I'm not ready 5 years for everybody to comprehend The Outer Worlds 2 is one other Obsidian traditional—I'm giving it its flowers now
Private Decide
Along with our important Recreation of the 12 months Awards 2025, every member of the PC Gamer workforce is shining a highlight on a sport they cherished this 12 months. We’ll publish new private picks every day all through the remainder of the month. You could find all of them right here.
The Outer Worlds 2 just isn’t one of the best RPG of 2025—that is Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. Relying on who you ask it could not even be Obsidian’s greatest sport this 12 months—not less than one PCG editor thinks it was Grounded 2, and I nearly could not select between it and Avowed. It speaks to the studio’s deep bench and catalogue that in a 12 months Obsidian launched two different video games, The Outer Worlds 2 continues to be a standout.
Deadfire and New Vegas launched within the shadows of extra instantly lauded RPGs—Divinity: Authentic Sin 2 and Mass Impact 2 respectively—and I distinctly recall reviewers and commenters discounting them in favor of these extra polished or mechanically revolutionary opponents, a scenario that rhymes with TOW2’s comparisons to KCD2 this 12 months.
These Obsidian contenders have not supplanted their competitors, however they’ve had lengthy tails, and nowadays they’re proven extra respect in RPG sicko circles than they obtained on the time. So I am placing my chips on The Outer Worlds 2—and fuck it, Avowed too—proper now.
Skillful play
My favourite facet of The Outer Worlds 2 is how its talent system weaves into dialogue and quest resolutions. I’m a simple mark in the case of character build-based dialogue choices in RPGs, particularly after they rise above simply slamming the “persuade” button each time you wish to keep away from a struggle. At its coronary heart, this was the core design of Disco Elysium, and considered one of my favourite moments in New Vegas is the Legion Centurion interrogation at McCarran the place a excessive Intelligence stat allows you to freak him out by talking Latin.
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Each quest and sequence in The Outer Worlds 2 has not less than one variation or branching choice primarily based on how you have constructed your character, and most have a smorgasbord of prospects. Whereas the speech talent stays, as ever, the GOAT for doing non-combat stuff in an RPG, it is not at all times an instantaneous win button. After I spoke to TOW2 director, Brandon Adler, and design director, Matt Singh, earlier this 12 months, they advised me that was a significant precedence in improvement.
I am replaying Fallout: New Vegas on the time of writing, and I’ve already maxed out nearly each talent with a ton of sport left to play. That is a enjoyable energy fantasy in its personal proper, however TOW2 goes in the other way: You’ll be able to comfortably put money into and get near maxing out 4 of 12 expertise on a single character, 5 for those who fastidiously optimize your construct.
TOW2 does an amazing job delivering this sense that your character construct has its personal, distinctive path by means of the sport, with out making you are feeling some sort of FOMO for all the alternatives that are not obtainable to you. There are a couple of memorable quests the place I simply did not have the talents to pursue the decision I may need most popular, however different, equally attention-grabbing paths have been nonetheless obtainable to me.
Elsewhere, locked doorways and terminals might be bypassed by pickpocketing the appropriate key. Many tough speech checks might be circumvented through dialogue choices unlocked by your prior decisions, and even info you bought from speaking to the appropriate particular person.
I had an amazing second alongside these traces with the ultimate boss: I might managed to spoil for myself that the traditional ‘discuss the dangerous man down’ choice required a maxed-out speech talent, whereas my construct was primarily based on, but additionally restricted by, one of many sport’s flaws—particular perks with unfavorable trade-offs—stopping me from hitting the ultimate stage of the talent. I might resigned myself to getting a barely lower than excellent ending, however my cautious sleuthing and completionism all through the sport truly unlocked one other, simpler speech examine to speak him down.
All of those choices and decisions end in real penalties, each when you’re enjoying the sport, and once you sit back to look at that classico ‘the place are they now’ slideshow on the finish. This can be a smaller sport, with fewer quests, areas, and outcomes than New Vegas, however TOW2 boasts a proportional stage of complexity. I used to be shocked at how a lot it retains monitor of, what number of transferring components it has, and the way all of them affect one another.
The Outer Worlds 2 is to not be slept on: It’s one other nice RPG in a quiet scorching streak from Obsidian. In 2030, when all people decides this sport was at all times a heater, I’ll look again on this text with a sense of smug satisfaction—hopefully I will have been made First Citizen/President for Life by then, too.