Announced in the summer of 2019 by publisher Square Enix, Outriders has been postponed several times in 2020 like many games this year (thanks COVID). The People Can Fly studio, also known for having worked on the Gears license, was finally able to release this new RPG/Looter/Shooter in early April by offering notable differences with its current competitors.
In search of a new planet
The story of Outriders takes place in the not so distant future where our dear blue planet has become inhospitable and humans have had to flee on interstellar ships in search of a new habitable planet. After 80 years of cryostasis journeys, humanity approaches the planet Enoch where you are landed with a contingent of soldiers/scientists to find out if the planet could become humanity's new home. After a few adventures roughly serving as a tutorial for the player, you make your first extraterrestrial contact with the appearance of an electromagnetic anomaly which decimates your team and which forces you, while you are injured, to leave in cryostasis.
Thirty years of freezing will pass and when you wake up, the world has changed a lot. Humanity, despite the fact of the anomaly, has indeed landed on Enoch and the world looks more like a post-apocalyptic universe than a new cradle of humanity. Your awakening isn't painless either, and you're forced to be on the battlefield while once again facing the anomaly. In critical condition, you face death and will be reborn as altered. The latter altered are humans who survived the anomaly and possess extraordinary abilities. You will now have to make a choice: the one in your class that will be final.
The game offers four classes with totally different gameplay and which will therefore offer you a totally different gaming experience:
- Technomage : class at long distance, it is rather focused on the support as well as the damage of zone thanks to throwing grenades.
- Telluriste : the tank of choice at close range. He will be able to take a lot of damage thanks to certain skills as well as the attention of enemies.
- You are illusionists : short-range class that uses teleportation skills. She is time-bound to kill her enemies.
- Pyromage : medium range class that will use its skills to burn its opponents.
Each class will have eight powers which will be unlocked according to its level and only three of which can be equipped/used. The spells are very oriented between attack, defense and support, which will allow you to be a real Swiss army knife with any class. Good to know: it is possible between fights to change your spell build to adapt to your group or your enemies.
Battles and customization
The game shines with its many settings and the design of its levels. Even if we stay on an instance system rather than an open world, it is quite pleasant to walk around to contemplate the level design created by the studio or even to snoop around the corners of the maps to find hidden lore elements. . The title is not a visual slap on the media on which it was released, but it will happily take advantage of the power of the latter to offer you a game of very good quality. And it remains exceptional in everything related to visual effects with breathtaking animations for character abilities, for example.
Let's take a look at the game itself. The People Can Fly studio shows in Outriders the extent of its talent in combat by using all its know-how. As in the Gears license, cover management will be essential in combat, otherwise you will quickly be corrected by your enemies. The fights are very nervous and will always ask you to be on the move, because the enemies will use many tactics to push you to expose yourself to punish you (grenades, sniper shot, ...). Even if the bestiary is not the most imposing, between humans and aliens, you will have a lot to do on the ground to adapt properly. I think Square Enix will surely work on this subject with additional content such as DLCs.
A looter-shooter would be nothing without a customization of this name and this is where you will spend many hours fine-tuning your character. The objects will be found either on your enemies randomly or as mission rewards. They will increase your defense / attack statistics but will be especially useful for improving your skills because as soon as an equipment is of rare difficulty (blue), a bonus is present to improve one of your skills. You will also be able to sell your equipment or recycle it to recover components that will be used during the forge to create equipment or improve it. Your character will also have to perform his talent tree linked to his class where you can maximize some of your attributes or create a hybrid character.
As always, the story is not the end game and you will unlock the expeditions at that point which will be more multiplayer focused instances where the level is drastically higher. Between the world level and these high level instances, it will be quite simple to equip yourself with the rarest items, if you however reach the end of the instance. Very nice little feature: you will have the right to three attempts during an expedition before the latter ends in a critical failure (and therefore the loss of all the rewards gleaned).
Conclusion
Outriders is not a revolution in the genre to which it belongs, but it offers many interesting things both in terms of gameplay and depth of the latter. The publisher and the studio have chosen to abandon the "Game As Service" dimension of this type of game, which may be a winning bet or at least it also stands out from its competitors. As you would expect from People Can Fly, the fights are very nervous and will require you to be attentive at all times to avoid returning to square one. Even if I didn't use this feature, the game is cross-platform whether to play with other people but also for your progress.
Outriders will offer you rich content and many hours to get to the end of the story and even more if you want to rub shoulders with End-Game content. It is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series.
