Horizon Hunters Gathering 2nd Closed Playtest Set for May 22 to 25 - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 05 May 2026 / 1,590 Views
Publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment and developer Guerrilla Games announced the second closed playtest for Horizon Hunters Gathering is set for May 22 to 25.
The playtest is available on the PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam with registration available on the PlayStation Beta Program.
View a trailer of the second closed playtest below:
Here is the content in the second playtest:
Aside from quite a bit of implemented player feedback (which we will highlight at a later date), there will be a bunch of new content to explore.
- Two new Hunters: Aside from Rem, Sun, and Axle (who have each received improvements.), you can now get to know Ensa; a charismatic Oseram smuggler with a mercenary past. Or the mysterious Shadow, a Carja covert operative who commands a fearsome Stalker machine. We will be sharing a little more about them in the coming weeks.
- A playable Episode: Episodes play a central role in the game’s narrative campaign by introducing new mysteries, characters, and mechanics. Pick your Hunter, ready up, and head into the wilds to save Ashwater Valley from a horde of machines.
- Added difficulty: Two familiar game modes return with higher stakes than ever, as the war against the machines continues to ravage the wilds:
Machine Incursion is a high-intensity mission where waves of machines pour out from underground gateways, led by a formidable boss. To make things more interesting and encourage you to return for an even greater challenge, we’ve added two additional difficulty modes: Hard and Merciless. We dare all Hunters to try and beat a Thunderjaw and a Ravager at the same time…
Cauldron Descent is a longer, multi-stage trial pushing Hunters to their limits, from brutal machine encounters to hidden doors that promise power and reward for teams prepared to open them. Coordination and teamwork with other Hunters here are key to success, and our second playtest features even more challenging rooms to explore.
- New Region: Travel to Breakers’ Bounty, featuring dense jungles and ravaged ruins bordering a scorching desert home to dangerous machines, in order to save the Oseram and stop the incursion. You’ll also still have access to Devil’s Thirst, and of course the Gathering: the central social space where you can meet other players, build your loadout, and customize your camp.
- Play your way: Training Modules have been added to improve general onboarding for the game and its systems. For players wanting to master the hunt in Solo Mode, Hunter NPCs will be available for this playtest during Episode or Machine Incursion modes. These NPCs (either Rem, Sun, or Axle) offer battle assists where possible or can automatically fill an empty spot on a three-player team.
Horizon Hunters Gathering is in development for the PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
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Lol this is not cancelled?
Is this free to play?
If not then good luck getting more then 3000-4000 players.
Why would it be cancelled? Why would it be free?
So you think this game have any chance in oversaturated Live Service market? This will fail the same way as Marathon witch is great because we need Live Service genre gone once and for all.
Most of the money in the industry comes from live service. Sure we might wish for more single player adventures but for every game of the year Astro Bot or Expedition 33, there is an Arc Raiders selling twice or even 3 times as many copies as well as making bank from microtransactions.
Plus if you aren't interested in the game, just ignore it, comment positively on games you are interesting in. Or go play the Astro Bots and Expedition 33s GotYs to support them. Have you played either of those ? They are great. So is Arc Raiders, so is Helldivers 2, so is Marathon for that matter.
Yes but for every Helldivers 2 there are 5 Concords. Live Service genre is wet dream for many companies. It follows their favorite quote "you own nothing". They can support it as much as they want and they can pull the plug anytime they want leaving you with worthless piece of plastic (if you own physical copy), and you can't do anything about it.
There was 1 Concord.
Then don't buy or play them? Let them make what they want and you go out there and find the great games that aren't live service and deserve your money. This isn't a problem for you as you don't spend money on them, right?
Dude, you have zaro clue what I trying to say. At this point is just waste of time talking to you about this.
the ridiculousness of hating on live service games is something alright considering some of the biggest and most played games of the last decade have been live service.
The same as The Fury you completely missed on why I said what I said.
Ok, you like to be milked as much as they can milk you, you also don't care if they can pull the plug at any point and don't care about game preservation.
But others do care.
Live Service genre is made to keep you addicted and to spend as much money as you can on something that will just vanish at some point.
I just don't get how anyone can defende this.
This reads like you have an archaic interpretation of live service, and a misreading on ppl who like said games.
Would you levy the same complaints to a game like Gran Turismo 7?
And why critique constant monetisation when the game is a paid release, and therefore doesn't require constant monetisation nearly as much as a F2P variant?
You may as well complain about all the money ppl spent (and still spend) at arcade games because you'll never own the game and the arcade machine might be dropped at any given time.
Can't wait to check it out!
