Horizon Forbidden West

• “Horizon Forbidden West” is an action role-playing game released in 2022 on the PlayStation, where players take on the role of Aloy, a female hunter who must venture into uncharted lands and battle against mechanical monsters to uncover the origins behind a terrible blight which will annihilate all life on the planet.
• Others have accused the developers of ignorance and insensitivity.
• Both points of view demonstrate how “Horizon Forbidden West” can help audiences make sense of the present despite being set 1,000 years in the future.
• In the words of Avad, “change will not come in a single sunrise”.
• The game’s unique mythology, engaging characters, and enhanced combat systems are explored in a comprehensive guide to “Horizon Forbidden West” and genre.
• The post-apocalyptic world of “Horizon Forbidden West” is set around 1,000 years in the future and beyond the cultural context of the 21stcentury, so it is important to critically assess the representations of ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and social class, including their impact on the contemporary audience.
• Many commentators have praised the developers for including a diverse cast of characters, especially the representation of groups who are often marginalised in the industry.
• In terms of ethnicity, the game features a broad range of faces in Meridian and around the Daunt, with an impressive authenticity to the non-playable characters (NPCs).
• The Lead Character Artist at Guerrilla, Bastien Ramisse, described how his team aimed to improve the quality and fidelity of the models to make them more believable and inspirational.
• Computer games have been criticised for normalising power imbalances in society by underrepresenting and stereotyping minority ethnic groups.
• Williams (2009) and his team analysed characters from the 100 best-selling computer games of 2005, highlighting the overrepresentation of white males compared to other demographic profiles.
• The worldbuilding in “Horizon Forbidden West” is impressive with the developers constructing a vibrant history and culture for each tribe.
• Some players have reacted favourably to the game’s progressive stance towards the representation of ethnicity, gender, and sexuality.
• When Aloy bows and then thanks the Sun-King for his gift in the interlude, the developers are positioning the player to react favourably to his authority.
• Avad abolished slavery, opened opportunities for women to enter the military, and is trying to build better relationships with the other tribes.
• The representation of power and the powerless is important in science fiction texts.
• An open world game should be open to everyone.
• “Horizon Forbidden West” features a variety of gender identities, backgrounds, and orientations, which is a step in the right direction.
• In her study of top-selling game magazines and a sample of 149 computer game covers, Burgess (2011) concluded that “minority females are virtually absent in game representations” and “minority males” are overrepresented as aggressive “thugs” and “athletes”.
• George Gerbner argued there was a correlation between our perception of violence in the world and our consumption of violence on television.
• Stuart Hall identified three theoretical decoding positions: a dominant reading, a negotiated reading, and an oppositional reading.
• A dominant reading of “Horizon Forbidden West” could praise the representations of ethnicity encoded by the game’s designers.
• Some critics have taken a negotiated or even an oppositional reading of the text and accused Guerilla of relying on racist tropes and cultural appropriation.
• bell hooks encouraged audiences to be “enlightened witnesses” and think carefully about the representations we see in the media.
• When a woman did appear onscreen, they were often stereotyped as the damsel in distress who needed rescued by the male protagonist.
• Even allies of the Carja are reduced to cruel and untamed animals.
• Liesbet van Zoonen (1996) believed media representations “symbolically denigrate women, either by not showing them at all, or by showing them in stereotypical roles”.
• The producers intentionally romanticised the narrative of the American cowboy venturing into the wild west to bring order to the frontier and ignored the people who already called that landscape their home.
• In the game’s first interlude, Marad tells Aloy “the west is called ‘forbidden’ for a reason” – the Tenakth are a “tribe of ferocious warriors” who will hunt her on sight.
• Aloy is being taught to fear the Tenakth so it is no surprise she calls them “killers”.
• The Carja are one of the largest tribes in “Horizon Forbidden West”.
• The Tenakth dress in leathers and furs, wear ornate headgear, and cover their skin in heavy warpaint and tattoos – an aesthetic that seems to be inspired by Native American cultures.
• Guerilla Games are clearly not the first production company to be accused of exploiting indigenous cultures and identities to entertain a modern audience.
• Throughout much of their written history, the Carja positioned themselves as the superior force in the world and represented outsiders as “primitive” and “savage”.
• The binary opposition between the powerful Sundom and the “primitive” tribes they tried to conquer, especially during the Red Raids, is similar to the discourse European imperialists used to justify their civilising missions.
• The Sung-King, Avad, then warns the protagonist “that tribe is renowned for its brutality”.
• The creator of the Horizon franchise, Jan-Bart van Beek, responded to the criticism, saying they tried to “honor, respect and celebrate” our “shared legacy” in their depictions of the tribes and their cultures.
• The computer games industry has certainly been criticised for many years for underrepresenting women.
• According to scripture, the Carja migrated from the “Savage East” to settle in Meridian and cultivate the land.
• Some commentators believe the redheaded Aloy reinforces the white saviour trope.