Horizon Forbidden West Update Targets Players Afflicted by Thalassophobia

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Image: Guerrilla Games

Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is releasing exclusively for PlayStation 5 tomorrow, and the new DLC will be complemented by a patch that adds a number of new accessibility features, including one that addresses Thalassophobia, Guerrilla Games has confirmed. Thalassophobia is described as the persistent and intense fear of deep bodies of water (e.g., the sea, oceans, or lakes), and while some Horizon Forbidden West players have apparently suffered from that, with the game featuring a good number of underwater segments, the update promises to make those more tolerable by improving underwater ambient visibility and allowing players to breathe indefinitely, regardless of story progression. Guerrilla Games has also released a launch trailer for Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores that shows off one of Aloy’s new costumes, as well as what appears to be a big battle with a Horus machine.

From an r/Horizon post:

Will there be new accessibility features for Horizon Forbidden West added with this DLC?
Yes! With the patch released alongside this DLC, we’ll be adding a number of new accessibility features such as:

  • Thalassophobia – This feature aims to ease thalassophobia symptoms by improving underwater ambient visibility and allowing you to breathe indefinitely, regardless of story progression.
  • Improved UI readability options – Added options to increase waypoint and quest icon sizes.
  • Navigation Assist – Added an option to assist the player’s orientation during a quest, with a new option added in Focus mode to face the camera towards the current objective. Additionally, if the user has a waypoint set the camera will prioritize aiming towards this direction.
  • Color Blind settings – Added new color blind accessibility options.
  • Auto Camera – Added an option to allow the camera to follow your movement behavior from the left stick without having to control it with the right stick.
  • HUD Vignette – Added an option to add a vignette to darken the edges of the screen, increasing contract and improving HUD readability.
  • Auto Pickup – Added an option to automatically collect pickups without button-press interactions from the player.
  • Improved Subtitle Sizes – Increased the size of subtitles for the Large and Extra Large options.

Please note, you do not need to own the DLC to make use of these features as they will be patched into Horizon Forbidden West.

Will all accessibility features from Horizon Forbidden West be compatible with this DLC?
All features previously implemented for Horizon Forbidden West will work in Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores.

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Tsing Mui
News poster at The FPS Review.

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