Obsidian's Sequel Doesn't Quite Reach the Stars
Bigger isn't always better. It's an old adage, but it's also the best way to sum up my impressions after spending 50 hours with The Outer Worlds 2. The creators expanded on each element to the follow-up to its 2019's science fiction role-playing game — increased comedy, foes, firearms, traits, and settings, everything that matters in such adventures. And it operates excellently — at first. But the load of all those daring plans causes the experience to falter as the time passes.
A Powerful Initial Impact
The Outer Worlds 2 makes a strong opening statement. You belong to the Planetary Directorate, a do-gooder agency focused on curbing corrupt governments and companies. After some major drama, you end up in the Arcadia system, a outpost fractured by hostilities between Auntie's Selection (the outcome of a combination between the original game's two major companies), the Protectorate (groupthink pushed to its worst logical conclusion), and the Order of the Ascendant (like the Catholic church, but with calculations in place of Jesus). There are also a bunch of fissures tearing holes in the universe, but right now, you urgently require reach a relay station for pressing contact reasons. The challenge is that it's in the heart of a battlefield, and you need to figure out how to get there.
Like its predecessor, Outer Worlds 2 is a first-person RPG with an central plot and numerous secondary tasks distributed across multiple locations or areas (large spaces with a lot to uncover, but not open-world).
The opening region and the task of accessing that comms station are spectacular. You've got some funny interactions, of course, like one that involves a rancher who has overindulged sugary cereal to their beloved crustacean. Most direct you toward something helpful, though — an surprising alternative route or some new bit of intel that might unlock another way onward.
Notable Moments and Overlooked Opportunities
In one unforgettable event, you can find a Protectorate deserter near the bridge who's about to be killed. No mission is linked to it, and the sole method to discover it is by investigating and hearing the environmental chatter. If you're fast and careful enough not to let him get killed, you can save him (and then rescue his deserter lover from getting slain by monsters in their refuge later), but more pertinent to the current objective is a power line concealed in the grass nearby. If you trace it, you'll find a concealed access point to the relay station. There's another entrance to the station's underground tunnels tucked away in a grotto that you may or may not notice depending on when you pursue a particular ally mission. You can encounter an easily missable individual who's essential to rescuing a person much later. (And there's a stuffed animal who indirectly convinces a team of fighters to support you, if you're kind enough to rescue it from a minefield.) This initial segment is packed and engaging, and it feels like it's overflowing with rich storytelling potential that rewards you for your exploration.
Diminishing Expectations
Outer Worlds 2 never lives up to those early hopes again. The following key zone is arranged similar to a level in the original game or Avowed — a expansive territory sprinkled with key sites and optional missions. They're all narratively connected to the clash between Auntie's Choice and the Order of the Ascendant, but they're also short stories isolated from the primary plot narratively and location-wise. Don't look for any contextual hints guiding you toward new choices like in the opening region.
Regardless of compelling you to choose some difficult choices, what you do in this zone's side quests has no impact. Like, it really doesn't matter, to the degree that whether you allow violations or guide a band of survivors to their demise culminates in merely a passing comment or two of conversation. A game doesn't have to let each mission impact the plot in some significant, theatrical manner, but if you're forcing me to decide a group and acting as if my selection matters, I don't think it's unfair to hope for something further when it's over. When the game's already shown that it can be better, any diminishment feels like a compromise. You get expanded elements like the developers pledged, but at the price of complexity.
Daring Concepts and Absent Tension
The game's second act endeavors an alike method to the main setup from the opening location, but with noticeably less flair. The notion is a courageous one: an related objective that covers two planets and motivates you to request help from assorted alliances if you want a smoother path toward your aim. Beyond the repeated framework being a slightly monotonous, it's also just missing the suspense that this type of situation should have. It's a "deal with the demon" moment. There should be hard concessions. Your relationship with any group should be important beyond earning their approval by completing additional missions for them. Everything is lacking, because you can simply rush through on your own and clear the objective anyway. The game even takes pains to provide you methods of accomplishing this, pointing out alternate routes as additional aims and having allies inform you where to go.
It's a side effect of a wider concern in Outer Worlds 2: the anxiety of allowing you to regret with your decisions. It regularly exaggerates in its efforts to make sure not only that there's an alternate route in frequent instances, but that you are aware of it. Closed chambers almost always have multiple entry methods indicated, or no significant items within if they don't. If you {can't
