Partridge Senpai's 2019 Beaten Games:Previously:
2016 2017 2018* indicates a repeat
1.
Night Slashers (Switch)
2.
Bye-Bye BOXBOY! (3DS)
3.
GTA4: The Ballad of Gay Tony (Xbox 360)
4.
Katamari Forever (PS3)
5.
Detention (PS4)
6.
Donkey Kong 64 (N64) *
7.
OctoDad: Dadliest Catch (PS4) *
8.
FlintHook (Switch)
9.
God of War (PS4)
10.
God of War HD (PS3)
11.
Tiny Barbarian DX (Switch)
12.
God of War 2 HD (PS3)
13.
Starlink (Switch)
14.
Shin Gundam Musou (PS3)
15.
Battle & Get! Pokemon Typing DS (DS)
16.
Banjo-Kazooie (N64) *
17.
Super Mario 64: Rumble Edition (N64)
18.
Mario Party 3 (N64) *
19.
Paper Mario (N64) *
20.
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES) *
21.
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX (GBC) *
22.
The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages (GBC) *
23.
The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons (GBC) *
24.
Yoshi's Island (SNES) *
25.
Super Mario World (SNES) *
26.
Super Mario RPG (SFC) *
27.
Kaeru No Tame Ni Kane Wa Naru (GB)
28.
Final Fantasy VI (SFC) *
29.
Final Fantasy IV (SFC) *
30.
Final Fantasy V (SFC)
31.
Final Fantasy III (Famicom)
32.
Mother 2 (SFC) *
33.
Mother 3 (GBA) *
34.
Hebereke (Famicom)
35.
Donkey Kong Country 2 (SFC)
36.
Donkey Kong Country 3 (SFC)
37.
Donkey Kong Country (SFC) *
38.
Wario's Woods (Famicom)
39.
Paper Mario: Color Splash (Wii U)
40.
Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam (3DS)
41.
Luigi's Mansion (3DS) *
42.
Paper Mario: Sticker Star (3DS)
43.
Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga & Bowser's Minions (3DS)
44.
Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story & Bowser Jr's Journey (3DS)
45.
Tomato Adventure (GBA)
46.
Corpse Party (PSP)
47.
Rave Master: Fighting Live (GC)
48.
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA) *
49.
Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (GBA)
50.
Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (GBA) *
51.
New Super Mario Bros. 2 (3DS)
52. The Outer Worlds (Xbone)
I didn't really have this game on my radar until I started seeing people talking about it. I then very much had it on my radar once a friend of mine gave me an old Xbox One that came with his apartment (often you get some kind of gift from the owner/landlord when you move into a house/apartment in Japan) that he never used, so suddenly I had a machine that could access Game Pass and therefore, this game. The original Xbox One is hardly the ideal way to be playing games this far into the console generation, but it was more than serviceable to play this game. I enjoyed my time with TOW immensely, and it took me a little over 40 hours to do everything I could in my first playthrough on hard mode.
This is Obsidian's latest game, and as a result, story is a big part of what it brings to the table, and does it ever. Taking place in the 24th century, humanity has invented faster than light travel and begun to colonize the galaxy. The game takes place in the Halcyon Colony, and you play the role of a would-be colonist woken up 70 years late because your colony ship dropped out of FTL speed and got lost in the vacuum of space. With the Board of the colony not believing it was worth their time to save you and your fellow cryogenically frozen colonists, a scientist with an axe to grind against the Board wakes you up to help his fight against the Board and wake up your fellow colonists. But that's just the set-up.
The premise of TOW is certainly a political piece on the inherently destructive (and often self-destructive) impact of capitalism on people, the environment, and everything generally, but you don't HAVE to help the scientist who saves you. You can even almost immediately betray him to the Board and have a far different path through the game's main plot. While there are ultimately two sides to the conflict (anti or pro-Board), where characters themselves lie in it and how they justify it to themselves are where the more grey areas of morality lie. They've also really gone out of their way to give Halcyon a diverse cast of characters, with humans of all colors and creeds playing prominent roles in the story. I especially appreciated just how many women and women of color play prominent roles not just in the story, but in Halcyon's society in general. It's not something you see in a lot of games like this, so it made for a welcome change of pace that more games should aspire towards in how they cast their sci-fi worlds. Obsidian does a great job as usual making characters with spirit, personality, and compelling motives for what they do and a logic that dictates what they believe. Even in fairly incidental characters like shopkeepers or information givers, there's a good degree of nuance to their acting and dialogue that really says a lot about who they are and what they believe that could've easily been lost with a less talented writing team.
You get a total of 6 companions and can have 2 in your party at a time (in a very Mass Effect sorta way). Also in a sorta Mass Effect way, they'll have chats on what you're doing, will interject in conversation, or will even approach you about a decision you're about to make if they have some sort of opinion on it. 5 of the 6 of them have character quests, and out of those I'd say 3 are very good. The companions are on the whole quite good, but range from very forgettable and annoying to stand-out exemplary in their quality. Ellie and Parvati were my two favorites, but Parvati is my #1. She is by far the best example of asexual representation (something quite close to my heart, being I'm asexual too) I've seen in any media, let alone a video game, and her character quest was one I identified with a LOT of. I really loved the writing in this game, from the world to the companions to even incidental logs and books you find in the world, and I think it's one of the biggest selling points of the game.
Beyond the writing, this is an FPS RPG very much in the vein of the newer Fallout games, but also not quite. For starters, especially for an Obsidian game, this game runs fantastically at launch. Technical limitations on the Xbone aside, I encountered one soft-crash my whole 40 hours with the game, and one small audio bug that went away quickly. Beyond that, it isn't one giant world map, but a series of small maps that you unlock as you progress through the story (and depending on how you progress through it, you'll unlock different ones at different times). These smaller maps allow the experience to be much more curated and deliberately designed than the massive sprawling worlds of Skyrim or Fallout 3, but also sacrifice those games' elements of emergent storytelling and outright exploration because of it. This is an even more guided story than Fallout: New Vegas was, so if you like these sorts of games for the super open exploration, that is largely not what you'll find here. I prefer the more deliberate design, though, so I was very happy with what's here.
The shooting and combat are much tighter than Bethesda's Fallouts though. Instead of Fallout's VATS system, you have an ability to slow down time to target specific enemy body parts to debuff them in certain ways (shooting a limb will mean they have weakened attack, shooting the head will blind them, etc), as well as hovering over enemies in general to get a look at their stats. You can also do things like issue orders to your companions to attack or use their abilities more easily during this time, as while not moving or firing your weapon, your slow time-meter goes down very slowly.
The game is also designed to make any kind of playstyle doable. On top of hacking or talking your way out of a potential fight just about always being an option, dialogue and tech skills also have uses in combat as well, so being a smooth talker genuinely makes you better at fighting too. You can even completely respec your perks and stats at any time on your ship to experiment with different ways to play. I'd heard that normal difficulty was a way too easy and that hard mode provided a better challenge, and I'd absolutely agree with that statement. Hard mode was a good sweet spot of challenging, but not impossibly hard.
To comment on the hardware I played it on, the Xbox One version of the game is serviceable, but not great. Tons of texture pop-in, especially when talking to characters is a very consistent problem. There's also a good deal of slowdown when looking around very quickly as texture/objects quickly pop into existence. That said, it was only cosmetic difficulties for me. Never once did the hardware affect how I dealt with the combat in a significant way, so while this is far from the prettiest way to experience The Outer Worlds, it's a perfectly fine way to enjoy the game.
Verdict: Highly Recommended. I went in expecting to like this game, and I came out absolutely loving it. This is easily one of my new most favorite Western RPGs I've ever played, and it's nice to see that Obsidian can make a first-person game that isn't buggy as hell XD. If you like story-driven sci-fi and like a story that isn't afraid to critique while poking fun at modern socioeconomic problems, this is a game I cannot recommend enough.
I identify everyone via avatar, so if you change your avatar, I genuinely might completely forget who you are. -- Me