Home Features E3 2019 Eyes-On Preview: Outer Worlds gives you intriguing and hilarious ways to complete quests

E3 2019 Eyes-On Preview: Outer Worlds gives you intriguing and hilarious ways to complete quests

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There’s no disputing it – The Outer Worlds looks like a Fallout game in all but name. Which shouldn’t come as a surprise, given that Obsidian Games is behind it. As the creators of arguably the best Fallout game out there (even with New Vegas’ misgivings) it’s still somewhat surprising how much of that DNA is retained in Outer Worlds. That isn’t to say this looks like a decade old RPG either. Outer Worlds instead looks to build on ideas that haven’t worked out as well in past Obsidian ventures, giving you even more ways to approach its more open-ended quests.

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The walkthrough we were treated to offered glimpses of how you might infiltrate restricted areas without firing a bullet. The mission in question tasked the player with hunting down a target for assassination. This target was in a massive abattoir that genetically grows bacon-flavoured cysts (which was mentioned in a very nonchalant manner, disturbingly) on massive space pigs, and your contractor isn’t happy about the monopoly this business is having on the overtly capitalistic planet you’re on.

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Being a first-person shooter along with a role-playing game, there’s no question that you could use your assortment of weapons to blast through the guards at the facility and work your way up to your target. But in this demo peace prevailed. Instead of combat, Outer Worlds also lets you use wit to complete objectives. You’ll be able to put points into certain attributes as you level up, which in turn open up specific conversational paths when talking to the guards you need to bypass. You could, for example, choose to lie to them while wearing a disguise, letting you gain access to areas without any threat of other people wondering why you’re there.

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The disguise system features a bar that slowly ticks down as you’re hiding in plain sight, with the disguise breaking if it depletes. You also have three notches above the bar that signify how many times you’re able to lie under the same disguise, which should force you to use a combination of disguises and circumvention instead of just relying on your silver tongue to get past every obstacle. It’s a smart-looking system that allowed this playthrough to get by mostly without any combat at all, even when presented with doors that couldn’t be passed by conversation alone.

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When reaching the target, choosing restraint was once again rewarded with an interesting spin. Instead of blasting him as soon as we entered the room, the demo instead allowed us to converse with the target and seek out a middle-ground that benefitted anyone. The demo ended before we could be shown the possible consequences of turning on our previous contractor and starting an entire new mission to hunt her down instead, but the implication that every mission has alternative ways to complete it was evident. Choice is at the centre of what you do in Outer Worlds, and it’s not just about the weapons you choose to take into its combat either.

Outer Worlds is out this October, and its launching on Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

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Last Updated: June 18, 2019

20 Comments

  1. You mix up Outer Worlds and Outer Wilds throughout the article =)

    (Outer Wilds is an excellent game btw and CH should totes do a story on it)

    Reply

    • Kromas

      June 18, 2019 at 14:03

      They won’t. Epic exclusive. 😛

      Reply

      • GooseZA

        June 18, 2019 at 14:03

        It’s out on Xbox too (part of Game Pass), which is what I’m playing it on, so no it’s not an Epic exclusive 🙂

        Reply

        • Kromas

          June 18, 2019 at 14:12

          Epic exclusive means PC.We generally don’t include inferior hardware when we talk about exclusivity. 😛

          Reply

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:12

            I don’t know if there were shots fired or somebody got horribly burned….

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:19

            Bit of both.

          • GooseZA

            June 18, 2019 at 14:19

            Cool cool, I’ll just keep playing the game on my inferior hardware and let you superior people keep arguing among yourselves about boycotts and Epic and different launchers etc.

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:19

            I don’t argue. I use all the launchers. 😛

          • GooseZA

            June 18, 2019 at 14:20

            Well, all power to you then. No idea why you felt the need to establish your “superiority” or even bring that into the discussion.

            Have a great day further.

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:20

            You know I just kid around … unless you play on mobile!

            😛

            ps: That was also a joke before someone who actually enjoys mobile games get mad.

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:28

            How dare you!!

            Oh wait…you’re right.

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:19

            GOG 2.0 is coming…

            DON’T SUPPORT DRM!!!

            something Cyberpunk?!?!

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:20

            Getting Cyberpunk on Steam. Gog is terrible and we have not seen anything good about GoG 2 yet.

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:20

            But if you buy it on GOG CDPR gets all the revenue…..don’t they deserve it?

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:20

            No. Gog was so bad that I had to buy Witcher 3 again on steam just so I can play it. The first purchase was a CE mind you and they told me to STFU and deal with it when I requested a fix or a steam key alternative.

            So I might just be the 1 guy who isn’t all starry eyed and gaga for CDPR.

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:28

            Understandable…i bought the physical copy of TW3 so had to install it trough gog and never had any issues.

            But i’m all for a studio that gives you what you pay for ( and more) and not give you the bare minimum and have to pay (EA) for the rest.

            But i’m sure somewhere in the distant future were all gonna meet each other on common ground…

          • Kromas

            June 18, 2019 at 14:28

            Not saying TW3 was bad mind you but after 3 save wipes I switched to steam and couldn’t bother getting past the intro. I am a huge fan of TW1 and 2 apart from the absolute worst combat ever made for a fantasy game ever they had an absolutely amazing story. One day I will finish 3. Hell I only recently finished Skyrim and Fallout 4 finally. And those two were also save game related bugs.

          • Llama In The Rift

            June 18, 2019 at 14:36

            Ill admit..i only played TW1 for those uhm…collectible cards…but just for the uhm Art ya know.

            But yeah…you’ll not regret completing TW3…just needs ALOT of time. It permanently ruined RPG’s for me.

    • Geoffrey Tim

      June 18, 2019 at 14:43

      GAH. I keep doing that, and oit’s my bad.

      Reply

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