Meet the Machines is a series of tweets that Guerrilla Games puts out to describe some of the new machine-based enemies that will be coming with Horizon Forbidden West. The tweets release sporadically, but they provide little summaries on the machine in question whenever they do.
The last tweet Guerrilla released in the series described the Sunwing, one Horizon Forbidden West's new flying machines. However, today's tweet focuses on machines known as Tremortusks, land-based enemies that fans will recognize from the game's announcement trailer.
Guerrilla describes Tremortusks as lumbering fortresses that belong to the combat class. Their names, of course, stem from their large sizes and giant tusk. But outside of these fearsome aspects, they also have weapons hidden all over their bodies. The armor surrounding their bodies is also apparently indestructible, which echoes the description Guerrilla gave to the shell of the new Shellsnapper machine introduced a few weeks ago.
Horizon Forbidden West looks to have based the Tremortusk on the woolly mammoth — at least that's what it looks like from the size of their tusks and trunks. The idea that Tremortusks are fortresses may have also come from the fact that early humans used mammoth tusks to build shelters.
If Tremortusks' sheer size didn't give away how powerful and dangerous they are, then their class should. Being a part of the combat-class puts Tremortusks up there with the likes of Thunderjaws and Stormbirds, the two most powerful machines introduced in Horizon Zero Dawn.
Tremortusks may even end up being more formidable than the Thunderjaws and the Stormbirds, as their "fortress" aspect implies that Aloy will typically have to deal with humans too whenever she fights them. Mammoths also like to move in herds, so Aloy may find herself having to deal with two or more at once, which, depending on their hidden weapons, sounds nightmarish.
On the other hand, it will be interesting to see what taking control of Tremortusks will look like. In Horizon Zero Dawn, taking control of a combat-class machine just turned it against enemies for a short amount of time. But since the Tremortusks are built something like fortresses, maybe players will be able to ride the huge things around, even for just a short period of time. It doesn't seem likely, but Forbidden West being Zero Dawn's successor really should add more variety in what happens when the player takes over machines.
Horizon Forbidden West releases on PS5 in 2021.
