Two reviews in two weeks! Didn’t think I had it in me did you? Actually I ended up playing through and finishing The Outer Worlds 2 much quicker than I anticipated, I usually enjoy a good gander at side quests and extra content within a game and while I did do plenty of that within this experience I guess there was just so much that I missed out on. Perhaps this warrants another playthrough… Anyway, enough of that, let’s get on with the review!
The story this time around sees you playing as an agent for the Earth Directorate, a type of parody of standard Space Ranger heroes who go to different colonies, fight fascists and corrupt business leaders and overall save the day for all of humanity. After an operation you are involved in inevitably goes wrong it’s up to you to find out what happened, how to save the colony of Arcadia you have been sent to rescue and decide who would be best to run things around here. It’s a fairly similar premise to the first game and typical of Obsidian RPG’s with you getting flung into an unknown world and having to meet the various factions and leaders ultimately with a goal of deciding who you want to side with. The mystery behind the main plot is engaging enough to keep you going and all the new groups of interest are enjoyable enough to experience. Being an Obsidian game there’s plenty of great dialogue, fun characters and it ultimately feels like this is a goofier experience than many of their other titles, and it’s all the more enjoyable for it. I’d say as a sequel it doesn’t really change up too much from the original game, felt like I was going through the motions at various times, but it was still enjoyable and an RPG with a good story is always a thumbs up in my book.
The presentation of this game really shines with advanced hardware as this game can look absolutely gorgeous. The environments are extremely colourful and vibrant, characters are unique and interesting, the art direction clearly had a lot of love and attention put into it and various places that you visit feel like real places that are actually lived in by the NPC’s. Voice acting too was top notch, especially from the villains of the story as their melodramatic way of speaking and extreme parody-laden propaganda gave me a chuckle at various points. Music was serviceable, though not particularly notable, it at least matches the atmosphere required of it and combat music was engaging and high octane as required. I also really enjoyed the various characters they designed, from their personality and voices to even just the clothing and armor they wore. You could really tell the designers worked together well to create a nicely rounded set of characters that were distinctly different and a visual treat to behold. I also really liked the variety of planets I visited as each of them felt very different in their alien landscapes and unique flora/fauna. While it might not win awards for how the game looks and sounds I feel as though the art direction it had made it stand out well and I felt as though the game really held its own type of visual identity, which in an industry with so many Sci-Fi worlds is a very important thing to have.
Gameplay of The Outer Worlds 2 will feel distinctly familiar to those who played the first game, and of course those who have played any modern Fallout game. It’s Fallout in space… again! So you’ll be shooting, smacking and conversing in first-person RPG gameplay with an emphasis on companions and utilising skills in dialogue to either prevent hostilities or give yourself an advantage during combat. The biggest change this time around is the introduction of the Gadget system, a series of unique devices that share an energy pool you can utilise both in and out of combat. These can range from bullet time, to shields, to even a double jump. You can focus your entire character build on a single gadget and design how you fight to fit best with the gadget in question. As an example, my biggest love was for the shield, which had me then focus on making my character as tanky as possible with as much uptime with the shield. They are enjoyable changes to the standard gameplay and while they may not be absolutely genre-defining they do enough to make it feel different from its predecessor. Aside from these, if you liked the previous game, you’ll know exactly what you’re getting into with this one.
There are a couple downsides to this title. Firstly, building off of my previous point, this does ultimately feel like the first game but just… again. Sure there’s the Gadget system and the dynamic in this star system versus the previous game’s setting is certainly different, but in terms of the minute to minute gameplay it feels like going through the same motions. Now if you’re looking for consistency then that’s great, but for those who were hoping the sequel would provide something a bit more tangible than just the previous game but in a different setting you won’t find much to entice you here. Secondly, and I know this was designed as a core philosophy thing by the team, but I hated not being able to respec my character. The developers claimed they didn’t allow this because they wanted people to experience actual consequences for their actions, which is fine, but if that’s the case introduce something that you have to really work at in order to respec. Make it worth a large amount of money or a limited resource, god knows money needs more uses in this game as the crafting system makes most of it obsolete. Finally, while the world itself is colourful, fun and silly to behold I didn’t find myself too compelled to actually want to go do the various side quests in the game. As an example, I didn’t even end up acquiring all the companions possible within the game, not for lack of trying, but because I didn’t feel compelled to scour every part of the world to eventually find all the possible side quests or characters I just ended up missing several. I looked back on my playthrough with guides afterwards and realised that even one of the potential recruits I passed by and didn’t pay attention to them. Perhaps my attention span is degrading, but to pass by a unique character who ends up becoming a potential crew member and not even bothering to stop and begin a conversation to them shows that I wasn’t too invested in all the things I could do. I absolutely see this as a game that to experience everything you should do multiple playthroughs, but I don’t know if I am invested enough to do so in future.
So there we are with this review. The Outer Worlds 2 is certainly a good time and I’d recommend it for fans of general first-person RPG experiences like Fallout, Starfield and especially the first game, but it didn’t fully grab me enough to consider this a masterclass in gameplay design. Perhaps it’s just because it’s a sequel that didn’t change up much, or perhaps I’m just salty about not being able to make character changes. Either way, I definitely think it’s worth your time, though whether it will be something to come back to time after time I’d say that’s a very tentative maybe. Give it a try, and if you don’t like it, then just claim you’re fighting against capitalism, that’s the message the game was trying to teach… right?