So, I got the game The Outer Worlds, made by Obsidian. Obsidian is basically the guys from Black Isle, who made Fallout 1&2, Planescape: Torment, and some other RPG's. Obsidian also made Fallout: New Vegas, the better sibling to Fallout 3.
The game is a First Person Shooter Role-Playing Game, or FePeSeRPeeGee. You travel between different planets in a solar system, and you interact frequently with other characters through a dialogue system very much in line with that of Fallout: New Vegas.
We'll start with what I like about the game.
The combat system is absolutely brilliant. Controls are precise, you can tackle enemies in any number of ways, there are lots of different kinds of weapons that operate completely differently. The combat system is so good that I could see it used in a regular FPS or a looter-shooter like Borderlands. In addition to your own weapons and abilities, each companion has a special attack that they can use with a cooldown that can hit like a ton of bricks.
Customizing your character is unsurprisingly well done, seeing as that's one thing that the guys at Obsidian have always been good at. Apart from choosing stats, you also choose skills to improve, IE pretty standard for this type of game. In this case, though, it's very seamlessly integrated into the gameplay. The skills you choose will impact in many ways how you'll tackle the world overall. Will you lie 'til your trousers conflagrate, or will you be threatening violence on everyone you meet? Or, for that matter, will you just pull out your gun and repaint the walls.
Yes, that last part is pretty much always an actual option that's written into the game.
Instead of one huge sandbox, the game takes place on a number of planets and stations in a solar system, where each location has its own little sandbox.
All in all, it's built to allow as much freedom to figure things out your way as it can.
As mentioned, you get a bunch of companions, and they all have really well-written personalities. They are three dimensional, have motivations you might not have guessed, and actually act as part of your conversations with NPC's.
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Now, all this sounds like a glowing recommendation, doesn't it? Well, that's because it is. Apart from the ending.
What the game does is not so much reach a crescendo as reach the point where the story takes off and it's time to make shit happen.
That's where it ends. It really bummed me out, to be honest. It really felt like the story was nowhere close to done. For those who have played Fallout 4, it's as if you made it into the institute, spoke to Father, then the game just ended, resolving absolutely nothing.
Oh, but maybe there'll be a sequel? Yeah, I'm sure it's likely there will be a sequel to a completely new intellectual property made by a company that's infamous for not finishing games on time.
Dammit!
