The latest game from Guerrilla Games set the world alight when it was released earlier this year, with praise aimed at the fantastic graphics, the unreal gameplay, and to be honest, everything else – the game just felt so fluid, and that comes down to the engine that was used in its development. It has now been confirmed by Guerrilla Games that the Horizon Forbidden West engine will now be used in a few upcoming PlayStation 5 releases. It says a lot for the quality of the game and its engine that it is now being touted for use in other games, instead of more established engines, such as Unreal Engine 5 even.
The Horizon Forbidden West engine is called the Decima engine, and it has the power to create entire in-game worlds. The engine first came into prominence when Guerrilla Games used it to work on Killzone: Shadow Fall all the way back in 2013, which then led to Horizon Zero Dawn becoming the biggest game to date that used Decima. Due to the success of the original Horizon game – with it being one of the best titles of the year, one that looked incredible too – the Decima engine was then updated so that the successor could take the series to the next level.
However, even though the studio has been the major operator of the engine, it does not have exclusive ownership of it, which is why other companies are now showing interest in it. In a recent interview with Famitsu, PlayStation Studios boss Hermen Hulst announced that the Decima engine would be used by many other studios. It is not known which specific studios would be in the running to use this engine, but a recently leaked document that named a few Sony titles led to a big group of fans wondering what the future could hold.
Some reports are claiming that the sequel to Death Stranding could possibly use the Decima engine, although that might have been quite obvious seeing as the original used the Decima engine. How about this one then: it has been claimed that the upcoming Horizon: Call of the Mountain from the Firesprite studio could also be set to use the Decima engine. Again, that might not come as a surprise though, as the future game is part of the Horizon series – we’re stating the obvious here a little bit, aren’t we?
If rumors regarding a Horizon Zero Dawn remake are to be true, then gamers could potentially see the updated version of Decima in full swing. What is it with all these remakes of already gorgeous and fluid games, games that have not even collected dust yet and hardly show any wrinkles? Money talks, I guess, and that will certainly sell extremely well.