• Guerilla Games is aiming to release PS5 exclusive Horizon Forbidden West in 2021.
• Insomniac Games’ Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales is the only confirmed first-party PS5 launch title.
• With the loss of Horizon Forbidden West, the PS5 launch slate suddenly looks a lot less exciting.

Guerilla Games announced yesterday it is aiming to release upcoming PS5 exclusive, Horizon Forbidden West, in 2021 .

The developer sandwiched the news into a new video offering a more detailed look at what’s in store for the sequel to the acclaimed Horizon Zero Dawn.

Horizon Forbidden West Not A PS5 Launch Title

For many hoping to see Horizon Forbidden West available when the console releases later this year, the news is a blow and divests the PS5 launch roster of arguably its star player. As far as games to kindle pre-orders and day-one purchases, few franchises quite have the pedigree of Horizon Zero Dawn.

When Sony announced Horizon Forbidden West last week, details about a release window were glaring absent. The omission led to speculation about when the game would launch, including riling up expectations among fans that it would be available at launch.

Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales

Sadly, that isn’t the case, and the PS5 launch slate suddenly looks a lot less exciting. Yes, there’s still Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales, but even that is already steeped in confusion thanks to conflicting descriptions from PlayStation and Insomniac games .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHzuHo80U2M

Full-on sequel? Expansion? It’s unclear, but according to a Bloomberg report, Miles Morales will be ‘a brand-new, standalone game similar in scope to Uncharted Lost Legacy.’  This description implies we could be looking at a short 10 hour or so add-on experience that fails to match the pomp of what you’d expect from a PS5 launch title.

Uninspiring Launch Slate

As for other announced PS5 exclusives, both Grand Turismo 7 and Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart have the potential to carry the PS5’s release, but neither Sony nor the games’ respective studios have explicitly confirmed them as launch titles. Demon’s Souls Remake, Sackboy: A Big Adventure, and Godfall fall into the same boat, although with less reach than the games above.

The rest of the launch slate  is fleshed out by either PS5 versions of current-gen titles like Fortnite, Call of Duty: Warzone, and Rainbow Six Siege. Or, third-party games that, despite offering an array of exciting premises and next-gen eye candy, aren’t console-sellers. Deathloop, Dirt 5, Jett: The Far Shore, Bugsnax, and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla are but a few examples.

Fortunately, Sony says there’s still a lot to share before the launch of the consoles during the holiday period 2020.

Hopefully, upcoming announcements will shed more light on whether it will be worth buying a PS5 day one. Or whether we’re best holding off a few months for more heavy-hitting releases.