source has been lost, so the rechargeable force shield no longer works.
Forbidden West rectified this somewhat with the Overshield Valor Surge, but now Aloy can use Drop Shields to protect herself in combat. These are crafted and placed as traps, protecting Aloy from long-range attacks. But much like the shields produced by the Tripcaster, they will degrade over time.
4 Flying Mount Abilities
With two flying mounts now at their disposal, players can use these machines in more ways than they could in the Forbidden West. Aloy gains two new abilities in the expansion: the Flying Mount Dislodge and Flying Mount Pickups. The Sunwing and Waterwing can rip off vents on buildings that Aloy can’t dislodge with her Pullcaster (marked with a symbol of feet with talons), and they can pick up caches in challenging areas.
There’s another ability that Aloy can learn in the Machine Master skill tree, which enables her to grapple to a mount and launch off of it. It’s the same process as the usual grapple point launch by pressing the Circle button just before reaching it.
3 Grappling To Vents
Aloy can now grapple to certain vents within the Burning Shores. These vents appear yellow instead of blue, and have a triangle grapple symbol rather than a circle. Grappling to it works in the usual way: the closer Aloy gets to it, another symbol will appear, prompting players to use the Pullcaster and grapple to it.
In this case, she’ll grapple, then stab her spear into the vent to open it and jump back off. A standard grapple symbol will appear, and Aloy can grapple back to the vent and traverse like usual. It certainly makes for more interesting traversal in the DLC, much like the Flying Mount Dislodge.
2 Elite Weaves
In addition to Legendary weapons, players can purchase Elite Coils and Weaves from the Hunter and Stitcher at the Fleet’s End settlement. These can also be found in caches across the Burning Shores, much like in the Forbidden West. Each Weave and Coil costs 2350 Shards and 3 Brimshine, with 10 Coils and 12 Weaves to choose from. The Coils focus on boosting Elemental damage, increasing the probability of machines entering elemental states instantly.
Weaves, on the other hand, focus on increasing Outfit skills. These include increased levels in Concentration, Evasion, Low Health Melee, Machine Override, Silent Strikes, Valor, and Weapon Techniques. Equipping one of these Coils or Weaves will unlock the “Equipped an Elite Coil or Weave” trophy.
1 Machine Grapple Strike
Another new ability, the Machine Grapple Strike, can be found in the Hunter skill tree. When a machine is Knocked Down, players can grapple to them by tapping X and pressing R1 to energize the damage made to the machine.
This results in a powerful Resonator Blase, which Aloy can shoot or strike with her spear to create a massive amount of damage in a short period of time. This is a fun new mechanic, especially when fighting big machines like Thunderjaws, Slaughterspines, and the new Bileguts.
Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is available now on PS5.