The beginning of the new blog post focuses on Aloy’s Stealth combat. Guerrilla Games intends on bringing more fluidity and versatility to all of Aloy’s combat decisions and associated animations. Her new combat abilities are intended to add another layer to Aloy’s story and development according to Richard Oud, Gameplay Animation Director for Horizon Forbidden West. New clips in the blog post show Aloy smoothly chaining attacks, showing off her athleticism, combat ability, and gadget proficiency all in one smooth take.

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In the new clips, Aloy is flexing her new combat versatility on both Humans and Machines. These combat improvements are not one-sided though, as the enemy AI is built to react better to the threat that Aloy is. Human AI will be able to search as a group for her, instead of separating and making it easy to get picked off. Machines will read and react as well. The example given by Lead AI Programmer Arjen Beij claims that Machines with swimming capabilities will chase after Aloy if she dives into the water and attack. A clip in the blog post shows this as Aloy has to dodge a machine darting after her. If there is a mixed team of enemy humans and machines, humans will react accordingly if they come across an allied machine downed by Aloy.

With all the visual layers being added, the team at Guerrilla Games has also upgraded the game audio to match. Specifically, with the Machine enemies are all built with unique sound cues for different situations. Machines that are passive or not alert to Aloy will sound vastly different from their combat sounds. The player will also be able to hear unique audio cues when fighting machines for both melee attacks and ranged attacks and learn how to adapt to the threat of multiple machines. More audio cues will be heard in the game world, and not only to the player. Human Enemy AI will be programmed to hear wayward arrows better in the game world and will react accordingly.

Aloy’s new combat acumen won’t be native when fans first get their hands on the game though. As Richard Oud the Animation Director continues Aloy’s combat fluidity will be tied to the skill tree in Horizon Forbidden West. The added layers of skill abilities, along with armor mods, valor surges, and craft tables, are sure to create more unique experiences for fans.

Horizon Forbidden West will release on February 18, 2022 for PS4 and PS5.

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