It might be the first time a phobia has been dealt with in this way.
If you’ve never heard of thalassophobia before, then that probably means you or anyone close to you don’t suffer from it. If you have, then you likely already know that it the term used to describe the fear of deep water.
In a unique update, PlayStation have added a new mode to their hit game Horizon Forbidden West, which will allow players suffering with thalassophobia to hopefully enjoy the sections of the story which sees the player journey into the depths of San Francisco Bay.
On the eve of the release of the game’s new DLC, titled Burning Shores, the developers of the game announced the following on Reddit: “This feature aims to ease thalassophobia symptoms by improving underwater ambient visibility and allowing you to breathe indefinitely, regardless of story progression.”
This addition has been added alongside a host of new accessibility features for both the original game and the Burning Shores DLC, including improved UI readability options, navigation assist, colour blind settings, auto camera, HUD vignette, auto pickup and improved subtitle sizes.
In terms of new types of quality of life additions to games, focusing one on a specific phobia in order to allow certain players to enjoy aspects of the game more is actually kind of brilliant.
Meanwhile, Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is available exclusively for the PS5 from today (Wednesday 19 April).
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