🔗 Share this article

Upon my initial experience with the first Outer Worlds game, I was quickly hooked by its irreverent, Fallout-like style of comedy. This release featured lively conversations, personal journals, and promotional posters that portrayed a business-controlled nightmare that was at once bleak and amusing. My biggest worry heading into the sequel was that this installment – through no fault on its part – might not be as humorous compared to the first.

Certainly, conditions weren't ideal. Yet society certainly seemed somewhat less damaged back then. This game showed a bleak future that didn't feel extremely relatable, and yet accomplished to be at once emotional and comical. I started the sequel feeling quite confident that this release wouldn't be able to pull this off a second time, but I'm happy to report that I was mistaken. This follow-up is just as laughter-provoking as the release that came before it, and also introduces fresh concepts as opposed to simply reusing the same content like an tired company slogan.

Changing NPCs

A large portion of the game characters players encountered in the initial release had been beaten down by the deeds of corporate entities such as the fictional company, and were painfully aware of the degree that their situation was terrible. The Outer Worlds 2 progresses matters in a different direction, featuring characters who are brainwashed (sometimes figuratively, often literally). A lot of these characters aren't even aware of how profoundly screwed up their situations are, or that there could be options to a life lived under the domination of a huge company or limited by the doctrines of a demanding cult.

This follow-up examines forms of business domination that are more subtle than merely maintaining the population impoverished. Various personalities have been programmed with the type of extremely eager "work ethic" rhetoric you might encounter on digital platforms that vow to show the key to success when you buy an expensive course, or participate in a dubious blockchain project. Additionally, the title's corporate propaganda has developed.

Contemporary Issues

There continue to be plenty of unmotivational posters in various locations indicating reductions in pay from workers who even consider having a break, but there are also allusions to pyramid scheme tactics, featuring a new hire handbook that boldly states, "Unfamiliar individuals are simply clients you haven't met yet!" Being a person who grew up in a direct sales family, I instantly erupted laughing upon viewing this allusion, because it's a saying I have regularly listened to spoken verbatim by individuals in lower positions of those structures.

Luckily, The Outer Worlds 2 is as comedic and satirical as the original title.

This installment additionally investigates the predicament various individuals find ourselves in regarding work, political matters, and including buying decisions: Having to select the lesser of several poor choices. During efforts to decide whether to assist a dangerous corporate entity or a problematic faith organization throughout the experience, I realized I became siding with the devil I know: A familiar business organization that is terrible (but only uses advertising to indoctrinate its followers), as opposed to the religious group, which is equally bad, but uses an awful technique called "psychological renewal" to maintain its followers compliant.

Questionable Employers

Additionally, the individuals you represent may not be trustworthy. In the role of an Earth Directorate agent, your assignment includes trying to reestablish order to the Arcadia colony after an aggressive business acquisition, and you will quickly find that each of the aggressors and the residents adhere to distinct (yet equally horrific) ideologies. But a quick review of the transmissions on your spacecraft's system show that the Earth Directorate isn't precisely the universe's most principled organization as well, as evidenced by a reply to a help request that tells the sender it will take "three to five corporate years" for a response to their communication. (That time frame is approximately the time it takes for many people to reach a real customer service agent via telephone currently.)

Recognizable Scenarios

Numerous instances in this sequel are highly recognizable, but it's a therapeutic sort of relatability, and this title succeeds in balancing its grim future world with comedy that's authentically amusing without feeling out of place. An important idea is the quick commencement of enshittification that seems to take place after large company takeovers. Workers from each party of The Outer Worlds 2's big merger experience their living standards worsen therefore, while the CEOs in charge of the structure are, of course, raking in profits quickly.

Well, at minimum I understand my situation.

Just like the initial release, The Outer Worlds 2 is inherently funny, but it also isn't afraid to turn solemn. At one point, while wandering around the title's initial explorable world, I stumbled across a body with a recording close by. This message showed that this NPC (connected to the programming faith group) had perished in an incident during efforts to locate and dispatch her significant other. This partner had reportedly deserted from their group, and the perished individual was incensed at her significant other's {traitorous