These games just aren't for me. It's like a more basic version of Mass Effect 3's multiplayer. Go to cover, shoot things, collect loot and figure out the one that's marginally better than the others, repeat.
if you played destiny or gears of war, you probably already got the gist of what this game has to offer. unlike those games though, there really isn't anything special about it
there's a beastie boys reference so it gets extra points for that
there's a beastie boys reference so it gets extra points for that
I’ve been playing a lot of PC games recently and I REALLY don’t want to sound like one of those “PC master race” people. But....this game on console feels HORRENDOUS to play.
I’m gonna leave it at 2.5 stars because the game visually is amazing and the potential for it to be really fun is definitely there.
There’s just no way this was made to be played on a console, or with a controller.
Will possibly pick up again when it’s available on gamespass pc but the hype will have probably passed by then and it won’t be much fun to play alone.
I’m gonna leave it at 2.5 stars because the game visually is amazing and the potential for it to be really fun is definitely there.
There’s just no way this was made to be played on a console, or with a controller.
Will possibly pick up again when it’s available on gamespass pc but the hype will have probably passed by then and it won’t be much fun to play alone.
It's ok the endgame is fun with friends if you're into things like WoW Mythic + however the main campaign was pretty bad
Outriders is a game that when it hits its power fantasy feels great; gives you the Fast and Blast that peak Path of Exile or Diablo have where you’re just destroying waves of hapless foes and feeling all mighty for it. It is quite a shame that these moments are few and far between until you’ve almost beat the story and heavily gear locked; if your numbers aren’t big enough then no fun for you. The core design is Diablo with chest high walls (which you mostly get to ignore come late game) coupled with one of the worst, most misanthropic stories I’ve seen in modern gaming. Terrible writing and voice acting abounds with jokes that hit maybe twice in the whole game and would otherwise be embarrassing for a 13-year-old boy to author.
The character ability customization and build variety are evidence of a developer who hasn’t put much time into researching what others are doing in the space nor to find out what works and what doesn’t in a similar vein to Anthem’s screwups. The armor mod system is wonderful where you can swap out one of the two abilities on your armor or weapon for anything you’d previously unlocked. Sadly, the substat system means anything but the most basic of “make gun hit gud” build is extremely finnicky and reliant on the perfect set of stats and mods while still often not being as effective, turning the game largely into a shooting gallery instead of fun power testing ground. You also barely have enough class points to make any sort of decisions about your build, as the vast majority of your points just go to getting to your necessary capstone ability.
This isn’t even mentioning how buggy the game is, what with inventory wipes, crashes, and a non-functional multiplayer environment. Even the working parts often seem like they should be called bugs in any other game, where attack hitboxes don’t match up to the red circles on the ground, or said indicators are covered up by terrain or simply non-present. Telegraphs as to what to do to avoid attacks are often missing, the interrupt system is half baked nonsense, and the general vertical field of vision where you need to watch the ground while shooting evil birds in the air hardly works.
There’s potential under all this; when the game clicks and you start dropping meteors on burning enemies from your legendary shotgun it can feel wonderful. Even then the payoffs in terms of fun are too small and everything that surrounds it simply fails. Hidden nerf mechanics such as “downscaling” which punish you for gearing up, insane balance decisions from the developers, and the fact that basically everything else in the game is total garbage makes this a hard derec, don’t waste your time.
The character ability customization and build variety are evidence of a developer who hasn’t put much time into researching what others are doing in the space nor to find out what works and what doesn’t in a similar vein to Anthem’s screwups. The armor mod system is wonderful where you can swap out one of the two abilities on your armor or weapon for anything you’d previously unlocked. Sadly, the substat system means anything but the most basic of “make gun hit gud” build is extremely finnicky and reliant on the perfect set of stats and mods while still often not being as effective, turning the game largely into a shooting gallery instead of fun power testing ground. You also barely have enough class points to make any sort of decisions about your build, as the vast majority of your points just go to getting to your necessary capstone ability.
This isn’t even mentioning how buggy the game is, what with inventory wipes, crashes, and a non-functional multiplayer environment. Even the working parts often seem like they should be called bugs in any other game, where attack hitboxes don’t match up to the red circles on the ground, or said indicators are covered up by terrain or simply non-present. Telegraphs as to what to do to avoid attacks are often missing, the interrupt system is half baked nonsense, and the general vertical field of vision where you need to watch the ground while shooting evil birds in the air hardly works.
There’s potential under all this; when the game clicks and you start dropping meteors on burning enemies from your legendary shotgun it can feel wonderful. Even then the payoffs in terms of fun are too small and everything that surrounds it simply fails. Hidden nerf mechanics such as “downscaling” which punish you for gearing up, insane balance decisions from the developers, and the fact that basically everything else in the game is total garbage makes this a hard derec, don’t waste your time.
There is a rift between how fun this game is to play if you're a Pyro playing like it's gears, or a Trickster playing like it's Doom. The latter works, and is one of the funnest TPS' I've ran into.
The former is boring and not that interesting. Feels cheap when enemies laser you regardless
The plot is standard B movie stuff (and fun) but the lore is fairly interesting and provides sufficient enough motivation to drive the world forward
Loot is bountiful and fun. The mod customization is very well tuned, and that combined with a customized skill tree can create epic power fantasy destroyers that are pure fun to play
The former is boring and not that interesting. Feels cheap when enemies laser you regardless
The plot is standard B movie stuff (and fun) but the lore is fairly interesting and provides sufficient enough motivation to drive the world forward
Loot is bountiful and fun. The mod customization is very well tuned, and that combined with a customized skill tree can create epic power fantasy destroyers that are pure fun to play
It was fine with friends. Guns were bad, abilities worse. Laggy glitchy mess, but fun with friends.
I actually don't mind too much about the actual combat in this game and it feels fine enough. It's just so hard to not think about how dumb as rocks the story is. I feel like I'm just back to basic "game bad story blah" communication on this but even compared to Destiny, there really is no intrigue for this universe.
Alright so here is the thing with this game. It is actually fun when it wants to work and the story I did not care for at all but my issue which is a HUGE problem is how terrible this game was optimized for the base xbox one . I played this game through the gamepass which I feel like saved the score a little but this game has serious bugs , glitches and hell even crashes on the base xbox one. Frame drops left and right and audio issues I mean the list goes on and on for this version of the game and with that being said it made the experience more painful then fun by the end and it sucks because I know this game is fun but there is nothing I can do about a crap version of a game.
"Hey, let's make one fight into a 30 hour game!"
destiny but for goths (it’s pretty fun to be honest)
Pros:
Really good combat loop
Great class system with distinguishable classes
Simple to use difficulty system with lots of replayability potential
Interesting story
Cons
Lots of bugs
Lots of minor usability annoyances
Terrible dialogue
Bugs
- Crash when selected a face option on character creation
- Character pacing back and forward when opening gates to transition between areas (assume game is trying to make character stand in the right place)
- Had a glitch where the same really loud and intense audio track was playing on repeat until i reloaded the save
- No custom markers or waypoints. Incredibly annoying when you're trying to find where you need to go to pick up a quest you dont have yet
- Characters would ask you about your progress on a quest when you've just picked it up
- Dialogue is inaudible when closing/opening inventory. Dialogue doesn't pause though so once inventory is opened the dialogue continues but you've missed seconds of it
- Clunky transitioning between areas. Can't just walk into a section you have to press a button and your character lifts a tree out of the way every time. Why?!
- Some objective trackers wouldn't work until you left the area and loaded back in
Really good combat loop
Great class system with distinguishable classes
Simple to use difficulty system with lots of replayability potential
Interesting story
Cons
Lots of bugs
Lots of minor usability annoyances
Terrible dialogue
Bugs
- Crash when selected a face option on character creation
- Character pacing back and forward when opening gates to transition between areas (assume game is trying to make character stand in the right place)
- Had a glitch where the same really loud and intense audio track was playing on repeat until i reloaded the save
- No custom markers or waypoints. Incredibly annoying when you're trying to find where you need to go to pick up a quest you dont have yet
- Characters would ask you about your progress on a quest when you've just picked it up
- Dialogue is inaudible when closing/opening inventory. Dialogue doesn't pause though so once inventory is opened the dialogue continues but you've missed seconds of it
- Clunky transitioning between areas. Can't just walk into a section you have to press a button and your character lifts a tree out of the way every time. Why?!
- Some objective trackers wouldn't work until you left the area and loaded back in
I'm gonna go ahead and abandon this. I haven't played it long enough to properly rate it so I am leaving it unrated. The combat is excellent and the AI is challenging, especially on higher difficulties, but bad server issues at launch combined with always online requirements sunk this before it could really get going. I'm sure it would be awesome if I had some pals to play with but grinding through a lame story alone isn't something I'm interested in at the moment.
It is a mix of Gears and Diablo, in fun playing together with other people.
My answer is...
Meh... It's good game, but is very repetitive.
Can be improved.
My answer is...
Meh... It's good game, but is very repetitive.
Can be improved.
I think this is a great looter shooter, I just wish there was slightly more variety of endgame-viable builds.
Good for refund.
Like someone found a 360 cover shooter at the back of Square Enix's warehouse collecting dust, popped it in and said "Well, let's add some loot and repeatable quests to give players something to do then ship this thing". Surprisingly, that actually works. Feels good to play and the idea of tying class abilities to healing works really well.
Compelling storyline, everything else about it is either generic and bad
This review contains spoilers
English/German below
After about 35 hours, maybe it's more and 715 gamerscore I finished the campaign with my Pyro. Basically I am only evaluating the way to the end, I will still look at the endgame, but I think the idea of expeditions to collect resources is good and logically linked. I played on the Xbox Series X.
story
I had a lot of fun with the campaign, finally a decent sci-fi setting again, which by colonizing a new planet arouses the urge to explore and is very interesting. As outriders, we had the task of scouting the planet before it was to be colonized. However, an anomaly makes a huge difference and in the further course (30 years after the anomaly incident) you have awakened from the cryostasis and first have to find your way around. There is of course a war between the survivors and further exploration of the secrets of the planet Enoch.
For me, the storyline is perfectly fine, especially at the beginning everything is almost coldly killed in Game of Thrones style. But the beginning in particular still seems a bit tedious, the campaign takes time and only really gets going when you:
spoiler
learn about the other species on the planet.
With this introduction it got really exciting. It's also towards the end (and you always have the feeling that it's over now) but also very predictable what happens, but it didn't bother me so much.
The final boss was a bit disappointing and didn't really fit for me because he was put on too suddenly (despite the previous experience with this one).
I also really liked the fact that you keep exploring the planet from camp to camp and always gain new team members.
In terms of dialogue it was rather clumsy, but it was also funny every now and then ("son of a bitch, asshole, etc." are often used expressions). Basically, shoot first, then talk.
Performance / graphics / glitches
I'll start with the performance, which was terrific on my Xbox. I can't remember having burglaries despite a major thunderstorm. Really great and especially with such a shooter it is important that it runs smoothly. The sci-fi look is beautifully staged and Enoch also offers different areas (lava, snow, forest, desert, etc.). In some scenarios, the atmosphere of the setting had an optimal impact.
The individual cities, camps, etc. are more or less wildly assembled, namely exactly as one would imagine in a colonization that is unclean.
Unfortunately, there were always texture reloaders or e.g. Elements of flora that didn't look really awesome. Some trees were downright ugly. The characters also showed weaknesses. The facial expressions in particular were sometimes incredibly bad. The prostitute Lucy serves as a prime example, whose face has twisted so much with the umpteenth suitor that one can only refuse with thanks. It is precisely these completely abnormal facial expressions that one sees again and again in the course of the game. Sometimes there were also dropouts in the sound.
Regarding crashes and disconnections, I can only say that I only had disconnections on the day of the release, as well as one day later, otherwise it always seemed to be timed so that I was spared. I only had one hard crash in the tutorial. I haven't had any other problems, such as a complete loss of inventory. But it is already weak that this bug is found so often in loot games (e.g. the complete loss of level and gear in Marvel's Avengers).
Gameplay
This time starting with the negative aspects. It really bothered me very much that the fauna of a completely new planet is so incredibly repetitive. What's the point of fighting the same critters over and over again. The humanoid opponents were basically always the same, shotgun breakers, snipers, little soldiers left and right and an elite. Would have been cool if individual factions had recognizably specialized in different combat strategies.
Also, more changed bosses or bosses like the spider would have been nice. The recycling of opponents was just too much for me and this became very clear during the hunting quests when you had to kill the Xth Reskin of a certain animal.
The level structures of each area are also very tubular and a bit monotonous in the gameplay. Especially here you could have brought more variety into the gameplay by not only being able to shoot explosive compartments, but also could have incorporated other environmental factors (e.g. rubble that you can shoot and damage opponents, etc.).
CAMERA, it is really terribly bad and I can only recommend everyone to save at least a little in the options. But with some quests ("Gezinkt" side quest or the bounties) it just sucks, every freshman student can do it better. The game also has a hell of a lot of very unnecessary cut scenes that at some point I just skipped instantly.
BUT! Although a level is rather monotonous, it is still a lot of fun to test your character skills, to use different skills, mods or weapons. The weapons are a lot of fun, the looting is sufficiently satisfactory (unfortunately I only get the same legendary items all the time) and I find the classes sufficiently different (pyromancer on 30, technomancer on 19, trickster on 13). All three of the classes I've played so far are fun and I would have liked to have got a few more skill points or more magic. Especially with the pyro, this vortex of flames, a real firestorm would have been really cool.
The gameplay offers the possibility to replay missions, collect bounties or play hunting quests and you can adjust your level of difficulty again and again through the world levels. These levels also offer enough motivation to unlock more and more levels. The game works very well both in single player and in co-op, but especially with Pyro I have some problems alone at higher levels ... Glass cannon.
I will now happily enter the endgame and continue to play the game a bit, probably also raise another class, because it makes me want to go.
Conclusion
The game is worthwhile for the single player campaign alone and that is also a quality difference to the other genre representatives. Outriders doesn't make it perfect by far, but does a lot of things very well and for me is well served with 4/5 anomalies, in the end I fluctuated between 3.5/5 and 4/5.
------------------------german------------------------------
Nach ca. 35 Stunden, vielleicht ist es auch mehr und 715 Gamerscore hab ich mit meinem Pyro die Kampagne beendet. Ich bewerte hier im Grunde nur den Weg bis zum Ende, das Endgame werde ich mir noch anschauen, aber die Idee mit den Expeditionen, um Ressourcen einzusammeln finde ich gut und logisch verknüpft. Ich habe auf der Xbox Series X gespielt.
Story
Ich hatte echt Spaß mit der Kampagne, endlich wieder ein ordentliches Sci-Fi Setting, das durch die Besiedelung eines neuen Planeten gleich den Erkundungsdrang weckt und sehr interessant ist. Als Outrider hatten wir die Aufgabe den Planeten bevor er kolonialisiert werden soll auszukundschaften. Eine Anomalie macht aber einen gewaltigen Strich durch die Rechnung und im weiteren Verlauf (30 Jahre nach dem Anomalievorfall) ist man wieder aus der Kryostase erwacht und muss sich erstmal zurechtfinden. Es herrscht natürlich Krieg zwischen den Überlebenden und man erforscht weiter die Geheimnisse des Planeten Enoch.
Für mich ist der Storyverlauf vollkommen in Ordnung, vor allem am Anfang wird fast schon in Game of Thrones Manier alles eiskalt weggekillt. Gerade der Anfang wirkt aber noch etwas mühsig, die Kampagne brauch seine Zeit und kommt erst wirklich in Fahrt wenn man:
Spoiler
etwas über die andere Spezies des Planeten erfährt.
Mit dieser Einführung wurde es richtig spannend. Es ist gerade auch gegen Ende (und man hat immer wieder schon vorher das Gefühl es wäre nun zu Ende) doch auch sehr vorhersehbar was passiert, hat mich aber jetzt nicht so sehr gestört.
Der Endboss war etwas enttäuschend und hat für mich nicht so wirklich gepasst, weil er zu plötzlich aufgesetzt wird (trotz des vorherigen Erlebnisses mit diesem).
Auch sehr gut gefallen hat mir, dass man immer wieder von Lager zu Lager weiter in den Planeten hinein erkundet und auch immer wieder neue Teammitglieder gewinnt.
Dialogstechnisch war das eher plump, dadurch aber auch immer wieder mal witzig ("Hurensohn, Arschloch usw." sind gern benutzte Ausdrücke). Grundsätzlich gilt erst schießen dann reden.
Performance/Grafik/Glitches
Ich fange mit der Performance an, die war auf meiner Xbox grandios. Ich kann mich nicht erinnern, trotz großem Effektgewitter Einbrüche gehabt zu haben. Wirklich toll und gerade bei so einem Shooter ist es wichtig, dass es flüssig läuft. Der Sci-Fi Look ist sehr schön inszeniert und Enoch bietet auch verschiedene Areale (Lava, Schnee, Wald, Wüste usw.). Bei manchen Szenerien hat die Atmosphäre des Settings optimal durchgeschlagen.
Die einzelnen Städte, Lager usw. sind mehr oder minder wild zusammengebaut, nämlich genauso, wie man es bei einer Kolonialisierung, die unsauber verläuft, sich vorstellen würde.
Leider gab es aber auch immer mal wieder Texturnachlader oder z.b. Elemente der Flora, die nicht wirklich geil aussahen. Manche Bäumen waren regelrecht hässlich. Auch bei den Charakteren zeigten sich Schwächen. Gerade die Mimik war teilweise unfassbar schlecht. Als Paradebeispiel dient wohl die Prostituierte Lucy, deren Gesicht sich beim X-ten Freier so sehr verzogen hat, dass man nur dankend ablehnen kann. Gerade dieses völlig abnormalen Mimiken erblickt man immer wieder im Verlauf des Spiels. Beim Sound gab es manchmal auch Aussetzer.
Zu Crashes und Verbindungsabbrüchen kann ich nur sagen, dass ich lediglich am Releasetag Verbindungsabbrüche hatte, sowie einen Tag später, ansonsten hat es scheinbar immer zeitlich so gepasst, dass ich davon verschont geblieben bin. Hardcrash hatte ich nur einen im Tutorial. Andere Probleme, wie den kompletten Inventarverlust hatte ich bisher nicht. Aber es ist schon schwach, dass dieser Bug gerade bei Lootgames, so oft Einzug hält (z.b. der Komplettverlust von Level und Gear bei Marvels Avengers).
Gameplay
Dieses mal beginnend mit den negativen Aspekten. Wirklich sehr gestört hat mich, dass gerade die Fauna eines völlig neuen Planeten so unglaublich repetitiv ist. Was soll das immer wieder gegen dieselben Viecher zu kämpfen. Auch die humanoiden Gegner waren im Grunde immer gleich, Shotgun Brecher, Sniper, kleine Soldaten links und rechts und ein Elite. Wäre cool gewesen, wenn sich einzelne Fraktionen erkennbar auf verschiedene Kampfstrategien spezialisiert hätten.
Auch wären mehr veränderte Bossgegner oder Bosse wie die Spinne schön gewesen. Das Gegnerrecycling war mir einfach zu viel und gerade bei den Jagdquests ist das sehr deutlich geworden, als man den X-ten Reskin eines bestimmten Tieres killen musste.
Auch die Levelstrukturen eines jeden Gebiets sind sehr schlauchig und etwas eintönig im Gameplay. Gerade hier hätte man mehr Vielfalt ins Gameplay einbringen können, indem man nicht nur Explosivfächer beschießen kann, sondern auch andere Umgebungsfaktoren hätte einbauen können (z.b. Geröll, dass man losschießen kann und Gegner schädigt usw.).
KAMERA, die ist wirklich grandios schlecht und ich kann jedem nur empfehlen in den Optionen es zumindest ein wenig zu retten. Aber bei manchen Quests ("Gezinkt" Nebenquest oder den Kopfgeldern) ist das einfach nur scheiße, das kriegt jeder Erstsemester Student besser hin. Auch hat das Game verdammt viele sehr unnötige Cutscenes, die ich irgendwann einfach nur noch instant übersprungen habe.
ABER! Zwar ist ein Level eher eintönig gestaltet, es macht aber trotzdem unglaublich viel Spaß, seine Charakter Skillung zu testen, verschiedene Fähigkeiten, Mods oder Waffen zu verwenden. Die Waffen machen extrem viel Spaß, das Looten ist ausreichend befriedigend (leider bekomme ich ständig nur dieselben Legendären Items) und die Klassen finde ich ausreichend different (Pyromant auf 30, Technomant auf 19, Trickster auf 13). Alle drei von mir bisher gespielten Klassen machen Spaß und ich hätte mir irgendwie gewünscht noch ein paar mehr Skillpunkte zu bekommen bzw. auch mehr Zauber. Gerade beim Pyro wäre dieser Flammenwirbel, ein richtiger Feuersturm doch richtig cool gewesen.
Das Gameplay bietet die Möglichkeit Missionen wiederzuspielen, Kopfgelder zu sammeln oder auch Jagdquests zu spielen und dabei kann man seinen Schwierigkeitsgrad immer wieder durch die Weltstufen anpassen. Diese Stufen bieten auch genügend Motivation immer weitere Stufen freizuschalten. Sowohl im Singleplayer als auch im Koop funktioniert das Spiel sehr gut, aber gerade beim Pyro hab ich auf höheren Stufen alleine doch etwas Probleme...Glaskanone.
Ich werde jetzt freudig ins Endgame einsteigen und das Spiel noch ein bisschen weiterzocken, wahrscheinlich auch noch eine weitere Klasse hochziehen, denn es macht Bock.
Fazit
Alleine schon nur für die Singleplayer Kampagne lohnt sich das Spiel und das ist dann schon auch ein Qualitätsunterschied zu den anderen Genre-Vertretern. Outriders macht es bei weitem nicht perfekt, macht aber vieles sehr gut und ist für mich mit 4/5 Anomalien gut bedient, letztlich habe ich zwischen 3.5/5 und 4/5 geschwankt.
After about 35 hours, maybe it's more and 715 gamerscore I finished the campaign with my Pyro. Basically I am only evaluating the way to the end, I will still look at the endgame, but I think the idea of expeditions to collect resources is good and logically linked. I played on the Xbox Series X.
story
I had a lot of fun with the campaign, finally a decent sci-fi setting again, which by colonizing a new planet arouses the urge to explore and is very interesting. As outriders, we had the task of scouting the planet before it was to be colonized. However, an anomaly makes a huge difference and in the further course (30 years after the anomaly incident) you have awakened from the cryostasis and first have to find your way around. There is of course a war between the survivors and further exploration of the secrets of the planet Enoch.
For me, the storyline is perfectly fine, especially at the beginning everything is almost coldly killed in Game of Thrones style. But the beginning in particular still seems a bit tedious, the campaign takes time and only really gets going when you:
spoiler
learn about the other species on the planet.
With this introduction it got really exciting. It's also towards the end (and you always have the feeling that it's over now) but also very predictable what happens, but it didn't bother me so much.
The final boss was a bit disappointing and didn't really fit for me because he was put on too suddenly (despite the previous experience with this one).
I also really liked the fact that you keep exploring the planet from camp to camp and always gain new team members.
In terms of dialogue it was rather clumsy, but it was also funny every now and then ("son of a bitch, asshole, etc." are often used expressions). Basically, shoot first, then talk.
Performance / graphics / glitches
I'll start with the performance, which was terrific on my Xbox. I can't remember having burglaries despite a major thunderstorm. Really great and especially with such a shooter it is important that it runs smoothly. The sci-fi look is beautifully staged and Enoch also offers different areas (lava, snow, forest, desert, etc.). In some scenarios, the atmosphere of the setting had an optimal impact.
The individual cities, camps, etc. are more or less wildly assembled, namely exactly as one would imagine in a colonization that is unclean.
Unfortunately, there were always texture reloaders or e.g. Elements of flora that didn't look really awesome. Some trees were downright ugly. The characters also showed weaknesses. The facial expressions in particular were sometimes incredibly bad. The prostitute Lucy serves as a prime example, whose face has twisted so much with the umpteenth suitor that one can only refuse with thanks. It is precisely these completely abnormal facial expressions that one sees again and again in the course of the game. Sometimes there were also dropouts in the sound.
Regarding crashes and disconnections, I can only say that I only had disconnections on the day of the release, as well as one day later, otherwise it always seemed to be timed so that I was spared. I only had one hard crash in the tutorial. I haven't had any other problems, such as a complete loss of inventory. But it is already weak that this bug is found so often in loot games (e.g. the complete loss of level and gear in Marvel's Avengers).
Gameplay
This time starting with the negative aspects. It really bothered me very much that the fauna of a completely new planet is so incredibly repetitive. What's the point of fighting the same critters over and over again. The humanoid opponents were basically always the same, shotgun breakers, snipers, little soldiers left and right and an elite. Would have been cool if individual factions had recognizably specialized in different combat strategies.
Also, more changed bosses or bosses like the spider would have been nice. The recycling of opponents was just too much for me and this became very clear during the hunting quests when you had to kill the Xth Reskin of a certain animal.
The level structures of each area are also very tubular and a bit monotonous in the gameplay. Especially here you could have brought more variety into the gameplay by not only being able to shoot explosive compartments, but also could have incorporated other environmental factors (e.g. rubble that you can shoot and damage opponents, etc.).
CAMERA, it is really terribly bad and I can only recommend everyone to save at least a little in the options. But with some quests ("Gezinkt" side quest or the bounties) it just sucks, every freshman student can do it better. The game also has a hell of a lot of very unnecessary cut scenes that at some point I just skipped instantly.
BUT! Although a level is rather monotonous, it is still a lot of fun to test your character skills, to use different skills, mods or weapons. The weapons are a lot of fun, the looting is sufficiently satisfactory (unfortunately I only get the same legendary items all the time) and I find the classes sufficiently different (pyromancer on 30, technomancer on 19, trickster on 13). All three of the classes I've played so far are fun and I would have liked to have got a few more skill points or more magic. Especially with the pyro, this vortex of flames, a real firestorm would have been really cool.
The gameplay offers the possibility to replay missions, collect bounties or play hunting quests and you can adjust your level of difficulty again and again through the world levels. These levels also offer enough motivation to unlock more and more levels. The game works very well both in single player and in co-op, but especially with Pyro I have some problems alone at higher levels ... Glass cannon.
I will now happily enter the endgame and continue to play the game a bit, probably also raise another class, because it makes me want to go.
Conclusion
The game is worthwhile for the single player campaign alone and that is also a quality difference to the other genre representatives. Outriders doesn't make it perfect by far, but does a lot of things very well and for me is well served with 4/5 anomalies, in the end I fluctuated between 3.5/5 and 4/5.
------------------------german------------------------------
Nach ca. 35 Stunden, vielleicht ist es auch mehr und 715 Gamerscore hab ich mit meinem Pyro die Kampagne beendet. Ich bewerte hier im Grunde nur den Weg bis zum Ende, das Endgame werde ich mir noch anschauen, aber die Idee mit den Expeditionen, um Ressourcen einzusammeln finde ich gut und logisch verknüpft. Ich habe auf der Xbox Series X gespielt.
Story
Ich hatte echt Spaß mit der Kampagne, endlich wieder ein ordentliches Sci-Fi Setting, das durch die Besiedelung eines neuen Planeten gleich den Erkundungsdrang weckt und sehr interessant ist. Als Outrider hatten wir die Aufgabe den Planeten bevor er kolonialisiert werden soll auszukundschaften. Eine Anomalie macht aber einen gewaltigen Strich durch die Rechnung und im weiteren Verlauf (30 Jahre nach dem Anomalievorfall) ist man wieder aus der Kryostase erwacht und muss sich erstmal zurechtfinden. Es herrscht natürlich Krieg zwischen den Überlebenden und man erforscht weiter die Geheimnisse des Planeten Enoch.
Für mich ist der Storyverlauf vollkommen in Ordnung, vor allem am Anfang wird fast schon in Game of Thrones Manier alles eiskalt weggekillt. Gerade der Anfang wirkt aber noch etwas mühsig, die Kampagne brauch seine Zeit und kommt erst wirklich in Fahrt wenn man:
Spoiler
etwas über die andere Spezies des Planeten erfährt.
Mit dieser Einführung wurde es richtig spannend. Es ist gerade auch gegen Ende (und man hat immer wieder schon vorher das Gefühl es wäre nun zu Ende) doch auch sehr vorhersehbar was passiert, hat mich aber jetzt nicht so sehr gestört.
Der Endboss war etwas enttäuschend und hat für mich nicht so wirklich gepasst, weil er zu plötzlich aufgesetzt wird (trotz des vorherigen Erlebnisses mit diesem).
Auch sehr gut gefallen hat mir, dass man immer wieder von Lager zu Lager weiter in den Planeten hinein erkundet und auch immer wieder neue Teammitglieder gewinnt.
Dialogstechnisch war das eher plump, dadurch aber auch immer wieder mal witzig ("Hurensohn, Arschloch usw." sind gern benutzte Ausdrücke). Grundsätzlich gilt erst schießen dann reden.
Performance/Grafik/Glitches
Ich fange mit der Performance an, die war auf meiner Xbox grandios. Ich kann mich nicht erinnern, trotz großem Effektgewitter Einbrüche gehabt zu haben. Wirklich toll und gerade bei so einem Shooter ist es wichtig, dass es flüssig läuft. Der Sci-Fi Look ist sehr schön inszeniert und Enoch bietet auch verschiedene Areale (Lava, Schnee, Wald, Wüste usw.). Bei manchen Szenerien hat die Atmosphäre des Settings optimal durchgeschlagen.
Die einzelnen Städte, Lager usw. sind mehr oder minder wild zusammengebaut, nämlich genauso, wie man es bei einer Kolonialisierung, die unsauber verläuft, sich vorstellen würde.
Leider gab es aber auch immer mal wieder Texturnachlader oder z.b. Elemente der Flora, die nicht wirklich geil aussahen. Manche Bäumen waren regelrecht hässlich. Auch bei den Charakteren zeigten sich Schwächen. Gerade die Mimik war teilweise unfassbar schlecht. Als Paradebeispiel dient wohl die Prostituierte Lucy, deren Gesicht sich beim X-ten Freier so sehr verzogen hat, dass man nur dankend ablehnen kann. Gerade dieses völlig abnormalen Mimiken erblickt man immer wieder im Verlauf des Spiels. Beim Sound gab es manchmal auch Aussetzer.
Zu Crashes und Verbindungsabbrüchen kann ich nur sagen, dass ich lediglich am Releasetag Verbindungsabbrüche hatte, sowie einen Tag später, ansonsten hat es scheinbar immer zeitlich so gepasst, dass ich davon verschont geblieben bin. Hardcrash hatte ich nur einen im Tutorial. Andere Probleme, wie den kompletten Inventarverlust hatte ich bisher nicht. Aber es ist schon schwach, dass dieser Bug gerade bei Lootgames, so oft Einzug hält (z.b. der Komplettverlust von Level und Gear bei Marvels Avengers).
Gameplay
Dieses mal beginnend mit den negativen Aspekten. Wirklich sehr gestört hat mich, dass gerade die Fauna eines völlig neuen Planeten so unglaublich repetitiv ist. Was soll das immer wieder gegen dieselben Viecher zu kämpfen. Auch die humanoiden Gegner waren im Grunde immer gleich, Shotgun Brecher, Sniper, kleine Soldaten links und rechts und ein Elite. Wäre cool gewesen, wenn sich einzelne Fraktionen erkennbar auf verschiedene Kampfstrategien spezialisiert hätten.
Auch wären mehr veränderte Bossgegner oder Bosse wie die Spinne schön gewesen. Das Gegnerrecycling war mir einfach zu viel und gerade bei den Jagdquests ist das sehr deutlich geworden, als man den X-ten Reskin eines bestimmten Tieres killen musste.
Auch die Levelstrukturen eines jeden Gebiets sind sehr schlauchig und etwas eintönig im Gameplay. Gerade hier hätte man mehr Vielfalt ins Gameplay einbringen können, indem man nicht nur Explosivfächer beschießen kann, sondern auch andere Umgebungsfaktoren hätte einbauen können (z.b. Geröll, dass man losschießen kann und Gegner schädigt usw.).
KAMERA, die ist wirklich grandios schlecht und ich kann jedem nur empfehlen in den Optionen es zumindest ein wenig zu retten. Aber bei manchen Quests ("Gezinkt" Nebenquest oder den Kopfgeldern) ist das einfach nur scheiße, das kriegt jeder Erstsemester Student besser hin. Auch hat das Game verdammt viele sehr unnötige Cutscenes, die ich irgendwann einfach nur noch instant übersprungen habe.
ABER! Zwar ist ein Level eher eintönig gestaltet, es macht aber trotzdem unglaublich viel Spaß, seine Charakter Skillung zu testen, verschiedene Fähigkeiten, Mods oder Waffen zu verwenden. Die Waffen machen extrem viel Spaß, das Looten ist ausreichend befriedigend (leider bekomme ich ständig nur dieselben Legendären Items) und die Klassen finde ich ausreichend different (Pyromant auf 30, Technomant auf 19, Trickster auf 13). Alle drei von mir bisher gespielten Klassen machen Spaß und ich hätte mir irgendwie gewünscht noch ein paar mehr Skillpunkte zu bekommen bzw. auch mehr Zauber. Gerade beim Pyro wäre dieser Flammenwirbel, ein richtiger Feuersturm doch richtig cool gewesen.
Das Gameplay bietet die Möglichkeit Missionen wiederzuspielen, Kopfgelder zu sammeln oder auch Jagdquests zu spielen und dabei kann man seinen Schwierigkeitsgrad immer wieder durch die Weltstufen anpassen. Diese Stufen bieten auch genügend Motivation immer weitere Stufen freizuschalten. Sowohl im Singleplayer als auch im Koop funktioniert das Spiel sehr gut, aber gerade beim Pyro hab ich auf höheren Stufen alleine doch etwas Probleme...Glaskanone.
Ich werde jetzt freudig ins Endgame einsteigen und das Spiel noch ein bisschen weiterzocken, wahrscheinlich auch noch eine weitere Klasse hochziehen, denn es macht Bock.
Fazit
Alleine schon nur für die Singleplayer Kampagne lohnt sich das Spiel und das ist dann schon auch ein Qualitätsunterschied zu den anderen Genre-Vertretern. Outriders macht es bei weitem nicht perfekt, macht aber vieles sehr gut und ist für mich mit 4/5 Anomalien gut bedient, letztlich habe ich zwischen 3.5/5 und 4/5 geschwankt.
The opening few hours are so insufferably bad that I could not bring myself to go further, even with the promise of better gameplay to come later.
The game itself can be really fun, but like with Destiny, there's only so much you can play by yourself before the experience just feels old. Since I don't know anyone playing this, and some of the crossplay is locked currently, I can't really continue playing right now.
Also the story is worth skipping over whenever possible, it's just not worth it.
Also the story is worth skipping over whenever possible, it's just not worth it.
Game is simple basic run and gun fun. No more more less but in a time of year without much going on it's certainly a blast.
I just can't for the life of me begin to care about this game. The premise is boring, the gameplay trys playing it safe so hard that there's just no excitement. Genuinely happy for those who were able to enjoy it. I desperately wanted to enjoy this game, and sink considerable hours into it. But it is plaqued by problems. From technical flaws, bugs, crashes, to deep rooted balance issues. Hoping it improves in the future for other's, but I won't be partaking.
Video Game: The Game
This seems like a fine one of those, but Those™ will just never be for me. Got a few hours of fun out of it on GamePass but even still, my interest wanted
Okay, so this is one of those situations where not having to pay for the game helped the enjoyment of it a lot, thanks to gamepass. Despite all that, I do think this game is VERY fun. Its combat is quite satisfying, and honestly feels good enough to justify playing through the whole campaign. The story is not really engaging at all, and I recommend just skipping some of the cutscenes if you're not into it at all. There are a handful of moments where it's possible to care about the characters or narrative, but that's all. Guns feel extremely good and using your powers in creative ways is always satisfying. You can play this game solo, but you may have to lower the difficulty. I played solo, but I know I would've defenitely had a great time playing with friends. It's easily the best three-player looter shooter that I've played, or at least better than something like Remnant. If you use gamepass I absolutely recommend it.
Not a bad game at all. The combat system is decent and the story isn't too bad however I think that it could be written so much better. Also the dialogue can be very ropey and it seems that the game takes itself a bit too seriously at times but overall I was pleasantly surprised with this
im always looking for good online co-op experiences and if the developer had bothered to finish the game before releasing it, this might have been one, but they didn't
Positives:
+ Neat set up for the story and world
+ The acting isn't half bad
+ I actually liked the character I created
+ The characters you meet are more interesting then I expected
+ Environments can look quite pretty at times
Negatives:
- Framerate isn't so great on PS4 Pro
- Interface is slow
- Always a small pause before and after a cutscene, which really ruins the fluidity
- Fairly repetitive gameplay loop (recommend playing with others)
- Matchmaking didn't work as well as in other games of the like (Destiny, Division etc.)
- Encountered the same enemy types a few to many times
- Audio implementation didn't feel so great
- Soundtrack didn't do much for me (though the main theme can be a bit catchy)
+ Neat set up for the story and world
+ The acting isn't half bad
+ I actually liked the character I created
+ The characters you meet are more interesting then I expected
+ Environments can look quite pretty at times
Negatives:
- Framerate isn't so great on PS4 Pro
- Interface is slow
- Always a small pause before and after a cutscene, which really ruins the fluidity
- Fairly repetitive gameplay loop (recommend playing with others)
- Matchmaking didn't work as well as in other games of the like (Destiny, Division etc.)
- Encountered the same enemy types a few to many times
- Audio implementation didn't feel so great
- Soundtrack didn't do much for me (though the main theme can be a bit catchy)
This was really fun for a time, but monotonous and frustrating combat ultimately pushed me away from this game before I hit max level. I would be willing to give it another shot after a few years of updates as the combat hook was fun when it wasn't frustrating.