Burning Shores is here and gets a lot of praise in the first tests at Metacritic. But there are also points of criticism, for example with the scope.
Aloy”s latest journey to Horizon Forbidden West takes her to lava-strewn Los Angeles – where new machines are lurking for her, of course. In the first reviews of the international press the DLC Burning Shores collects a lot of praise.
We take a look at the current metascore in the scoreboard, collect the most important votes and of course also look at what is criticized. You want to take a look at what Burning Shores looks like first? We”ve recorded the first 13 minutes for you on PS5 (without spoilers about the story or the new machines):
Burning Shores at Metacritic: More than just pretty to look at
The DLC currently comes to a (Metascore) of 80 with 13 press reviews Of these, eleven are positive and two are mixed. The base game Horizon Forbidden West stands at a Metascore of 88.
When looking at the scores, it is noticeable that most of them are in the 80s, with a few outliers upwards. The lowest rating is currently a 70. Also in the praise and criticism points are almost all reviewers agree, more about this you can read under the table.
| Website | rating |
|---|---|
| GamesHub | 100 |
| MeuPlayStation | 82 |
| Screen Rant | 80 |
| IGN | 80 |
| Push Square | 80 |
| VGC | 80 |
| Digital Trends | 70 |
What the international tests say
The new story about Aloy and her companion Seyka as well as the spectacularly beautiful graphicsare especially often praised. The DLC gets deductions in some tests because it doesn”t add much new and also doesn”t iron out any weaknesses, for example in the bloated upgrade system.
(Gameshub) has given the highest possible rating to Burning Shores. Tester Leah J. Williams is excited about the new map in her conclusion:
The smaller islands where this chapter of the story takes place are breathtaking. From realistic water lapping at sandy beaches to volcanic mountain peaks and high altitude dinosaur amusement parks, Burning Shores is filled with beautiful sights.
Kyle Gratton of (Screenrant) awards an 80 (or 4 out of 5 stars, which equates to an “Excellent” on the website). In his eyes, Burning Shores is an almost all-around successful expansion – but it falls short:
Burning Shores is a monumental chapter in Aloy”s journey and an incredible follow-up to Horizon Forbidden West, even if the story is a bit rushed.(…) Burning Shores may be woefully short, but it”s still great, and its technical achievements raise high expectations for the third installment in the series from Guerrilla Games.
Simon Cardy from (IGN) also had a lot of fun with the DLC and awards it an 8 out of 10 – according to the IGN scale, that results in a “Great”. He only didn”t like some of the boss fights. His conclusion is as follows:
Burning Shores is a worthwhile addition to this acclaimed, action-heavy sci-fi series. Fun new challenges and enemies are introduced, and cool new ways to take them down are presented regularly. (…) Aside from a few bad boss fights, it”s a great new chapter with enough creative bells and whistles to more than satisfy fans.
One of the most critical scores has been given by Giovanni Colantonio for (Digital Trends) . 3.5 stars out of 5 are given to the DLC, which he says is pretty and fun, but remains too superficial and offers little in the way of truly new content.
If you”re not already sold on the Horizon formula, Burning Shores probably won”t excite you. The DLC is a bite-sized version of Forbidden West with only a few new tricks of its own. (…) Burning Shores offers few new features overall, though there are enough to justify the DLC. It adds only a small handful of new machines, but each is memorable in its own way.
What do Metacritic users say? Burning Shores” user score comes in significantly lower than the press ratings, with a 5.4 out of 67 user reviews. Most of the negative comments are bothered by a homosexual kissing scene. At this point, we issue a clear spoiler warning: In many user reviews, the ending of the DLC is given away.
Burning Shores is PS5-exclusive, the main game Forbidden West is only available on PS4 and PS5 so far. Since the predecessor was also released on PC after a few years, we firmly assume that Horizon 2 will also run on the computer at home one day. The big story DLC Frozen Wilds was directly included in part 1.
