The skill of Obsidian Entertainment has never been questioned, and it is precisely for this reason that before giving a definitive judgment to their latest work, we took the right time to explore every joy and every pain that the galactic colony of Alcione is able to gift to the player. The Outer Worlds does not show up with his business card aiming at a real innovation, but more to want to create a new concept of action RPG in the first person where there is not only a gigantic and completely explorable macro area in favor of many less extensive areas , but more varied and above all full of details, characters and creatures. Unlike a classic post-apocalyptic title, therefore, we will not find ourselves living in black holes of cosmic emptiness and monotony, rather always maintaining a high rhythm and alternation. Certainly to help the software house recently acquired by Microsoft there was the huge community behind other titles of a similar genre (first of all Fallout 4), which helped to understand how it was possible to "rejuvenate" the genre but at the same time proposing something more accessible. This is what Obsidian's title, published by Private Division and already available in stores.
Hope adrift
The prologue of the title is as simple as we can imagine: in a future where our solar system is now in disarray, humanity needed to colonize "other shores", so much so as to create a fleet of colonial ships to give life in Alcione, a place where you do not make the mistakes of the past and where all the inhabitants have their own role to make everything work for the best. However, one of these ships (and all its passengers in cryogenic sleep) did not have this fate for reasons that will be revealed to you in-game, finding itself the victim of a real injustice that will lead all passengers to "certain" death. This ship is there Hope, and that's where we will create our avatar. But how did we wake up from cryogenics? Phineas Vernon Welles, a scientist wanted throughout the system, decided to free those thousands of people to give them back their "stolen" life. However, doing so requires technology, materials, time and experiments… and our avatar will be the first of these, as well as the first of his allies.
The phase of creation and choice of the characteristics of our (or our) protagonist will in fact be set on the ship, while Welles is freeing us. In this phase we will decide with which basic peculiarities our character will start his adventure, distributing both personal attitudes and skills. During the game you will be able to better understand what your style will be, so sticking, at least for the creation, to a more versatile model, could be the most sensible choice. Against all odds, now in Welles' laboratory, we manage to wake up from cryogenics and without even having time to understand what is happening we are catapulted onto Terrarium 2, one of the luxuriant planets of the colony of Alcione. From here on, our real adventure will begin, made up of chatter, missions, blood and creatures of all kinds (ed. If you are still confused, don't worry! An unknown settler has left a diary for you with 20 tips to follow to survive!).
The new worlds
We assume that we are not dealing with a game with a post apocalyptic theme, but sci-fi. However, many of the locations that we will find ourselves exploring will be littered with disused structures, or corpses scattered here and there, so much so that the difference between the two types is very thin, returning a feeling very similar to that given for example by the aforementioned Fallout. However, if we move away from this feature and the concept of the game itself, we will realize that The Outer Worlds is exactly something new, but not innovative. This is not necessarily a bad thing, because the brands from which it tacitly takes inspiration are still noble, succeeding in a good fusion and without disfiguring. Many of the mechanics that we will find ourselves managing, first of all those dedicated to our crew, crystallinely recall the saga of Mass Effect: whether it is for the personal missions of the members of our companions or for the choice of their equipment and their respective skills, the features dedicated to them have opened hundreds of possibilities to the players.
In any case, the mutants leave room for a alien creatures, the mad robots they have the flavor of a welcome cliché, but above all marauders super advanced and human can have their say. The game environment will be scattered throughout the urban areas of NPC: many of them will also have stories to tell and or quests to assign to you, and some may even turn out to be the travel companions you were looking for. Both through documents and through dialogues, Obsidian's work to describe the society in which the game is set has been excellent, without exaggerating too much in the length of the dialogues (always the best known merit and defect of the studio, especially if we take into consideration titles that have not even been localized, see the Pillars of Eternity series).
Wandering and talking is therefore one of the focuses of The Outer Worlds, so much so that often a chat can also save your skin by avoiding bloody firefights. On this, we point out that the difficulty of the game drops drastically if you focus a lot on verbal skills (intimidation, persuasion and so on), because it will be practically impossible to fail the tests and many of the situations will be solved with a click, but still making you money. a good chunk of experience from the completed quest. If we add to this that at each level reached we will be able to distribute 10 skill points in the various available, becoming a master speaker will be a no brainer.
Which side are you on?
In any case, the freedom to approach situations (including physical ones, such as charging with your head down or proceeding silently) is one of the cornerstones that will make you fully enjoy the experience without the feeling of being too "guided". No choices that affect karma therefore, but know that most of the main and secondary quests will still be assigned to you by someone important, and consequently belonging to a certain faction. Some of these will also be at odds with each other, and in some cases our behavior could even make our reputation drop towards one or the other. Clearly being well liked and becoming famous in a faction will have its benefits (one of the many is the discount from the merchants), but it will not always be a walk to succeed ... after all, even to yourself some may be "not very nice" and not deserving of yours selfless help.
Simple management
One of the features we liked the most about The Outer Worlds is undoubtedly the simplicity and clarity of how everything can be managed: starting from the inventory, the inhaler, the descriptions of the skills, up to the merchants, the upgrading of weapons and things like that, everything is extremely understandable and "friendly user". There are no multitudes of menus and submenus, nor unclear or poorly distributed graphics. This time Obsidian has thought a lot about the average player, without dwelling on the niche, coming up with a management and growth system as less complex as possible, also suitable for novices.
Even on the battlefield, everything can be managed in the best possible way: classmates they will be a fundamental card to play both in terms of guns and in terms of personal skills, who will be able to help you perhaps to compensate for some of your shortcomings. They are also gifted with one of their own special skill, often capable of inflicting altered status as well as considerable damage. You can also decide, if you are a solitary captain, not to take anyone with you during your journey, perhaps even deciding to dismiss all your companions, with all that will follow. Your avatar's special ability will instead be that of slow down time (side effect of 70 years of cryogenics, a completely normal thing ... right?), which you can use to think better, aim more accurately, but also discover the weaknesses of your targets - even crippling them - thus studying their characteristics.
even the level design is rich (as much as possible, but not perfect), and manages to variegate the gaming experience well thanks to different settings proposed. As already mentioned at the beginning, a big hand is given by the choice of creating many different "mini maps" at the expense of a single and macroscopic area: in this way it is possible to avoid unnecessary dispersion or the presence of entire portions of the map without a fixed game purpose, or that are mere "fillers". While this is very much in our favor from the point of view of experience, it follows a longer waiting time and a more cumbersome number of loads, between ascents and descents from the ship and also due to changes in location (internal, external and city).
Gears to be oiled
The technical sector, after our test on PlayStation 4 Pro, appears to be promoted, but with some inevitable reservations. Leaving aside some bugs, which inevitably we found ourselves in front of during the various hours of play, The Outer Worlds presents excessive timing in loading the textures of places and objects once an upload is finished, and in some cases there is a very annoying pop-up effect. This problem appears to be present even after the first updates occurred, and consequently we expect a resolutive patch as soon as possible. The level of graphic details remains satisfactory, however, without thinking of great masterpieces, but still in line with the average of the titles presented during this generation. The audio sector is also promoted without infamy and without praise, with a discreet English dubbing but at times out of sync (we would also have liked the voices in our local language, for which only the text is available) and a basic soundtrack that plays his homework with nothing memorable to report.
