Obsidian's Sequel Doesn't Quite Attain the Summit
More expansive isn't always superior. It's an old adage, however it's the truest way to sum up my feelings after investing 50 hours with The Outer Worlds 2. Developer Obsidian included additional everything to the follow-up to its 2019's futuristic adventure — additional wit, enemies, firearms, characteristics, and places, everything that matters in such adventures. And it operates excellently — at first. But the weight of all those daring plans makes the game wobble as the hours wear on.
A Powerful Opening Act
The Outer Worlds 2 establishes a solid initial impact. You belong to the Planetary Directorate, a do-gooder institution committed to controlling dishonest administrations and companies. After some serious turmoil, you wind up in the Arcadia sector, a colony divided by conflict between Auntie's Option (the result of a merger between the previous title's two large firms), the Protectorate (groupthink pushed to its most extreme outcome), and the Ascendant Order (similar to the Catholic faith, but with math rather than Jesus). There are also a series of fissures tearing holes in the fabric of reality, but currently, you absolutely must access a communication hub for pressing contact needs. The challenge is that it's in the heart of a warzone, and you need to determine how to get there.
Similar to the first game, Outer Worlds 2 is a first-person RPG with an central plot and dozens of optional missions distributed across different planets or areas (large spaces with a plenty to explore, but not open-world).
The opening region and the process of reaching that relay hub are spectacular. You've got some goofy encounters, of course, like one that includes a farmer who has overindulged sugary cereal to their favorite crab. Most lead you to something helpful, though — an unexpected new path or some new bit of intel that might provide an alternate route ahead.
Unforgettable Events and Lost Opportunities
In one memorable sequence, you can find a Protectorate deserter near the viaduct who's about to be eliminated. No quest is tied to it, and the exclusive means to find it is by exploring and paying attention to the ambient dialogue. If you're quick and sufficiently cautious not to let him get defeated, you can save him (and then rescue his deserter lover from getting eliminated by beasts in their lair later), but more pertinent to the task at hand is a electrical conduit hidden in the grass in the vicinity. If you track it, you'll locate a secret entry to the relay station. There's a different access point to the station's sewers stashed in a cave that you might or might not observe contingent on when you undertake a particular ally mission. You can find an simple to miss character who's crucial to rescuing a person down the line. (And there's a soft toy who implicitly sways a squad of soldiers to join your cause, if you're kind enough to save it from a minefield.) This opening chapter is dense and thrilling, and it appears as if it's brimming with deep narrative possibilities that rewards you for your exploration.
Diminishing Hopes
Outer Worlds 2 doesn't fulfill those opening anticipations again. The next primary region is structured similar to a location in the initial title or Avowed — a expansive territory dotted with notable locations and secondary tasks. They're all narratively connected to the struggle between Auntie's Selection and the Order of the Ascendant, but they're also short stories detached from the main story plot-wise and location-wise. Don't anticipate any contextual hints leading you to fresh decisions like in the first zone.
In spite of compelling you to choose some hard calls, what you do in this zone's side quests has no impact. Like, it truly has no effect, to the point where whether you permit atrocities or guide a band of survivors to their demise culminates in only a casual remark or two of conversation. A game doesn't need to let each mission impact the story in some big, dramatic fashion, but if you're making me choose a faction and giving the impression that my selection matters, I don't think it's unfair to hope for something further when it's finished. When the game's earlier revealed that it has greater potential, any diminishment appears to be a trade-off. You get expanded elements like the developers pledged, but at the expense of depth.
Ambitious Concepts and Absent Stakes
The game's middle section attempts a comparable approach to the main setup from the initial world, but with clearly diminished style. The idea is a courageous one: an linked task that covers two planets and urges you to request help from different factions if you want a more straightforward journey toward your aim. Beyond the recurring structure being a little tiresome, it's also lacking the tension that this kind of scenario should have. It's a "pact with the devil" moment. There should be difficult trade-offs. Your association with either faction should matter beyond earning their approval by doing new tasks for them. Everything is missing, because you can just blitz through on your own and clear the objective anyway. The game even takes pains to hand you ways of achieving this, indicating alternate routes as optional objectives and having partners advise you where to go.
It's a side effect of a larger problem in Outer Worlds 2: the anxiety of permitting you to feel dissatisfied with your decisions. It regularly exaggerates out of its way to make sure not only that there's an alternative path in frequent instances, but that you know it exists. Locked rooms practically always have several entry techniques indicated, or nothing worthwhile internally if they don't. If you {can't