Horizon Zero Dawn Main Quest

Lore & Background

The story is set in a post-apocalyptic Western United States in the 30th century (specifically around 3040 AD). Humans live in scattered, primitive tribes. Large robotic machines dominate the Earth. A phenomenon known as the 'Derangement' caused machines to become more aggressive toward humans.

Aloy is cast out from the Nora tribe at birth and raised by a fellow outcast, Rost. As a child, she obtains a 'Focus', an augmented reality device. Curious about her origins, she trains to win the 'Proving', a tournament. Aloy wins the competition, but masked cultists suddenly attack.

Rost sacrifices himself to save Aloy from the cult leader, Helis. Aloy learns the cultists are a splinter faction called the Eclipse. Exploring the ruins of Faro Automated Solutions, Aloy discovers that the past civilisation was destroyed roughly 974 years ago when Faro lost control of its self-replicating, biomass-consuming military machines. Sobeck spearheaded 'Zero Dawn', a project to create an automated terraforming system to eventually deactivate the machines and restore life to Earth.

Aloy is contacted by Sylens, who guides her to a decommissioned military base. She learns that Zero Dawn was an underground network of cloning facilities and databases controlled by a single artificial intelligence, GAIA. After the extinction of life, GAIA successfully deactivated the Faro machines and built her own animalistic machines to restore the biosphere. She then reseeded life on Earth using stored data.

Reader's Guide

The player controls Aloy from a third-person view. She can dodge, sprint, slide, or roll to evade enemies. Armed with a spear for melee combat, she can also shoot enemies with bows and arrows, set traps, harpoon them, or slingshot explosives. Different ammunition types offer specialized utility.

Weapons can be modified. The player can hide in foliage to ambush enemies, and distract enemies by throwing rocks or whistling. Aloy wears a Focus that scans machines to identify their location, susceptibilities, level, and loot. Machines are categorized into classes.

The open world can be freely explored. Campfires save progress and allow fast travel. Aloy can hack some machines to use as mounts. Scaling Tallnecks reveals locations.

Exploring underground ruins unlocks additional machines to hack. The main questline handles mysteries about Aloy's origins; side quests flesh out the world. Players can choose responses when communicating with NPCs. Optional activities include raiding bandit camps, hunting challenges, and combat trials.

Collectables include vantages, metal flowers, and old relics. Players collect resources and machine parts to craft ammo, traps, and potions. Hunting animals provides materials for upgrades. Merchants sell weapons and outfits.

Aloy earns XP from quests and kills; bonus XP for skillful play. Skill Points upgrade abilities in three categories: stealth, combat, and healing/gathering. Rarer weapon variants become available as the player progresses.

Did You Know?

• Horizon Zero Dawn was Guerrilla Games' first new intellectual property since Killzone in 2004.
• The game's engine, Decima, was originally developed for Killzone: Shadow Fall.
• Anthropologists and robotics experts were consulted during development.
• The game's soundtrack was composed by Joris de Man, with contributions from The Flight.
• Horizon Zero Dawn sold over 24 million units.