Horizon Forbidden West Burning Shores Guide – How to Start

The brand new DLC for Horizon Forbidden West is an exciting new chapter in Aloy’s adventures as she travels south to the Burning Shores which corresponds to present-day Los Angeles City and Hollywood. Sadly, for PS4 players, it is exclusive to the next gen PS5. On the plus side, it is expected to be far more ambitious in scope and scale due to this hardware exclusivity.

Purchase and Installation plus Troubleshooting

Keep in mind that Burning Shores is a paid DLC–not free, and therefore must first be purchased digitally from the PlayStation Store for $20 USD, and clocks in at 17GB currently. Next, update the Horizon Forbidden West base game to version 1.021.000 (14GB currently) or higher if available. If you encounter a store glitch where the Burning Shores DLC is not downloading automatically, you can force it to do so by:

• Navigating to the Horizon Forbidden West tile on the Home Screen
• Pressing the Options button
• Selecting Manage Game Content
• Manually downloading the DLC–it should be listed as “HFW: The Burning Shores”
• Restarting the game if it is currently running in the background

Successful installation of the Burning Shores DLC will be indicated by the appearance of a logo that reads “Burning Shores” in the top-right corner of the title screen.

Loading up and First Steps

In order to begin the DLC chapter, completion of Horizon: Forbidden West’s main storyline is compulsory, specifically the main story’s final quest “Singularity.” Load up a completed save, and you’ll be greeted by a splash screen thanking you for installing the Burning Shores DLC. After hitting Confirm, begin by listening in on a conversation between Aloy and Sylens over her Focus device. Next, navigate to Tilda’s mansion, making use of campfires for fast travel, and then speak with Sylens in person. At the end of this conversation, you will be prompted to either stay or embark upon “To The Burning Shores” main questline. A cutscene will play, and then your next adventure begins.

New Game Plus

Note: The Burning Shores DLC cannot be started from a mid-NG+ run, even though by definition, you have already completed the game once in order to unlock the NG+ mode in the first place. You will have to either complete the run in its entirety, or resort to your normal post-completion save.

Burning Shores offers players the opportunity to revisit the deep and detailed post-apocalyptic world of Horizon Forbidden West. The main questline can be zipped through in roughly eight hours, and side questing can easily double that playtime.

Have a good time in desolate Los Angeles City!