The Outer Worlds

I got it for 7 bucks on sale, so I don't particularly regret the purchase - but it's as painfully mediocre as it looked, hence me not purchasing it earlier, let alone for full price. The story didn't grab me, I don't care for the characters and the world isn't particularly compelling or immersive. It somewhat has a "We have Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic mixed with Fallout at home" vibes, but at least with the former even that might be a bit generous. KotOR had incredibly take-off and landing cutscenes for every location in 2004, letting you get a sense of the world and building a bond with your space ship, over a decade later we've devolved to nothing but a dot moving on a map and loading screens. Where these games of the past made you feel like assembling a valued crew, here it feels like we are picking up random strays.. just because. There isn't really a driving narrative to do any of these random quests, many of which quickly become an exercise of backtracking...

Pretty much an Obsidian game Fallout adjacent gameplay, just takes place in space, and to hop between settlements you have to use your spaceship. Environments are rich with story telling through medium, paper notes, computer notes and NPCs. RPG-Character customization/building aspect of the game is different than Fallout, on hindsight it is welcome but as the game progresses it leaves the player yearning for more when it comes to depth of the skill & perks system. The game is a decent criticism of the today's world's unchecked unprecedented corporatism, just taken to a whole new level, albeit a bit cringe at times. Gunplay aspect was lacking. Most weapons felt the same. Dialogs were overall fine, it is not as good as Fallout New Vegas, but it is definitely better than Fallout 4, but a contender for Fallout 3. Recommended

I had a good time, however, I have to mention: I know Obsidian marketed this with "Hey guys, we made New Vegas. You LOVE New Vegas!" This is not New Vegas. I know I bounced off the game until I met the game at its level. I can't take the game super seriously, because it doesn't really take itself seriously. The DLCs stand out as well-made, fun, self-contained little stories. Argueably liked them better then the main game, imo. So if you're wanting a satire of American Prosperity Gospel and our obsession with capitalism and profits above all else, I'd say its worth it.

I decided to play this again since the sequel is coming out and I regret it all over again. Gameplay: Boring and uninspired combat, despite the "wacky sci-fi setting" all the weapons are painfully generic: pistol, revolver, shotgun, assault rifle, sniper rifle, etc. No spaceship flying or combat, your ship is just a fast travel option to other planets. Many of which feel the same: Terra 2 and Monarch look identical. Dull enemies, standard guy with gun, guy with sword or maybe a space gorilla or space bug. All of which behave the exact same way, by running at you. Enemy aggro range being the worst I've ever seen, after a certain distance from their spawn points enemies will just reset and calmly walk back to their starting area. Utterly ignoring your continued attacks and out heal your damage. Once they've returned to standing around doing nothing then after a second they'll acknowledge your bullets bouncing off them and restart combat. Basic gameplay being non-existent, why ...

As a fan of Troika Studios and many other games by Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky, I was eager to try The Outer Worlds, but despite buying the game in 2021, it sat in my backlog until recently, partly due to confusion with Outer Wilds, which I accidentally purchased first (I haven't really played that either yet). Jumping into The Outer Worlds, you are soon immersed in Cain/Boyaski's signature dry wit, distinctive world building and deep and varied NPC backstories that are entertaining but not compulsory to explore, backed by an effortless dialogue system and great voice acting. The gameplay supports a wide variety of play styles, combat systems and weapons that are genuinely fun, though a bit too easy on normal difficulty, and your choices manifest in subtle but rewarding ways throughout the adventure. Its main drawback is that the constant scrounging for loot eventually becomes a tiring chore, slightly bogging down an otherwise fantastic role-playing experience. Much like many of ...

I enjoyed this at first and might eventually give it another chance: it's an RPG similar in several ways to others I've enjoyed. I've encountered the occasional glitch, but nothing terribly frustrating. And I don't think the combat is as bad as some others make it sound (although it is starting to feel bland). But the writing in particular is wearing thin on me. Obsidian nailed the Bethesda RPG formula to make this... which is not necessarily a good thing. This feels very much like a Bethesda game with its characteristic shallowness. For example, remember in Fallout 4 when [spoiler]Piper becomes your companion, deciding to follow you into who knows what, just because you allowed her to interview you?[/spoiler] An encounter here similarly made me think: "that's it?" That's certainly not the only issue, and this is not to say any of these games don't have their moments, but I haven't felt surprised or intrigued by the story recently. Instead I find that I'm often mentally rolling my eye...

I've played it fully before on console and partly again through spacer's choice edition, and the game is at best mid. I'd only consider it if it's on a deep sale. It's just feels like a MMO when it comes to the general experience and quality, rather than some immersive RPG you'd get from Bethesda or others. The game is quasi-open-world, as it's more like a few playable small open-world zones that feel like you're mindlessly wandering through a lifeless zone in a MMO. The gunplay and gameplay is barely passable, and the RPG leveling progression is the only thing that you can hope will keep you barely hooked long enough to bring yourself to finish the game. Quests and dialogue is a weakpoint that you'll feel ambivalent of, as many of the quests just feel like generic BS thrown in there to check a box. Outer Worlds 2 being $70 gave me such a laugh, haha, as if. The first game was mid and now we're supposed to think they can deliver on that $70 price tag? We'll just have to see, and I'd ...

Oh lawd if you ever thought that all them social commentaries in other post apocalypse RPGs like Fallout on how corporations are inhuman and evil were too on the nose, stay as far away from this thang here as you can. Seriously though, the lore building is one unfunny joke. Everywhere you go there's just more saturday morning cartoon data entries of "rich man bad". And then we're given the chance to side with said rich man? Without given any shade of gray to make that choice seem remotely reasonable? In basically every other RPG before this that had evil corpos, there was always just enough realism and an element of "better the devil you know" to help you believe that this world would be the way it is. Here it's just a joke. Honestly all I want to do right now is to make the same criticism 10 more times because I just can't get over how crass it is. Even a 4 year old kid would tell you you're laying it on too thick. Are these really the people that developed New Vegas? Sure, Caesa...

I wanted to like this game...it's ok... Just feels...stretched like butter scraped over too much bread... there is something to this game but I can't put my finger on what.

I only bought this because I felt sorry for the Devs team who got kick out by Bethesda but now after Avowed a Dev art team member verbally attack the fans a bad apple spoils the bunch comes in to play I will not support a group who attack their costumers.