Out of curiosity, what does everyone think of the Outriders demo?
My impressions:
Daggum but it’s dark. The bit we have access to largely has the “man’s inhumanity to man” theme, but it certainly looks like that’s just an aspect of greater cosmic horror. Our character is the hope spot, so we’ve got that going for us. If it isn’t subverted into grimdark. (I don’t think it will be, but I’ve got to note that it isn’t narratively ruled out.)
The setting is interesting, and I want to explore the mysteries.
It’s a looter-shooter with an actual story.
Because of this, they basically offer two pathways through the game. You can play the game through normally, or you can take advantage of an (ignorant? brilliant?) number of unlockable difficulty levels that reward with better loot, and grind.
There are a lot of cutscenes. Story beats and area transitions both. (The devs say they tested transitions without the cutscenes, and they were disorientating for players. I was irritated by them, but the devs have a point. If you can’t do it seamlessly, you need to keep the player orientated.)
The Powers are great.
The gunplay is floaty, and you’ll likely want to adjust ADS sensitivity downward (if you can, I haven’t checked). I’ve enjoyed worse, but it’s not great.
The level design is meh. (Oh goody. Another grey/brown area with lots of waist high cover. I wonder what’s going to happen?)
Helpful tip: the promo line of “cover is for cowards”? Believe it. There is a cover mechanic and lots of cover, but it’s for the AI opponents, not you. Most of the time.
You’ll get very frustrated as you’re flanked/grenaded. Keep moving. Stay aggressive. Rip and tear.
No micro transactions or games as service BS. You buy the game, you get the game. They might do DLC at some point if there’s demand, but it’s not something they’re currently working on.
Communication and responsiveness from the devs has been phenomenal.
(The above bit about transitional cutscenes is an example. Amazingly enough, when you give people good-faith explanations about the trade-offs you made, they tend to respect it.)
Just hearing about it now, actually. PS-exclusive?
Xbox, PS, and PC.
I forget the release date for the game proper, but it’s imminent.
Any progress/items/mods/materials are retained from demo to full game. (Unless you used hacker tools to cheat, in which case *snap*.)
First portion of the game, max level 7, crafting locked (but you get to keep any mods you learn from dismantling gear, which includes a small chance at legendaries which you are unlikely to have access to in the early-mid game otherwise. And mods are learned skills, not consumables.)
Helpful hint: the same gear mod doesn’t stack with itself. (I should pay more attention to words on loading screens. I might have seen this several times before I actually noticed.)
I should note that the grim darkness is played absolutely deadpan straight, but is too over the top to take seriously.
(One corpse hanging from the ceiling is horror. One hundred of them, many bouncing off the vehicle’s windshield as the driver tries to escape from a transcendental threat, is camp.)
Out of curiosity, what does everyone think of the Outriders demo?
My impressions:
Daggum but it’s dark. The bit we have access to largely has the “man’s inhumanity to man” theme, but it certainly looks like that’s just an aspect of greater cosmic horror. Our character is the hope spot, so we’ve got that going for us. If it isn’t subverted into grimdark. (I don’t think it will be, but I’ve got to note that it isn’t narratively ruled out.)
The setting is interesting, and I want to explore the mysteries.
It’s a looter-shooter with an actual story.
Because of this, they basically offer two pathways through the game. You can play the game through normally, or you can take advantage of an (ignorant? brilliant?) number of unlockable difficulty levels that reward with better loot, and grind.
There are a lot of cutscenes. Story beats and area transitions both. (The devs say they tested transitions without the cutscenes, and they were disorientating for players. I was irritated by them, but the devs have a point. If you can’t do it seamlessly, you need to keep the player orientated.)
The Powers are great.
The gunplay is floaty, and you’ll likely want to adjust ADS sensitivity downward (if you can, I haven’t checked). I’ve enjoyed worse, but it’s not great.
The level design is meh. (Oh goody. Another grey/brown area with lots of waist high cover. I wonder what’s going to happen?)
Helpful tip: the promo line of “cover is for cowards”? Believe it. There is a cover mechanic and lots of cover, but it’s for the AI opponents, not you. Most of the time.
You’ll get very frustrated as you’re flanked/grenaded. Keep moving. Stay aggressive. Rip and tear.
No micro transactions or games as service BS. You buy the game, you get the game. They might do DLC at some point if there’s demand, but it’s not something they’re currently working on.
Communication and responsiveness from the devs has been phenomenal.
(The above bit about transitional cutscenes is an example. Amazingly enough, when you give people good-faith explanations about the trade-offs you made, they tend to respect it.)
Just hearing about it now, actually. PS-exclusive?
Xbox, PS, and PC.
I forget the release date for the game proper, but it’s imminent.
Any progress/items/mods/materials are retained from demo to full game. (Unless you used hacker tools to cheat, in which case *snap*.)
First portion of the game, max level 7, crafting locked (but you get to keep any mods you learn from dismantling gear, which includes a small chance at legendaries which you are unlikely to have access to in the early-mid game otherwise. And mods are learned skills, not consumables.)
Helpful hint: the same gear mod doesn’t stack with itself. (I should pay more attention to words on loading screens. I might have seen this several times before I actually noticed.)
I should note that the grim darkness is played absolutely deadpan straight, but is too over the top to take seriously.
(One corpse hanging from the ceiling is horror. One hundred of them, many bouncing off the vehicle’s windshield as the driver tries to escape from a transcendental threat, is camp.)