Summary
Released in 2022 as the sequel toHorizon Zero Dawn,Horizon Forbidden Westlaunched to critical acclaim, hailed as one of thebest modern open-world games, and as one of thebest-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.
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.
Mod author
Download link
DLSS And Frame Gen 3.6.0 Update
The original version ofHorizon Forbidden Westwas released with an older version of Nvidia DLSS. Players began to notice that the game sufferedperformance problemsin certain places, and the modding community took it upon themselves to fix this problem.
TheDLSS and Frame Gen 3.6.0 Update modbrings DLSS and frame generation up to version 3.5.10, whichoffers a significant performance boostto 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.
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Visuals Enhanced (ReShade’s Pack)
Even though the graphics of the original version ofHorizon Forbidden Westwere very well-received, modders wanted more. With excellent tools such as the open-sourceReShade,which acts as middleware between a game and GPU drivers to directly modify the display available, thisVisuals Enhanced modwas 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.
No More Yellow Tint
This mod does something very simple indeed. As mentioned above, the originalHorizon Forbidden Westcamera 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.
TheNo More Yellow Tint modcomes 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.
dragoncosmico
Real Darkness
Horizon Forbidden Westis 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 theReal 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.
Savefiles For New Game Plus Or Burning Shores
This mod is a set of 8 save game files that can help players start a clean playthrough ofHorizon 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:
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HFW 100percent Savefile - Perfect For NG Plus
Players who want to move on to start NG+ gameplay content inHorizon Forbidden Westmay 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+.
This save has 100% completion on all aspects of the game. All skills are unlocked, and the save has everylegendary weapon, armor, and outfit completely upgraded. It is easy to install, and just needs to be extracted into the save game folder.
