PS5's Horizon Forbidden West Has "Virtually No Loading Screens"

Sony's Horizon Zero Dawn sequel, Forbidden West, will make use of the PlayStation 5's SSD to help improve load times dramatically. According to game director Mathijs de Jonge, there will be "virtually no loading screens" in Forbidden West.

"With the PS5's SSD, there will be virtually no loading screens," he said in a new video from PlayStation. "In an open-world game like Horizon Forbidden West, if you open up the map and fast travel from one end to the other, restarting from a check-point will be super fast. And when you boot up the game, you're right there--in the action."

The PS5's SSD has been one of the console's most-discussed features so far. Developers have spoken at length about how it will help improve load times and how this will make for an overall better gaming experience.

Capcom said Resident Evil Village will have "no load times" on PS5, while 2K Sports said NBA 2K21 will feature "drastically improved load speeds." The head of PlayStation, Jim Ryan, said Sony's Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart will have loading that happens "instantaneously," and this represents a "paradigm shift" for gaming.

For what it's worth, Microsoft's Xbox Series X also features an SSD that will help its games run and load faster. The Xbox Series X has a 1 TB SSD, while the PS5 has a 825 GB SSD.

Forbidden West is aiming to launch in 2021 on PlayStation 5. It's a sequel to 2017's PlayStation 4 game, Zero Dawn, which is headed to PC later this year.

Like the first game, Forbidden West is being developed by Guerrilla Games and features the Game of Thrones-inspired main character Aloy who lives in a world overrun by gigantic machine-robots.