Horizon: Zero Dawn marks a big change for Guerrilla Games, which is switching gears after more than 10 years developing the Killzone shooter franchise. A new series of trailers takes us behind the scenes for a look at what we can expect when the game launches on February 28.

The first video talks about how the studios went from developing shooters to a different genre. “Horizon Zero Dawn is the first time we are creating quests, so we had to invest a lot in terms of technology and the open-world engine, but also in assembling the team,” Managing Director Hermen Hulst said. “Hiring a writing team, a quest design team… it’s been a huge undertaking for the studio.”

The second video delves into the story and what it was like to design compelling quests for the game. “The main pillars of Horizon’s world were already there,” Narrative Director John Gonzalez said. “We had the lush, verdant nature. We had these mechanical beasts that are like robotic dinosaurs, and also human beings who are living in a more primitive or tribal state. At that point, how exactly those elements had come to exist in this world together hadn’t really been worked out.” 

The final video looks at the creation of a new franchise hero, Aloy, and discusses the numerous iterations the character went through before Guerrilla settled on the final version for the game. "There was so much about Aloy that the team felt vitally important they get right," Community Manager Jeroen Roding said in a blog post. "How she sees the world, how she interacts with other characters, and her deep relationship with Rost and how he helps her contend with being a tribal outcast." 

Horizon Zero Dawn is a PS4 exclusive and was one of our top picks from E3 last year.