I wake up, jump in my ship, and
activate its log. A new entry appears
for the ruins. There are rumors of
other possible points of interest too.
I’m trapped in a time loop. I’ve got
about 22 minutes until the sun
explodes once again.
What can I discover
this time?
Superficially, Outer
Wilds is a first-person
game in which you
explore a small solar
system containing a
handful of quirky
planets full of weird
and interesting phenomena. You fly
to a planet, you look at some stuff,
you die. You fly to a different planet,
you look at some different stuff, you
die. Maybe you die because you got
lost in a labyrinthine cave system and
your suit ran out of oxygen. Maybe
you die because your ship’s autopilot
isn’t very clever and sometimes tries
to fly you through the sun. Maybe
you die because your 22 minutes is
up. However it happens, you wake upback at the start, ready to find
something new.
But Outer Wilds is more than just
a game about looking at strange
planets. It’s a sandbox of mysteries. It
reminds me of Her Story or Return of
the Obra Dinn, in that
its solar system feels
like a puzzle that I
piece together by
connecting small, often
seemingly unrelated
details until they reveal
a larger truth.
You start each loop
on your home planet of
Timber Hearth. You’re the latest
astronaut for Outer Wilds Ventures—
think NASA by way of the National
Park Service. Their folksy aesthetic
fits perfectly in a solar system where
the distance between planets is
measured in kilometers and the only
inhabited settlement is a tiny village
built into a crater. That charm is
carried into your journey, too, from
the design and handling of your
spaceship, which is hardy enough toabsorb a few rough landings, to the
way you refill your air supply by
standing near some trees.
There are a handful of Hearthian
astronauts scattered around the
system already—you can go and meet
up with them if you like—but they’re
all content simply sitting by their
campfires, cooking marshmallows,
and playing a jaunty tune on their
favored instrument. You, on the other
hand, have been given a device that
lets you translate the language of the
Nomai—an ancient, technologically
advanced species. You’re sent out on
a journey of discovery, and quickly
realize there’s much to unravel.FOUND IN TRANSLATION
Much of your time is spent looking
for fragments of text, which the
Nomai write directly onto walls and
stone tablets in large spirals that
unfold out into full conversations.
Each text fragment is delivered
concisely, but the conversational
structure of their writing allows each
individual’s personality to shine
through. Their hopes, fears and
relationships are slowly revealed the
more time you spend uncovering
their past. Almost without realizing
it, I started to recognize and
empathize with specific characters
through the way they interacted with
their colleagues and friends. It’s clearNEED TO KNOW
WHAT IS IT?
A spacefaring
explore-’em-up set in
the final minutes of a
dying solar system
EXPECT TO PAY
$25
DEVELOPER
Mobius Digital
PUBLISHER
Annapurna Interactive
REVIEWED ON
GeForce GTX 1070,
16GB RAM, i5-6600k
MULTIPLAYER
None
LINK
http://www.outerwilds.comI’ve got about
22 minutes
until the
sun explodes
once againT
he sun has gone supernova. That’s bad and all, but right now
I’m actually more interested in some rocks. You see, I found a
physics-defying obelisk that emits a specific, eerie noise. I
wake up, jump in my ship, and use my signalscope to scan the
solar system for matching sounds. I follow one to the planet
of Brittle Hollow, but almost immediately get distracted by some ruins. I
land nearby and investigate. And then the sun blows up again.SOLAR FLAIR
OUTER WILDS is the next
great mystery game. By Phil Savage
WILD AT HEART A guide to the planets
THE HOURGLASS TWINS
Sand pours between them (like an
hourglass). There’s two of them
(like twins). Get it?TIMBER HEARTH
The boring, habitable planet on which you
live. It’s got trees and caves and water. Yawn.BRITTLE HOLLOW
It’s brittle! It’s hollow! It’s got a moon that
constantly pelts it with volcanic asteroids!GIANT’S DEEP
It’s got water, it’s got cyclones
and it’s got loads of gravity.
That’s about it really.DARK BRAMBLE
If not outright evil then at least
pretty malicious. Don’t go here
unless you have to. (You do.)REVIEW