nlmnyc The Outer Worlds 2 Review

I was so surprised by this game. Let me preface by saying that I was excited for Outer Worlds 1 when it came out and was severely let down by it. However - the DLC for that game OW1 is excellent and the sequel is similar to the OW1 DLC -- choices, story, dialogue, humor, challenge. Avowed was such a stinker (never even played it because I've never heard anyone say anything good about it) and OW1 was so underwhelming -- that lots of people skipped this game. Not to mention the racist, self-hating comments made by the art director at Obsidian and the lack of consequences for him and the lack of an apology by the company. I won't make this too long-winded, I would just say if you like the kind of games that I like, games like New Vegas, KOTOR, Bioshock, Mass Effect - then you're gonna like this game. It feels and plays like those old action RPGs - there's Skills, Perks, Flaws, tons of weapon & armor variety, choices that change the story (not all choices but many choices do), giant maps to explore -- tons of stuff and secrets to find. The only criticism I have of the game is the same as Starfield -- the planets and cities and factions are all indistinguishable from another because they are all monocultures. When everyone looks different, then everyone looks the same -- every faction has a white guy, a white girl, a black guy, a black girl, a brown guy, a brown girl. And also every city is like 4 to 1 women -- no culture anywhere in the world has that ratio. It's always around 50/50 --- because that's how nature works. Cold climates have fair skinned people with long noses, warm climates tend to have darker skinned people with broader, flat noses. If you're not going to have aliens in your space game, then stop making every city have the residents of downtown LA. If Earthlings migrated to another planet, in a few 100 years...those that reside there would look very different. Because that's how evolution works. It's SO immersion breaking for anyone. And women and men gravitate towards different things too for the most part. Since the female population on EVERY planet is 4 to 1 -- you end up speaking to countless gang leaders and military officers that are women -- and most women just don't gravitate towards those fields. Your brain just tells you --- this feels off, because you don't see this represented in real life -- women with purple hair with Tommy Guns telling you to "watch yourself when you're talking to the boss" :) Anyway - besides that, the game itself is VERY GOOD! I would recommend patching out and make the population more equally split. If we're all for equality then why are there so few biological males in the game? And if you want to make dudes the bad guys -- go for it, because organizations that are seen as villainous (the military, organized crime etc) are mostly made up of dudes anyway. This way it doesn't break immersion. You have outer space as your backdrop, you can literally make the people look like anything you want, speak any way you want, dress...etc etc.