If you had asked me a few weeks ago about the possibilities of Outriders, I would probably have stated emphatically that I would not put my hand in the fire for him. Today, however, the volcanic fire of the Pyromancer is already a part of me and I would not hesitate to recommend this adventure .
After a somewhat rough start and a visual, narrative and playable proposal that seems to have little to offer, Outriders opens the doors to one of the most challenging, fun and well thought out shooting games that have passed through our hands in a long time. By putting you on the ropes, People Can Fly has found its hallmark.
Trying to run away from the generic
The generic slogan is probably the feature that I have seen repeated the most times in comments from friends and social networks during these last days with the game. And they are right. From the menu to the history or the way it looks, Outriders is a curious collection of influences from here and there.
Some are more obvious than others, but in general all are spot on. There are the Destiny menus, the Gears of War covers, the collection of crazy weapons with Borderlands powers, or the mix of shots and RPG-scented powers of Mass Effect.
In fact, he even allows himself the luxury of stepping away from the sci-fi fanfare to sneak in cruder plots – with situations pissing off at the Geneva Convention – to put a darker spin on the Spec Ops: The story. Line.
But seeking to offer the best face of a looter shooter , Outriders finds a key that eludes everyone else: the mix between difficulty and RPG builds make this Frankenstein of shots and powers an experience as challenging as it is memorable.
Four classes, endless possibilities
After the typical post-apocalyptic space exodus that goes wrong, the remainder of humanity is stranded on a planet with storms capable of empowering those who are touched by it to shape godlike mutants. It is also the origin of the four classes that we can embrace in the game:
- The master of fire capable of scorching his enemies by creating columns of fire and opening the earth to bathe them in lava.
- The one that uses the power of the earth to become a tank capable of redirecting bullets or impaling the poor wretches who approach.
- The assassin who uses temporary bubbles to sneak into melee and slice necks.
- The builder who still summons you a rocket launcher that mounts a missile turret.
Again, seemingly nothing new under the sun, and in fact it’s a bit of the feeling it conveys during the early stages of the adventure. With devastating powers and elemental combos, Outriders seems like the classic game where you are the monster and the rest of the enemies are unlucky enough to be locked in with you.
A ride that would continue to add casualties for 20 hours to turn the campaign into yet another shooting game. The typical one who seems unable to hide that you constantly fight monsters and clone soldiers with timid visual changes.
But where others stay in the game that marks boxes to take you from the jungle to the snowy mountain and from there to the bowels of a volcano, Outriders manages to find the perfect distraction: while you’re trying not to die, it’s hard to stop and think about everything the rest.
In the challenge lies his personality
With a difficulty curve that grows with you, as your character becomes more powerful the world around you does too. So, while the possibility of reducing that challenge is always waiting at the push of a button, Outriders only seems to make sense when it praises it and twists it even more.
The aggressiveness of his enemies looking for your cover, the exquisite aim of both snipers a kilometer away and the classic putties that in any other game would be a sponge of bullets.
Complex confrontations that at times have transported me to the mythical Bungie shootouts in Halo 3. Deathmatches with showers of grenades and bullets in which the low- profile of their gunplay is compensated by the powers of your character and their weapons.
The only moments of pause that the game offers are precisely those that, between death and death, invite you to try to understand what you are doing wrong and how you could turn the situation around. It is there where, the apparently generic of its menus and RPG options, begins to gain depth steps .
Turning the bones of your enemies to shrapnel
The constant peaks of difficulty and enemies that sweep you off the map without letting you breathe are the perfect excuse to try to experiment. The bullets no longer matter and it begins to take on weight not only how you use your powers, but also how the improved statistics of its bland progress tree can be of help.
Suddenly, everything that seemed to matter between little and nothing, becomes a fundamental pillar to be able to move forward . You start to worry about discovering what your powers do beyond dealing damage while they execute an animation that is pleasing to the eye, or how you can improve your weapons to take advantage of them beyond the classic numbers that appear on the heads of the enemies, also giving weight to the skills you can embed in them to completely transform them.
The bullets and harmless fireworks of the first hours end up becoming twisted strategies in which you enter the same battlefield for the fifth time knowing what to do: With the incendiary bullets ready to kill the sniper of that building in the distance, a power to slow down the advance of the enemies that will arrive when you reach the hill, and an ammunition capable of turning the bones of the enemies into shrapnel after exploding into a thousand pieces the horde of putty that will be on you shortly after.
At that point you can’t help but think about when was the last time you experienced such a situation in a shooting game. At what point was progress not limited to simply leveling up or getting a better weapon. When has it been in your hands to be able to do something else to move forward. And then Outriders makes all the sense in the world.
With an endgame in which to farm legendary weapons and armor but that does not go much beyond fighting hordes alone or in company, I do not know to what extent People Can Fly or Square Enix are now pulling their hair for not having bet on A game as a service watching the Outriders pull, but I think we should be deeply grateful for not having lived that step.
With no intention of going beyond what it already offers, Outriders seems like one of those titles that throws all the meat on the grill to avoid gambling it more than necessary, and in his bet with an all-in he probably found the key to earn our respect.
It is far from perfect and but revisiting my previous impressions and with a clearer vision of all the places where it fails and succeeds, it is impossible for me not to recover the sentence with which I closed my last text about it. Today, even more so, Outriders is proof that not all games must be masterpieces to be highly recommended.
Outriders
| Platforms | PC, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Stadia and PS5 (analyzed version) |
|---|---|
| Multiplayer | Yes |
| Developer | People can fly |
| Company | Square enix |
| Launch | April 1, 2021 |
The best
- A formidable mix of shooter and RPG.
- An immense and varied world in which to sow chaos.
- You don’t have to worry about cut or DLC content.
Worst
- By appearance and ideas it can be generic.
- The progress tree is inconspicuous.
- It has had a run over start because of the servers.
