That did not take long. Sony has decided to offer a free Horizon Forbidden West upgrade from PS4 to PS5. A complete 360 after their misguided announcement on Thursday, September 2 that they planned to nickel and dime their fans for all that they’re worth.

Sony corporate pud, Jim Ryan announced the U-Turn on the official PlayStation Blog.

“Thursday was to be a celebration of Horizon Forbidden West and the amazing team at Guerrilla working to deliver it on February 18, 2022. However, it’s abundantly clear that the offerings we confirmed in our pre-order kickoff missed the mark.

Last year we made a commitment to deliver free upgrades for our cross-gen launch titles, which included Horizon Forbidden West. While the pandemic’s profound impact pushed Forbidden West out of the launch window we initially envisioned, we will stand by our offer: Players who purchase Horizon Forbidden West on PlayStation 4 will be able to upgrade to the PlayStation 5 version for free.

I also want to confirm today that moving forward, PlayStation first-party exclusive cross-gen titles (newly releasing on PS4 & PS5)–both digital and physical*–will offer a $10 USD digital upgrade option from PS4 to PS5. This will apply to the next God of War and Gran Turismo 7, and any other exclusive cross-gen PS4 & PS5 title published by Sony Interactive Entertainment.“

PlayStation.Blog

Mr. Ryan then went back into his office to brainstorm additional ways to alienate his most passionate fans.

It shouldn’t take a weekend shit-storm to realize how incredibly misguided and confusing their initial plan of strong arming PS4 gamers of to purchase the $79.99 Digital Deluxe edition, $199.99 Collector’s edition, or the $259.99 Regalla edition to get access to both the PS4 and PS5 versions of Forbidden West.

Horizon: Forbidden West releases February 18, 2022.

[Source: Sony]