The Outer Worlds E3 2019 Preview

July 2, 2019 at 2:21pm
By Jason Stettner

The Outer Worlds is a massive single player RPG from Obsidian Entertainment with Private Division. I was able to check out a special presentation of the game behind closed doors in this rather hidden area during E3 2019. This was rather exciting, as Obsidian makes great games and this one seems like a bundle of fun.

The presentation was a selected narrative driven mission, with an element of audience feedback in one spot. That being the ending choice described later on. This game feels similar to Fallout in terms of the look, and how it plays. You’d know what I mean by seeing some gameplay. It does also look like an improvement over that with detailed character models, really creepy environments and a really fresh setting.

This takes place in one weird universe where the corporations have taken over and you’re just sort of there in between them. It’s not weird due to corporations running everything, but the wacky sort of places you experience. In the particular mission I viewed the player was tasked with finding out a solution to this lady’s problem. It started out in a very expansive and lively market, where we were walking around to meet the one that runs it all. She then tasked us with finding the person that runs this one meat processing plant and to deal with them.

The walk there gave a hint as to what to expect in the overall experience. There were some loading screens, but that’s expected as the world segments seem large in scale. They also come across as rather lively, in terms of the buildings you can enter and the creatures that inhabit them. Between the market from where we headed from, to the plant as an open area. This spot featured a gorgeous backdrop and some outdoor plant segments. It was weird, super Sci-Fi in style and filled with what I’d consider fairly creepy monsters. Once that was dashed through, the player entered that meat plant building area. There were chat options that popped up, and that grants an element of choice in how situations are handled.

There was a cloaking device used to sort of go by, and some sweet talking to charismatically get those robots out of the way. This breaks down over time, mostly because they wanted to show off some action. That’s cool, but it was just hilarious to see the discussion with these robots to trick them. The combat was interesting, neat sense of violence and again choice. I say that latter part, as we set off a cleansing program in the plant which had the robots turn against the staff. It was crazy, and just fun to see this play out. It cleaned out the field, aside from the now murderous robots that needed to be dealt with. The player handled it well and continued through this rather disgusting, yet awesome meat processing plant.

It all wrapped up with a big choice, the character met the guy they were sent to remove. This guy grants some options, a chance to work with him. With that, there’s basically the option to choose whether the player wants to cut his head off. There’s the choice to try and get these two factions working together or to perhaps kill the person that sent us after this guy. There’s a lot going on here, and it seems like a wonderful experience. I think it’ll be a ton of fun to make decisions in, and there appears to be a rich world to fool around in. They really lean into the gritty fantasy elements of what Sci-Fi can be, while adding player choice and making an interesting series of places to explore. That’s all for The Outer Worlds, at least for now. Check out our E3 2019 hub for additional coverage from the event.

Read our Dying Light 2 E3 2019 Preview
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