Sony is releasing one of its biggest PlayStation 4 releases on PC as well. Hermen Hulst, the boss of Sony Worldwide Studios, confirmed Horizon: Zero Dawn’s port in a PlayStation blog. The postapocalyptic robo-dinosaur adventure is launching on PC this summer. Here’s its store page on Steam.
Horizon: Zero Dawn debuted on PlayStation 4 in 2017. It quickly turned into one of the biggest new properties of the current generation of consoles. Now, a new audience will get a chance to play it without having to first purchase Sony hardware.
“Yes, I can confirm that Horizon Zero Dawn is coming to PC this summer,” Hulst said. “There will be more information coming from Guerrilla, [and] from the new studio directors [Michiel van der Leeuw, JB van Beek, and Angie Smets] pretty soon.”
Sony is publishing Horizon on PC. This is unlike games like Journey, Detroit: Become Human, and more that were PS4 exclusives and then released on PC under different publishers.
Sony explains its reasons for bringing Horizon: Zero Dawn to PC
This is a major move for Sony, but it doesn’t represent a seismic shift away from consoles. Hulst says the company doesn’t plan to move all of its games to PCs. And anything that does get a release on Windows won’t come anytime near the debut on a PlayStation device.
“Releasing one first-party AAA title to PC doesn’t necessarily mean that every game now will come to PC,” said Hulst. “In my mind, Horizon Zero Dawn was just a great fit in this particular instance. We don’t have plans for day and date [PC releases], and we remain 100% committed to dedicated hardware.”
But then why is Sony doing this? Well, for one, it’s going to bring in more money from first-party games that are expensive to produce. But it’s also a new way to build brand recognition as Sony moves into followups for games like Horizon on PlayStation 5.
“I think it’s important that we stay open to new ideas of how to introduce more people to PlayStation,” said Hulst. “And [to] show people maybe what they’ve been missing out on.”