Update: Sure enough, the day after I wrote this piece, Guerrilla Games mentioned that they have some sort of story update in the works for Horizon Zero Dawn.
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You may have missed it. I know I almost did.
We exist in a climate of video game add-ons, special editions, map packs, and iconic baseball hats, lost in the deafening onslaught of pre-orders and ultimate editions. Yet, one of the biggest, most anticipated games of 2017, Horizon Zero Dawn, has arrived without mention of a season pass, or any future DLC content for that matter.
In fact, when asked about future DLC in an interview with PlayStation LifeStyle, Roland Ijzermans, Lead Concept Artist for Guerrilla Games, dodged the question. Here’s what he said:
I’m here to talk about this one and not about future plans.
Let that sink in for a moment.
For a triple-A video game to not have any announcement about future DLC plans before release is pretty much unheard of these days. Yet here comes Horizon Zero Dawn, which has thus far remained unsullied by the greed and the grit that so many of its predecessors have fallen prey to.
Sure, it’s not completely fair to say this was a game without any DLC at all. There were, after all, some pre-order bonuses, which granted some bonus weapons and armor, and there have thankfully been several patches to get rid of bugs. But the lack of season pass or future content plans means that nothing was cut from the game so it could be monetized for later release. The game we got at launch was the full Horizon Zero Dawn experience, nothing less.
And, for a game this gorgeous, with so many cool features, not having to wait in anticipation for the next content pack is a breath of fresh air.
