Recent reviews by Integer Devourer

After about a couple hours you'll see everything the game has to offer and unfortunately, at this time, it isn't much. If they expand the game to have more environments, a meaningful survival element, more vehicles and things to do... the game could potentially worth a revisit.

It's like System Shock, but it feels off. It's clunky and feels wrong. When it decided it wanted to overwrite my quicksave when I died due to getting stuck on boxes, I uninstalled the demo. No thanks.

Good so far, except crashing my computer after playing for a bit.

Yeah:
1. I really enjoy the design of the rooms and building the goofiest house in existence.
2. Story/lore tidbits that slowly build as you explore.
3. Game's pace is nice and relaxing and has great atmosphere. The music is great.

Nah:
1. RNG can hit really badly sometimes and can decimate even the best run.
2. Not a big fan of some of the puzzles (especially mixed with the RNG).
3. You can't pause a run and come back to it. if you Save/Exit it will END the run. PLEASE ADD THE FEATURE TO SUSPEND A RUN.

Other:
1. I would love to see more rooms or a "build your own room" (design exits, color, etc).
2. A single use item that would guarantee a specific room or type of room would be a nice addition.

It's worth playing if you like an (mostly) at your own pace rogue-lite puzzle game that has a bunch of charm and oozes vibes, but just be aware that it can be very frustrating at times when you just can't seem to hit the right room or get enough key/gems/items to progress.

Everything is as I expected: a fun, buggy, beautiful mess of weird decisions and hilarious English voice acting. The mod support is also excellent. Buy it.

The game has vastly improved since it initially came out and I believe a good portion of the issues I had with it were addressed. After two quality of life updates, they've taken care of a few annoyances with HKs (Hunter Killers, high tier enemies that hunt you down and know where you are at all times) making them less common as well as making the movement much more fluid.

The changes the water system were for the better and allow people to not baby sit their save in fear of losing progress. Water is more or less only used a currency to fast travel to mission areas and doesn't deplete in real time. There still is the threat of thieves but you can defend your base against them.

The changes to the travel system are fantastic as well, you now either choose between spending water/drones to fast travel to your primary objective or travel underground tunnels, possibly (most likely) spending some ammo and supplies on your way to your mission. The tunnels could definitely see some improvement in variety, mostly the same couple rooms stapled together, but that's a minor gripe.

Some quests have been fixed (not sure if all) and new questlines have been added. The main base, The Innards, has even more additions but require grinding for building materials or are quest gated. Progression to new areas also require you to travel to them via the tunnel network first to unlock them, which is fine.

The big areas that need improvement is the enemy AI, progression, and guns:

First, the AI more or less spawns in an area a sits there until you move, it seems like rather than being part of a war they are only there to be an annoyance to you. The same squad can patrol back and forth in an erratic pattern while a war rages on in the distance and will focus you down if you even think about moving past them. Outside of that, suppressed weaponry is almost a must as you will have every enemy in a ten mile radius decide you are the biggest threat.

Character progression is unfun, grinding experience to unlock skills then having to repeatedly reset to grow your XP max to only do it again and again and again. There has to be a more meaningful way to improve your character over time, slow down progression and avoid the prestige system, give more skill unlocks or things to spend XP on? I am not sure the correct course here, but it just kind of a bummer to constantly start from scratch.

The gunplay is fairly weak. While discourages you from being an active participant in battle, you are often thrown into a situation where you need to fight back (a lot). Hit registration, animations, and the whole thing just feels off.

Some guns have a bevvy of attachments, parts, etc that allow you to make them super fancy and other guns barely give you anything to work with. On top of that it is sometimes impossible to know if the part you already own the part you are about to buy as the inventory system isn't the greatest at sorting. Attachments like laser sights and flash lights can't be turned off and I wish they did, but AI doesn't even notice them, because the flashlight is absolutely blinding at times.

Despite these gripes, I think the devs have improved since the initial offering, but is it worth recommending? I think so now.

Don't come into the game expecting the level of complexity of big budget immersive sims, it's made by a single person. It's not particularly long and at the end you might feel a little unsatisfied. The combat is alright and at times it feels like it really just wants you to fight, especially near the end. Throwing objects is by far the easiest strategy to taking down enemies quickly, but it's inaccurate. I never felt like the increased stats made much of a difference in combat besides unlocking new moves/abilities. Health is extremely plentiful and the credits barely have an use. Levels are fairly linear and the world as a whole feels pretty lifeless. Lot of ideas in the game are not expanded upon (reputation for example) or just underutilized.

It's an admirable first attempt a full release, but you should probably avoid it unless you really like immersive sims. I had fun, but recognize that this is likely not for everyone. Play the demo, but be aware the full game isn't completely like that.

Other musings:
The power kick/punch and slide kick are very overpowered, often launching enemies off cliffs.
Allure seems like the most useless stat as there is little dialog.
The email/note tracker really doesn't record everything, but it largely doesn't matter.

Dwarf Fortress rewards you much like the dwarves in the game. Strike the earth, dig deep, and find wondrous surprises and FUN. Put sometime into the game and learn the mechanics and you will be pleasantly surprised at what you may find, build, or achieve.

Play it.

TL;DR: Frustrating game that doesn't respect your time and doesn't feel rewarding to play.

Outward often feels you are spinning your wheels, progression is slow at times and it feels like little progress is made. It asks a lot out of you, but doesn't give you much in return. I went into the game expecting it to be difficult, but I found it more frustrating than anything. It's often unfair or expects a lot out of your character for little to no reward. Your character only progresses through money, it lacks nuance and is largely uninteresting. It is clear the developer hates players and actively nerfed strategies to make money (read make your life easier), who does that?

The game's world is interesting: the different factions, society, and lore are generally interesting... but the actual physical world is expansive and mostly devoid of interesting things. Granted having more encounters along your LONG travels would probably make the game much more annoying, but it would at least give the impression that it was a living world. When you do find enemies, they are almost always either: one super tough enemy or a group of (still difficult) enemies. And if you manage to clear enemies from an area they don't return for quite awhile, leaving the place even more barren.

Your best course of action is usually to avoid fighting entirely, often having to run through areas without stopping and engaging with anything, not that there's much to interact with. The "death" system in the game is actually more frustrating than dying. Often times you are revived in a hostile area and just murdered again until the game mercifully decides to spit you outside. There are also times when the game is just outright unfair to the player for no reason. I remember one time just having a dialog with a bandit and was transported to a prison without a fight, don't worry I got my revenge by challenging him to a fight and lead him down a corridor filled with tripwire traps. It felt like a slap in the face when the game could do whatever it wanted to me.

Crafting is essential to the game. A lot of early recipes are handed out pretty quickly, but if you are new it might just be better to buy them from the get go or just look them up online. The crafting system is nice and it allows you to create most items as long as you have the components. Learn what components you need to keep and which ones you can sell. Some items I don't recommend selling: Blood Mushrooms, Gravel Beetle, Seaweed, Ochre Spice Beetle.

My best advice if you do intend on being stubborn and picking up this game is to use traps. It feels cheesy, but do everything in your power to cheese the game because it will certainly not hesitate to do horrible things to you. Tripwire traps fairly common and easily crafted, they provide a great edge against tougher foes, if you can spend the time setting them up in a long line you can quickly drain the life bar of even the worst of the enemies.

I am about 20 hours into the game at the time of this review and only beating it out of obligation to the $10 or so I couldn't get refunded... because I'm stubborn, but this is definitely a game I probably will never touch after that.

The game is far too frustrating for most to play and I don't recommend it. Maybe it is better with a friend, but I don't want to have my friend spend money on this game.