Knocking on Death's Door: Designing a New Bunker for 'Horizon Forbidden West'

In this 2022 Level Design Summit session, Guerrilla’s Blake Rebouche goes in-depth explaining the creation and iteration process of the new Horizon Forbidden West quest, “Death’s Door.”

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[dionkemp]

Dear GDC, we need more breakdowns like this 🙏

[evanlane]

Fun watch. Seeing the iteration is key. I think with a lot of the GDC talks we hear "And we iterated a lot." but the specifics of that iteration gets glossed over.
It was really nice to see the process from a very successful, long iteration cycle.
Thanks for sharing this! It's hard to open yourself up to peer critique, but I (definitely NOT a peer... hobbyist at best) learned a lot from the talk.

[imperfectgamedev]

Amazing breakdown. So great to see how they balance narrative and gameplay.

[k.kuzziah]

I have so much respect and admiration for everyone over at Guerilla who have made this game an amazing labor of love.

[tylerboyce]

Thank goodness! This was the #1 session I was hoping to see at GDC, so I'm glad it's finally be released from the Vault.

[gosu]

I really liked this quest. I found the 'traversal parkour puzzle' in the big room rather challenging, but it was a change of pace that I enjoyed. The boss fight was probably one of the most memorable fights of the game imo and it set the bar for what was coming later in the story. It was fascinating to see the work that was put behind it, really puts things into perspective

[gShop]

I am feeling sad for Blake, because of all the hand-holding that he had to implement back to his puzzle design.(bright points, voice queues, markers, hints - the whole lot). I do believe that this is sacrificing the joy of discovery and the satisfaction of overcoming those hurdle by yourself, even if you need a couple of tries. I get that those games are being shipped for very wide audiences, but still it seems sad that all of the solutions are plainly spelled out by Aloy herself, constantly.

[MoosebreathMan]

It’s funny how they never solved the problem where the player is always looking up and away from the boss. Almost every iteration (except the shield overcharge one) has this issue. I assume it just got to a point where it was way too expensive to change the design with all the art resources pouring into the spider.

[uxorioushornet]

I'd love to hear more about the ACE pillar method. It sounds like a great test to make sure encounters will be meaningful and fun. Reminds me of the CPNR method Extra Credits talked about when they analyzed the first floor of Durlag's Tower in Baldur's Gate.

[maxgrieve]

A really interesting talk. Have to say that I too, like many it seems, found the traversal sequence a pretty hard slog when I played it. But hearing here how tight time was for gameplay tuning, gotta say that makes a lot more sense now!

For the record though, this quest didn't 'nearly make me quit'. Not even close. The cinematics and interactions before entering the facility made it clear this was going to be a Big Deal for the story, then the (very spoilery, like he says) revelations in the recluse chamber felt like a suitably big reward for the effort. I ended up feeling my experience on the quest was worth it.

Yeah, could argue that's more down to luck with Narrative bailing out Quest - but game design is a team effort. Overall Guerrilla smashed it with HFW.

[kaba]

Really interesting ! Even if I didn't really liked that section of the game. Thought it lacked direction. Level designers did their best with the mechanics they had but for me most of the new game deisgn elements (unable to grapple below water, need to grapple traps, same tool used for grappling and pulling but different distance, etc.) make no sense and feel too game-y. The iterations are better and better but maybe it just lacked some focus from the very beginning. The final result is of astonishing quality though. Thank your very much for sharing this content !

[mutalix]

PlayStation 1st party studios are just built different, either they're setting the standard by which other games are judged or totally blowing the previous ceiling of quality.

[JM.....]

The whole pullcaster thing really didnt add much to the game, and seems like it really became a central focus point of quests, despite of that.
It was a puzzle feature, without any purpose besides being a new puzzle feature. It over gimmicks all puzzles

Players dont care that your engine can now do pull mechanics, we had the rope launcher to lock down machines in HZD, this is just that, but on the env.

Override doors make sense, theyre controlled access points.
Water sections make sense, things flood.
Shootable ladders make sense, and reward spacial awareness.
HZD puzzles were about exploring spaces, and overriding access points so you could explore the next space, which was consistent with the game narrative of exploring the old world

[daanduijkers]

Personally, I think the developers should find another way to progress quests than "Aloy talking to herself".

It often causes her to solve solve puzzles before the player does and many hardcore gamers have voiced their annoyance!

[Mawal]

Aw man I thought this was about Death's Door

[sebastienbarre]

This is interesting and disheartening at the same time, since he clearly spent a ton of time on this quest, but this was for me (and some others here apparently) the quest that almost made me quit the game. The platforming section in the pillars room was so frustrating to me as it was too easy to fall in the water, leading to lengthy and needless back-tracking. The player can see the door to reach from the very start of the room, and all that spiderman-ing around felt like padding. I had a truly bad time with the swimming mechanics from start to finish in this sequel, and the escape sequence near the end of this quest is very high on my list of overall grievances. I had to take a break from the game after that level for sure. It's surprising because there are other games that implement swimming mechanics a lot better, why not copy the same systems? (say, Sekiro).

[TDVL]

For the future: add a Gen-Z mode. So the rest of us can get decent puzzles and actual challenges. Also, when the entire level is based on a poor idea, no amount of technicality will make it good. Better yes, good no. The level is about a single story beat: introducing the invincible Far Zenith guys (a bad idea to begin with), their Spectres (that suck) and Beta (she is actually a good idea). There are embellishments of world building (everything Travis), but other than that it is like the majority of the game puzzles: inconsequential. The much less sophisticated HZD bunkers and puzzles had been significantly more interesting just because of the mystery-exploration component. No story-stakes here other than the obvious MacGuffin Gaia copy and a weak one at that, even if Sylens is used to make it more serious.

[JasonHoningford]

This is amazing, but I find this puzzle type gameplay really frustrating and boring.

[vinniemassimino]

Another great one GDC. Unfortunately, my brain is now tarnished when thinking about Horizon Forbidden West. Watching this *after* seeing Blake Rebouche's Elden Ring tweet "nor quest design, really" made his talk wildly informative... TL;DR, he created the discussion, so I'll continue it - HFW vs Elden Ring? HFW is "quest design" vs Elden Ring's pure gameplay
In Elden Ring, FromSoftware took core elements from their past games, added and improved upon them, and presented a refined product. In HFW, Guerrilla over-designed much of the game. They also placed too much emphasis focus on new mechanics.
I would argue the story in the Death's Door mission was supposed to have the same payoff ("whoa") as HZD when you climb Faro's tower. In HZD, you have multiple possibilities: stealth, full combat - options to reach the boss before the dramatic payoff. Here? Use Pullcaster, pullcaster again, pullcaster... "Is this is a "puzzle"? Aloy self talks frequently, and the player is practically told to hurry up and finish.
In addition, why all of the underwater segments? Since when were pullcasters and underwater segments the strengths of Horizon's gameplay?
I was so bothered and bored by the level I didn't feel a dramatic payoff.
Before February 2022, I would never have thought to compare Horizon to FromSoft, but now that I have to, maybe this guy could learn a thing or two from Elden Ring: play to your strengths, create opportunities for the player to accomplish the goal how they want, when they want, and it'll be more satisfying for the player when they get it done. (And stop giving excessive hints.)

[nakirisama]

I remember he criticized Elden Ring on twitter, "No quest design, really."