Horizon Hunters Gathering, the multiplayer spin-off announced earlier this year, is not the game it was pitched as. Guerrilla Games has been rebuilding it since June, and the version in development now drops the live service framework entirely in favor of a smaller co-op multiplayer game with a story mode attached.
Quick answer: Horizon Hunters Gathering has not been cancelled, but the live service version has been scrapped. Guerrilla is now building a smaller co-op multiplayer title with a story mode, and the team has until December 2026 to clear its next internal milestone.
What changed in the Horizon Hunters Gathering reboot
The core change is structural. Everything that made Hunters Gathering a live service product — the ongoing content cadence, the systems built to keep players logging in indefinitely — is being removed. What replaces it is a more conventional co-op multiplayer game, built at a noticeably reduced scope and organized around a focused story mode that was not part of the original design.
Guerrilla Games, the studio behind Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West, is still the developer. That has not changed. What has changed is the size of the team working on it. Many of the developers who were on the original project have been moved to other work, leaving a smaller group to deliver the new version.
| Element | Current status |
|---|---|
| Developer | Guerrilla Games, with a reduced team |
| Design direction | Co-op multiplayer, live service elements removed |
| Story mode | Added as a focus of the new version |
| Scope | Significantly smaller than the announced game |
| Reboot start | June 2026 |
| Next internal milestone | December 2026 |
| Platforms | PS5 and PC |
| Release date | None announced |
Why the original version stalled
The turning point was testing. Hunters Gathering ran a playtest in March, and the response from players was poor enough that PlayStation reconsidered the whole approach. Participation on Steam was thin, and the reaction from those who did play did not give the company confidence in the live service model it had built the game around.
Rather than cancel outright, PlayStation opted to reset the project. The reboot began in June, which gives the smaller team roughly six months to show something convincing before the December checkpoint. The instruction, in blunt terms, is to impress executives with the next milestone.
Note: surviving the reboot is not the same as being safe. Cancellation remains on the table if the December milestone does not land.
What the reboot means for the next mainline Horizon game
The knock-on effect is the part Horizon fans will feel most. Nearly all of Guerrilla’s staff were assigned to Hunters Gathering right up until early this summer, which means the next single-player Horizon game has not had the bulk of the studio behind it. A new mainline entry is a long way off as a result.
The franchise itself has not been idle. A LEGO-themed Horizon spin-off arrived recently, though it did not connect strongly with either LEGO game players or the Horizon audience.
How this fits PlayStation’s live service record
Sony originally committed to shipping ten live service games by 2026, then raised the target to 12. The plan was viewed as aggressive from the start, and execution has fallen well short of it. Two projects were cancelled in early 2025, including one at Bluepoint that was reportedly a God of War live service game, and another at Bend Studio. Neither studio was closed.
Concord is the clearest failure of the strategy. It was pulled offline about two weeks after launch, wiping out years of planned content. Marathon, Bungie’s entry, has struggled to hold onto players, and a free weekend did not reverse the decline. Helldivers 2 remains the standout success in the category.
| Project | Outcome |
|---|---|
| Helldivers 2 | Released and successful |
| Concord | Taken offline roughly two weeks after launch |
| Marathon | Live, with a declining player count |
| Bluepoint project | Cancelled in January 2025 |
| Bend Studio project | Cancelled in January 2025 |
| Horizon Hunters Gathering | Rebooted as a co-op multiplayer game |
Release status on PS5 and PC
Horizon Hunters Gathering is still listed as coming to PS5 and PC. There is no release date, no release window, and no new gameplay showing the rebuilt version. Sony has not publicly commented on the change in direction, so the announced game and the game actually in development are, for now, two different things.
The practical read for anyone tracking the game is simple. Treat the December milestone as the real decision point. If the project clears it, expect a re-reveal that looks meaningfully different from the March playtest build. If it does not, the game joins the list of PlayStation multiplayer projects that never made it out.
