🔗 Share this article

Upon my initial experience with the initial Outer Worlds game, I was quickly hooked by its satirical, Fallout-like type of wit. This title featured lively conversations, individual logs, and advertising displays that illustrated a business-controlled nightmare that was both bleak and humorous. My primary concern heading into the sequel was that this version – without blame on its part – could fail to be as funny compared to the first.

Admittedly, conditions weren't ideal. Yet society definitely felt a bit less broken back then. The Outer Worlds presented a dystopia that didn't strike too close to home, and nonetheless succeeded to be at once touching and hilarious. I commenced The Outer Worlds 2 feeling quite confident that this release wouldn't be able to pull this off once more, but I'm delighted to state that I was incorrect. This sequel is equally chuckle-inducing as the game that came before it, and furthermore presents new themes instead of merely repeating similar elements like an tired company slogan.

Developing Personalities

The majority of the game characters users found in the first title had been defeated by the actions of company organizations like the fictional company, and were painfully aware of the degree that their lives sucked. This installment progresses matters in an alternative path, featuring characters who are indoctrinated (periodically symbolically, often literally). Many of these personalities aren't even aware of how extremely disordered their circumstances are, or that there may exist options to a life lived under the boot of a huge company or bound by the beliefs of an intense faith.

This follow-up examines forms of business domination that are more insidious than merely maintaining the population impoverished. Various personalities have been indoctrinated into the kind of overly enthusiastic "hustle mentality" rhetoric you can discover on social media accounts that vow to show the secret of achievement should you purchase an expensive course, or participate in a questionable digital currency plan. Even the game's corporate propaganda has evolved.

Contemporary Issues

There are still many discouraging displays throughout facilities threatening to dock staff compensation who dare to contemplate taking a day off, but furthermore exist mentions of pyramid scheme strategies, such as a new hire handbook that boldly states, "Strangers are just customers YOU haven't met yet!" As someone who grew up in a network marketing household, I promptly exploded with laughter when encountering this mention, because it's a phrase I have frequently encountered stated precisely by individuals in lower positions of those structures.

Fortunately, this follow-up is just as funny and satirical as the initial release.

This installment furthermore explores the predicament many of us experience concerning employment, political matters, and even consumer choices: Having to choose the reduced of several poor choices. During efforts to decide whether to support a risky company or a concerning cult throughout the experience, I found myself aligning with the known negative: An established corporate entity that is terrible (yet merely employs advertising to indoctrinate its followers), as opposed to the cult, which also sucks, but uses an awful technique named "mental refreshment" to control its members compliant.

Unreliable Masters

Even the people you represent could fail to be trustworthy. As an space operative, you're tasked with working to return order to the Arcadia colony following an aggressive business acquisition, and you will quickly find that the two the invaders and the invadees adhere to distinct (though equally awful) doctrines. Yet a speedy inspection of the transmissions on your spacecraft's system demonstrate that this agency is hardly the world's most ethical organization too, as demonstrated by a reply to a distress call that informs the caller it will take "three to five organizational cycles" for a response to their message. (This duration is about how long it takes for many people to contact a human support representative via telephone nowadays.)

Relatable Moments

Various situations in this sequel are painfully relatable, but it's a cathartic sort of relatability, and this release manages to balance its depressing dystopian setting with humor that's truly humorous without feeling inappropriate. An important idea is the near-instant onset of deterioration that appears to occur in the wake of any major corporate acquisition. Workers from each party of this installment's significant consolidation experience their living standards decrease consequently, while the CEOs in control of the food chain are, expectedly, accumulating profits quickly.

Hey, at least I understand my situation.

Comparable to the original title, The Outer Worlds 2 is naturally humorous, but additionally isn't afraid to get serious. During a moment, while traveling around the release's primary explorable world, I stumbled across a corpse with a message in the vicinity. This message showed that this character (connected to the brainwashing religious faction) had perished in an incident while trying to locate and eliminate her romantic partner. This partner had apparently defected from their faction, and the perished individual was angry about her partner's {traitorous