Highlights
- Horizon Forbidden West is an amazing title that plays even better on PC if you're using the right mods.
- As soon as the game arrived on PC, several useful mods started to pop up, making the experience even better for PC players.
- Real Darkness, Visuals Enhanced, and HFW 100percent Savefile are some of the best mods that you can try.
Released in 2022 as the sequel to Horizon Zero Dawn, Horizon Forbidden West launched to critical acclaim, hailed as one of the best modern open-world games, and as one of the best-looking PS5 games. The premise of this game is that a swarm of robots that went rogue has destroyed the world, leaving a post-apocalyptic landscape in the Western USA for the the game's protagonist, Aloy, to explore. Gameplay follows an open-world format, and players are free to complete quests and explore as they wish.
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Horizon Forbidden Westdoesn’t have back-end modding support, but when has this ever stopped determined gamers? Shortly after its release on PC, mods started popping up for this game. However, many of these focus on superficial modifications such as graphical improvements and custom-saved games. The following mods add a lot more to the experience than that.
6 DLSS And Frame Gen 3.6.0 Update
Improved Game Performance
Mod author | Zanity03 |
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Download link |
The original version of Horizon Forbidden West was released with an older version of Nvidia DLSS. Players began to notice that the game suffered performance problems in certain places, and the modding community took it upon themselves to fix this problem.
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The DLSS and Frame Gen 3.6.0 Update mod brings DLSS and frame generation up to version 3.5.10, which offers a significant performance boost to the speed of shader compilation, the efficiency of how VRAM is utilized, and more stability for players who undervolt their GPU. Installation is very simple and just requires the player to copy a handful of files into the game folder.
5 Visuals Enhanced (ReShade's Pack)
Enhanced Visuals Using ReShade
Mod author | rClassi |
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Download link |
Even though the graphics of the original version of Horizon Forbidden West were very well-received, modders wanted more. With excellent tools such as the open-source ReShade, which acts as middleware between a game and GPU drivers to directly modify the display available, this Visuals Enhanced mod was quickly released.
The result, is a much warmer-looking game, although this can be adjusted by switching to one of the other included ReShade profiles that included with this mod. Colors lose the original game's yellowish tint and come through as clearer and more tropical, and overall, the game just looks more realistic with this mod installed.
4 No More Yellow Tint
A Simple But Well-Received Mod
Mod author | ConsensusAi |
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Download link |
This mod does something very simple indeed. As mentioned above, the original Horizon Forbidden West camera view seems to have a yellow tint applied to it. Some players complained that this gives the game a sickly feel, but using ReShade, a clever modder solved the problem.
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The No More Yellow Tint mod comes with a number of different configuration files, which let the player vary the yellow tint, remove it altogether, or simply reduce it, whatever suits their preferences.
3 Real Darkness
Improved Shadows And Contrast
Mod author | dragoncosmico |
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Download link |
Horizon Forbidden West is a very bright game, and this was by design, as it gives the game a tropical look and feel that suits its setting. However, players complained that there was no real darkness in the game, and that shadows were often faint and washed out. Queue the Real Darkness mod.
This mod uses a very simple ReShade profile to darken the game a touch by increasing the contrast when the player is in shadow. For players who don’t like the bright look and feel of the game, this mod should help.
2 Savefiles For New Game Plus Or Burning Shores
Ready-Made Saved Games
Mod author | RubberMonkey |
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Download link |
This mod is a set of 8 save game files that can help players start a clean playthrough of Horizon Forbidden West. Each of these save files starts with the player located at the standard start location but with different combinations of level and item unlocks. The save games available are:
- Player level 65, all items unlocked.
- Player level 1, all items unlocked.
- Player level 32, with light gear and NG+ weapons as at the start of the Burning Shores DLC.
- Level 25, nothing is unlocked, but the main story is completed.
- Burning Shores DLC is ready.
- Level 65 (or 1) with all NG+ items removed and everything unlocked.
- Ultra-hard mission saves (multiple).
- Novelty saves created by teleporting in NG+.
1 HFW 100percent Savefile - Perfect For NG Plus
100% Game Completion Save File
Mod author | 3viso |
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Download link |
Players who want to move on to start NG+ gameplay content in Horizon Forbidden West may not want to take the time to complete the game 100% beforehand. This save file can help with that, as it is perfect for starting NG+.
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This save has 100% completion on all aspects of the game. All skills are unlocked, and the save has every legendary weapon, armor, and outfit completely upgraded. It is easy to install, and just needs to be extracted into the save game folder.
