Everything You Need To Know About Aloy's Story Before Horizon Forbidden West

thegamer.com:

Horizon: Forbidden West is a big game. It's the sequel to Horizon: Zero Dawn, and if you're just getting into the series you might be wondering what's going on. Aloy was also the protagonist in Zero Dawn, and her journey has brought her to an entirely new region of the world.

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If you want to jump right into Forbidden West without playing through Zero Dawn (which is understandable, since both games are very long), here's a summary of Aloy's first adventure and the events that led her to travel west.

Major spoilers for Horizon: Zero Dawn are beyond this point.

The world into which Aloy was born is one inhabited by tribes of humans in the rough equivalent of the late Stone Age and early Bronze Age, and players can tell almost right away that this society is built on the long-forgotten ruins of our modern world. Robots in the form of animals roam the earth in packs, behaving similarly to their biological counterparts, who are nowhere to be found.

The Nora, the tribe inhabiting the Rocky Mountains, worship a sacred peak that they believe to be the home of All-Mother, the goddess who created humanity. When a newborn baby girl was discovered alone inside the sacred mountain, the tribal elders were divided; some argued that the girl was a gift from All-Mother, but others pointed out that a motherless child in their matriarchal society was a bad omen who would bring curses on their people.

The infant was given to Rost, an outcast warrior who had been exiled by the tribe, to raise. This compromise allowed the child to remain close to the tribe but far enough away that if she was indeed cursed she could be kept out of Nora society. Rost named the baby Aloy an