Horizon Forbidden West: Platinum GAIA Recovery

Trophy 16: Completed 3 Relic Ruins

Official Description: Discovered and completed 3 Relic Ruins.
Type: Bronze
Earned on: March 13th, 2022
Overall Earned: #1821

Relic Ruins are yet another variety of new side activity where you solve environment puzzles to get at an ornament thingy. My 3rd one was the Restless Weald. This required use of a train cart to access areas. It took me forever to find the access code for the computer. It was an obvious number on the side of the building. Sigh.

Trophy 17: Reached Level 20

Official Description: Reached player level 20.
Type: Bronze
Earned on: March 13th, 2022
Overall Earned: #1822

Solving the 3rd Relic Ruin was the last bit of XP I needed for level 20. I was definitely overleveled for the entire story. Getting lost in side content and one-shotting the main story is what I do best!

Trophy 18: Established the Base

Official Description: Secured a base of operations and rebooted GAIA.
Type: Bronze
Earned on: June 16th, 2022
Overall Earned: #1823

Very long story short, Aloy finished off the orb-ly remains of HADES (Sylens had interrogated it to death) and learned of a GAIA backup in a facility called the HADES Proving Grounds. After tracking down two backup copies of GAIA, Aloy learns she needs all of the subordinate functions to fully restore her.

Aloy is rudely interrupted by another clone of Elisabet Sobeck and a group of super advanced jerk humans who try to kill her. After almost drowning in the escape, Varl rescues Aloy and he finds a girlfriend named Zo in a pro-nature machine-worshipping tribe called the Utaru.

MINERVA, the subordinate function Aloy catches a signal from, was hiding out in a Cauldron that happens to be in a cave the Utaru considered sacred. The Chorus (the Utaru’s leadership council) refused to let Aloy enter but an inexplicable surge of violent machines helps Aloy, Varl and Zo get inside anyway.

HEPHAESTUS was behind all the deranged machines, of course. After Aloy cleansed it from the Cauldron, she discovered a facility area in the Cauldron where MINEVRA was hiding. It felt lost and alone, but stood down when Aloy assured the poor subordinate function that it will be whole again with GAIA.

GAIA gets rebooted and drops lots of cool story details. The kill signal HADES got came from a distant galaxy, and the group of super advanced jerk humans are the ones who escaped from Earth to that galaxy long ago. GAIA sends Aloy off to get 3 more subordinate functions while she calculates a plan to wrangle HEPHAESTUS. This facility is now Aloy’s base of operations!

Trophy 19: Upgraded Every Pouch Type

Official Description: Upgraded the Food Pouch, Potion Pouch, Resource Pouch, Trap Pouch, and any ammo pouch at least once.
Type: Bronze
Earned on: March 13rd, 2022
Overall Earned: #1824

The only way to upgrade pouches is to kill innocent critters for their materials. Sigh. I want all the upgrades but their death squeaks make me feel like a monster. They’re just pixels, right??