horizon-forbidden-west-vr — Image courtesy Guerrilla, Nixxes Software

‘Horizon Forbidden West’ Gets Unofficial VR Support from ‘Horizon Zero Dawn’ Modder

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Apr 8, 2024

Luke Ross, the modder dedicated to bringing unofficial VR support to flatscreen games, released a new VR mod for the PC version of Horizon Forbidden West.

Only released on PC on March 21st, Horizon Forbidden West again follows series protagonist Aloy as she braves a majestic but dangerous new frontier that’s filled to the brim with bigger and more awe-inspiring machines.

Ross is already well-known in the space for having previously modded VR support for GTA V, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Mafia II via the R.E.A.L. VR mod injector, however due to a dispute with Rockstar Games, many of have been removed from the project’s Patreon, although continue to be available on GitHub.

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Like the Luke Ross VR mod for Guerilla Games’ Horizon Zero Dawn, which is built on the studio’s proprietary Decima game engine, the Horizon Forbidden West VR mod allows you to play in third-person, letting you essentially be a floating head over Aloy’s shoulder to take in all of the lush scenery. The mod also has a first-person mode, however as Eurogamer’s Ian Higton reports the latter is “not great at the moment,” as it makes combat significantly harder.

As with many of the latest R.E.A.L. VR mods, you’ll need to be a Patreon supporter to get access, which starts at $10 per month. If you’re looking to follow Ross, you can check out regular updates over at his Patreon page.

To see Horizon Forbidden West in action in VR, check out Higton’s full 20-minute video below:

Rudl Za Vedno

Modders are saving PCVR atm. I’m having so much fun with UEVR injector. High on life, Atomic heart, Trepang 2, The forgotten city all feel damn close to native VR games. Any suggestions what to try playing next?
- kakek
  
  gylt. Hidden gem.
  - Rudl Za Vedno
    
    Thanks
- Hussain X
  
  There is indeed an unbelievable amount of content on PCVR now thanks to the modders as well as many older native PCVR games which still run today on modern headsets.
- ViRGiNCRUSHER
  
  UEVR injector is pretty dang good. The Luke Ross mod supporting the game in the article are very hit and miss.
- david vincent
  
  – Chilling/exploration: ABZU, Stray, Jusant, Tchia
  – Less chilling exploration: Scorn (amazing Giger trip, native stereo mode works but no DLSS, you may need FSR); Robocop – Rogue City: Fun nostalgic trip, 6DOF motions controls, runs and looks great; High on Life : if you like Justin Roiland’s quirks
  – Spaceship combat : Chorus
  – Nice open-worlds: Grounded (better in multi but still fun in solo), Hogwarts Legacy : gorgeous open-world but the game is CPU bound so you may want to run it @60 fps with SSW ON.
- Hatori Hanzo
  
  tell me a bit more, what is euvr
- Markis
  
  You could try Final Fantasy VII Remake using UEVR (not LukeRoss…) but you have to use a special UEVR build Praydog has pinned on the discord.
  
  You could also check out Cyberpunk 2077 but only if you have a lower resolution headset otherwise it is basically unplayable without monstrous sacrifices to visual quality being made. See my other comment on here for specifics. This one is worth it though even for only a few hours just because of the immersion factor.
  
  There are some Resident Evil games that can be fun hit/miss in VR depending on your tastes, but don’t expect good visuals from them. The lighting and stuff makes them wonky and they can be stomach flipping for some people.
  
  Stalker 2 is one to set your sights on when it comes out, but obviously can’t play it yet.
  
  The new RoboCop game is one of the better UE5 entries and a visual treat.
Nothing to see here

Dear VR industry. Want to go mainstream? Make VR support as simple to implement as supporting oddly shaped monitors and ditch VR controllers as a requirement (gaming controllers work just fine, and are a lot safer to use). This way every 3D game can be a VR game. Yes the may require the latest GPUs but that just means your game will have a long shelf life as gamers upgrade their systems and can play your game in VR at a later date.
- Andrew Jakobs
  
  Ditch vr controllers? No way, only certain games are fun to play with a gamepad, like where you follow/move a third person character. To me VR controllers are a necessity for most first person games.
  - Totius
    
    The more options, the better
    - Arno van Wingerde
      
      Not necessarily: if the extra options are not delivering a good experience then they obscure the good games in a sea of poor ones. Also they may stop people from putting in even a low level of effort into making the game VR playable. I am not asking for full rewrites, but the UEVR injector would already provide a playable experience, asking for less is simply not productive IMHO.
- ViRGiN
  
  Nah, just get a big monitor with is a norm today and play the way it’s inyended. Why cosplay it as VR? 3DTV gaming didn’t take off for a reason. There is no reason why such use case would help anything but to look pcvr even further.
  
  You know, all vr software is competing about users time.
- NL_VR
  
  Then its not the “VR industry”.
  Part of the fun playing VR games is using motion controllers.
  if its playing with a regular controller its just a “flatgame in VR”.
  But i do agree, it should be standard to be able to play all games in VR.
Ender772

too much camera shaking…i dont think this is playable
Markis

Wont play it. LukeRoss’ method of VR projection is stomach wrenching and requires such fucking absurd resolutions to run at without extreme double image ghosting that the only way to play it on a headset that doesn’t have low resolution is to dramatically lower settings to allow it to have sane FPS at such high resolutions (we’re talking like 6-7kx6-7k resolutions on something like a HP Reverb G2 is mandatory, not optional, to run properly without the visual bugs).