5/5 ★ – pinksteady's review of Outer Wilds.

A magnificent homage to science, space and the spirit of adventure Hard to know where to start with this one. This has been one of the most memorable gaming experiences in some time for me. I came to this game in that nirvana of circumstances - knowing absolutely nothing about it yet it happening to be a critically acclaimed, impeccable quality game - a recipe for a positive experience beyond what I could have hoped for. If you want this same experience, stop reading now and go play it. On the surface, Outer Wilds is an open-world space exploration puzzle game. You become aware early on of some unexplained things that are going on, and you get to figure out what they are (if you so choose). Imagine blending the passive puzzles from The Witness, the playfulness, charm and storytelling of Psychonauts, and the freedom of space exploration from No Man’s Sky. At its core Outer Wilds is a game about the joy of discovery. All Outer Wilds wants from you is for you to explore it, and revel in the journey. From the very first area you start in, the game cleverly hints at the possibilities that lie ahead, while making it clear the route you take is entirely up to you. I’ve never seen a game so brilliantly manage to instil a sense of wonder and excitement in the player, without actually telling them anything directly. The core mechanic of the game is that you are stuck in a 22 minute time loop. After 22 minutes, you die. This is unavoidable. But with each play through you learn something, and that knowledge helps you decide what to explore next, leading on to discovery after discovery. Everything you learn helps you piece together what is going on, what things mean, and what you need to do, without ever explicitly saying so. By the time you’ve discovered everything, you have acquired the knowledge to complete the entire game within the 22 minutes. What is so magnificent is that on your first try, you could in theory beat the game, but you lack the knowledge to do so. Nothing in the world has changed from your first play through to your last - nothing has been unlocked, everything is just accessible to you as it always was. What has changed is your knowledge. Through discovery and learning, you unlock new possibilities, and this is at the heart of what Outer Wilds is all about. It has created a mechanic that inherently respects and demonstrates the beauty and art of scientific discovery. This is the perfect embodiment of the spirit of the game - science, discovery and exploration as a means to unlock heightened understanding of what already exists. The game also exists on a profound level. By having to endure death over and over again, and by having to deal with the consequences of this when you do manage to affect the time loop, you come to consider the nature of death. The end of each time loop is unavoidably sad - everyone you’ve encountered in the last 22 minutes dies! Over and over again, including you. So the game teaches you about embracing death, about acceptance, and about the appreciation of what you have and what you have experienced, rather than what you hope may come in the future. The characters in the game complement this message. Each fellow astronaut you meet has an inspiring and uplifting attitude to the circumstances around them. They are endlessly and playfully curious, and it is infectious. It made me connect even more with the joy of discovery that the game already excels at creating. They weren’t without emotion though, and at different stages of the game there are sad and emotional conversations with characters who are coming to terms with their own reality. But throughout, the feeling is uplifting. As an example, you locate your fellow adventurers by homing in the sound of their musical instruments across the solar system - literally their music is what drives your exploration. On a more practical level, the physical reality created in this game is staggering. The solar system is physically accurate - stars and planets have mass and gravity, all of which are extensively used to create interesting exploratory possibilities. But it is all on a micro scale - you can get around in minutes (think the opposite of Elite Dangerous), while still feeling like you are experiencing something real and vast. It is the perfect blend of realism and fiction in the interests of creating a compelling game. There’s so much more I haven’t talked about - I haven’t talked about the exploration of the nature of time and the representations of black and white holes, or about the deep lore that is built into the game that is the core to the story itself, or about the wonderful soundtrack that is cleverly used to help the player, or about how the game examines the pitfalls and sacrifice of scientific pursuits above all else, or about the planets themselves, each with their own personality, themes, hazards and mysteries. Suffice to say, this is an incredible game. Especially reading about the student thesis roots of the game and the crowdfunding approach it took to get up to scale, it really is an incredible feat. I am in envy of those who haven’t yet played this game - I just hope they don’t read this first as having no expectations is a great way to play it!