This game deserves its own thread where we can discuss all things Outer Wilds related.
This game more than perhaps any other I've ever played is worth going into completely blind (which I did). The trailers quite simply spoil one of the primary driver's of the game....discovery.
It really will ruin those first time moments of discovering the landscapes, properties, visual splendour, the alien atmosphere, when first landing on these magnificently designed planets.
I'd go as far as saying the story is one of the best, most interesting stories I've experienced in a game.
The elevator pitch for Outer Wilds:
You play as a Hearthian astronaut exploring a solar system that is stuck in a 22 minute time loop, resetting after the sun explodes. This is a game about discovery & (as Dyni puts it) "The Aquirement Of Knowledge"
I'm right at the end of the game so I'll chime in with thoughts soon. Its safe to say this is easily one of the best games of the year for me.
I can confirm this game deserves its own thread, I think? I put it in a category of my favorite games that are hard to talk about, except from a glancing angle, lest I spill the beans.
'Spoiler' doesn't really cover it. Spoilers are about plot points, but these games are more of a "you can only really play these once" kinda games. Outer Wilds, The Witness, maybe Obra Dinn, maybe Portal? Best name I have for them so far is First Person Revelators.
I think Kerbal Space Program is adjacent as well, and Space Engine for a different reason.
For those worried the flying around mechanics will be too frustrating, I'd like to point out that to get from planet to planet you can just hit the gas till your in space, look at the one you wanna go to, and hit an auto pilot button that will get you there and ready to land.
I also think this game might present a hump to some in the form of that 22-minute reset mechanic. I get it. Remember you can get from anywhere to anywhere pretty fast, and what you're really accumulating is knowledge, so the reset doesn't take much away from you.
Also, like Portal or Braid, where mechanics and puzzles seem intertwined, I don't think there aren't actually any puzzles that require mechanical skill, just knowledge. But you might interpret a goal as requiring crazy platforming nonsense where its really a matter of thinking.
I suggest putting spoilers in the title
I really enjoyed it and the premise until I got to a certain part where the mechanics went from challenging to impossible for some reason. Maybe I was doing something wrong but the game did not do anything to help so?
I'm almost done with it. Kinda stuck, but I love it so much I can't bear to finish or look up spoilers. I'll bang my head against it soon again, and see if I can make some progress.
One thing I'm stuck on as to whether or not I need to do is:
Do you have to land on the sun station? It looked like the teleporter is blocked. I tried a few times and got on it, but there was not really any place to land when you get in contact. Just looking for a simple Yes/No without spoilers. Don't want to waste time.
It’s conceivable that I’ll remember the theme song until I die. Because of the ending-
The emotion it evokes for me is a sort of... I dunno... joyful, satisfied, sadness- if that makes sense. Kind of like remembering an amusing anecdote about a long lost loved one. You still feel the pain of their loss, but enough time has passed that the memory is mixed with happiness to have known them and remember them.
This was my wife's birthday gift to me this year and it was fantastic.
Also, like Portal or Braid, where mechanics and puzzles seem intertwined, I don't think there aren't actually any puzzles that require mechanical skill, just knowledge. But you might interpret a goal as requiring crazy platforming nonsense where its really a matter of thinking.
I specifically remember there was a difficult jump on Brittle Hollow that involved shifting gravity. I kept "dying" to this one jump, so I caved and looked it up online. Saw a video demonstrating how to make the jump, and I couldn't replicate this guy's technique. Bummed out, I tried one last time and I looked around and saw that there was a ledge to rest on, in the middle of the jump, meaning I could make two smaller jumps to get there. It was really refreshing to know that I just had to take a moment to take stock of the surroundings, and that it wasn't about my 3D platforming skill.
I also got a heavy Anathem vibe from the game. Thank you Danjo, for recommending Anathem to me all those years ago, it was also fantastic, and one of my favorite books.
I never put two and two together, but I think I can see it now, the link between Anathem and The Outer Worlds. A secluded pod of stoics, taking advantage of their partial insights into a bigger picture to kick off something bigger than them. With a thin thematic thread of audacity/humility woven in.
I may need to go back and read that book again. I recall the ending being hard to follow cause it got all wibbly wobbly.
Yes, this game absolutely deserves its own thread, even if it is a year late
I've already discussed my feelings on Outer Wilds at length in the Finished Games and 2019 GOTY threads.
'Spoiler' doesn't really cover it. Spoilers are about plot points, but these games are more of a "you can only really play these once" kinda games. Outer Wilds, The Witness, maybe Obra Dinn, maybe Portal? Best name I have for them so far is First Person Revelators.
First Person Revelators. I like that. This also reminds me that I really need to check out Obra Dinn.
I really enjoyed it and the premise until I got to a certain part where the mechanics went from challenging to impossible for some reason. Maybe I was doing something wrong but the game did not do anything to help so?
I don't recall anything too mechanically intensive, so perhaps you just hadn't figured out exactly what to do yet. I don't think there's anything wrong with looking up solutions to progress in this game. Just be careful to not read too far ahead. The guide over at Polygon seemed like a good reference for finding exactly what you need without revealing too much, since it breaks everything up by planet.
If I remember correctly there was some type of small piece of a space shuttle you had to land on and grab but you could only see it when you were on top of it and it was also in the gravity of well of a planet so controlling your ship was also difficult. I think there was a 3rd thing complicating the interaction but i can;t recall now.
Onto my end game dilemma.
Spoiler:I've explored everywhere now, finally landing on the Quantum Moon, which was an experience. I did have to look it up even though I should have known to use what I learned at the Tower Of Quantum Trials in Giant's Deep. I thought that stuff would be applicable only when on the actual moon. Turns out the scout is required to take a pic of the actual moon before going into its atmosphere. I again had to check how to get to the the secret sixth location which didn't seem obvious in the slightest (I'd never used the little mini map to note which direction I was going).
Funnily enough, I figured out how to land on the moon super early in the game. I had taken pictures of Quantum rock back in the Timber Hearth museum and noticed that it didn't warp away as long as I could still see the picture. Figuring out how to get to the 6th location was one of the few things I had to look up for myself.
Now onto the the last journey:
Spoiler:Headed to Ash Twin, straight to the broken tower to teleport into the core. Wait for the sand to drain enough that the purple teleporter on the floor is revealed. This is another part that is a little obtuse & thus I had to look up. To know that your required to stand in the little encave within the room or alternatively just outside the room under the bridge, while the sand passes overhead. Next rush into the room when the sand is directly above you to teleport doesn't exactly equate to putting 2 & 2 together, it seems a bit of a reach. You get the warp core once inside then your straight out & back to your ship.
This was one of the other things I had to look up. I figured out that I needed to stand in that spot for the teleporter, but I kept trying to stand on it ahead of time as the sand pillar washed over me, which always resulted in me being swept away by sand. I thought I was missing something, but I just had to wait until it was overhead and then walk out onto the platform for it to work. This is one of the only parts of the game I found to be poorly designed. It should have worked by standing on it ahead of time, or it should have been communicated in some way that you needed to walk onto the platform at a specific time.
Spoiler:The tough part is that near 7 mins are used up by this point & your fighting against the clock. Going to Dark Bramble is were I've got killed over & over by the angular fish. The first time I got right through to the vessel but was going so slow as to not catch the attention of the fish that the sun exploded when I was about to enter to its interior. The next load of times I've rushed each misty area & have gotten eaten at one point or another. Its actually fairly hard to be quick & not get caught by one of these huge creatures. I'm sure I'll find a sweet spot but I've a feeling this is gonna take a while.
Have you already figured out your exact path? If so, you should have enough time to make it. The tricky parts are lining up your trajectory as closely as possible at the start and knowing when you can thrust. I'm assuming the spot you're struggling with is the area with 3 fish near the entrance blocking the eggs? For that part, position yourself a bit outside of the seed and line yourself up with the red dot. Thrust hard right until you enter the seed, then let off the thrust and float on by. You'll be moving at a snail's pace near the end, but you should still make it just fine.
Once you're almost to the eggs, you should be able to safely thrust again to the vessel entrance. The other thing to note is that once you pass through a seed, the fish in your current area stop chasing, so if you're close to a seed and far enough away from the nearby fish, you should be able to thrust your way through to the next seed entrance. I've also seen people mention that it's easier to bail out of your ship once you hit the 3 fish part and just try to do it with your suit so you're less likely to bump into them on the way, but I never tried that myself.
Also, just out of curiosity,
Did you figure out how to get inside the Interloper? It seems like a lot of people never figure out how to do this. It's not mandatory, but it's totally worth doing before you finish the game.
I tired to get into the game three different times. Makes me sad because a lot of what it’s doing is right up my ally. The movement did not work for me. Timed exploration made me feel like I was wasting a lot of time just getting to where I want to go. Those things made the story uninteresting for me to uncover.
It won Giant Bomb’s GOTY which is really cool.
Cross posting from the VR thread:
I'm unabashedly in love with my Valve Index.
My game of the year for 2020 is the Outer Wilds.
Marry the two and you've got the Greatest of All Time.
Stumbled across NomaiVR which is a VR implementation of Outer Wilds and it is as mind blowing, disorienting, beautiful, and all around game changing as you'd think. Only got a chance to put 30 minutes in and there's a fair bit of jank and even as someone with iron VR legs, still feeling a bit funky after but WOW. I can't wait to play through my favourite game of the year (and probably my number 2 all time) again in my favourite new platform.
I'll probably try and stream my playthrough of this on the GWJ Twitch channel. If you have VR and don't get motion sick, it's a MUST TRY experience.
Neat. I can see where VR would make certain aspects of Outer Wilds extra spectacular.
Also there's a decent amount of getting pushed around by the environment. Seems like the VR-barfiness factor would be a little high. I could see making a bad jump in Brittle Hollow and losing it!
Really surprised to see there aren't more posts about this amazing game. Outer Wilds and Sekiro are definitely my 2019 GOTY games (even though I played both in 2020).
I'm almost done with it. Kinda stuck, but I love it so much I can't bear to finish or look up spoilers. I'll bang my head against it soon again, and see if I can make some progress.
One thing I'm stuck on as to whether or not I need to do is:
Spoiler:Do you have to land on the sun station? It looked like the teleporter is blocked. I tried a few times and got on it, but there was not really any place to land when you get in contact. Just looking for a simple Yes/No without spoilers. Don't want to waste time.
I know it has already been answered, but it is also possible to get on the Sun Station manually. In fact, there is an achievement for it. And it is a great feeling when you do it. Almost feels like the docking scene in Interstellar. You don't have to land the ship either. I mostly just get my ship in between the two parts of the station and then jump out of the ship to get into the open hallway by jetpacking into it.
Really surprised to see there aren't more posts about this amazing game. Outer Wilds and Sekiro are definitely my 2019 GOTY games (even though I played both in 2020).
Most of the conversation happened in the Xbox GamePass Beta thread as it was a GamePass game on Xbox upon release.
I also think it’s a hard one in general to talk about because everything is a spoiler and a wall of spoiler tags in a thread is just hard to read.
I think I want to do a replay of this over Christmas again this year though. I started the first 30 minutes again and upon replay there’s so much more depth and character than I even realized the first run through.
This game is amazing and I love it to bits, and I'm going to catch up and read all previous posts, but before I do, I need to share this interesting documentary.
(Again, thanks Staygold for nudging me into the delightful black hole that is this game.)
Releasing Sept 28th:
I really need to finish Outer Wilds one of these days.
I don't even wanna watch, going in knowing zilch & seeing nothing too. Cannot wait to get back into this world & take it all in.
I didn't watch it either
I truly have no idea what this expansion could be with the way the game played out, but I'm excited to find out.
Yeah, I’m not watching either. The announcement itself was enough to get me excited and I’m gonna pick this up as soon as it comes out. <3
New DLC is out TODAY!!!!!! Picked up the game a second time on Steam. So so so excited for this.
Oh man, I forgot this was out today. I will be picking it up after work for sure.
Dyni wrote:Oh man, I forgot this was out today. I will be picking it up after work for sure.
Was the release date for the DLC even announced?
If you scroll up, you'll see I mentioned a Sept 28th release date when I linked the trailer. I just forgot about it. That makes this release a nice surprise
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