Horizon Forbidden West is one of the best-looking games of this generation – in fact, it won ‘best graphics’ in our awards last year. With abundant foliage, beautiful lighting, and stunning environmental detail, Guerilla Games’ open world sequel was seriously impressive – but the Burning Shores DLC looks poised to be even more spectacular. A reworked cloud rendering system alongside PS5 exclusivity promises graphical enhancements above and beyond the base game experience. So how does Burning Shores raise the visual bar? And does the increased fidelity come at a performance cost?
It’s important to know that Burning Shores takes place after the main story in Horizon Forbidden West, so you need an endgame save with a high-level character to complete it. Right after booting the game with the expansion installed, you’ll be invited to the new area – which is about a third of the size of the main game. It’s big and breathtaking, from the moment you arrive to the climactic end of the story hours later; the new content is a visual treat throughout.
Before we get into why Burning Shores looks so special, let’s cover off the essentials. As with Forbidden West, Burning Shores is offered in ‘favour resolution’, ‘balanced’ and ‘favour performance’ modes. The resolution mode runs at 30fps but with a native 4K image, balanced mode runs at 40fps (ideal for 120Hz displays) at a checkerboarded 4K; performance mode runs at 60fps with a checkerboarded 1800p.
