I will try to keep it short with this review, since the game has been praised almost unanimously, by nearly everyone who played it. So then it should not be a controversial statement, if I call it a masterpiece of game story telling.
Starting off in Timber Hearth, talking to everybody and getting to know the basic rules of playing the game. Tutorials in this starting area are great, and successfully mask themselves as reasonable things one could expect from a location in which they are located. Best of all - they can all be skipped entirely, if one only chooses to go straight to where you are supposed to, and not indulge any people with conversations. While by no means is it a revolutionary feature, nor has it been done for the first time ever, it sets the tone for the game masterfully, letting all the players know that one of the main attributes they hold in this world - is their freedom to do, or not do, anything they want.
The gameplay is not particularly revolutionary either, except for the wonderful sense of liberty, that few games have the guts to grant their players. The interactive part of the game is mainly focused on exploration. Few puzzles exist, that don't prove too difficult even to people who don't normally have half a brain to solve such things (I'm speaking from experience here). However, overall, most of what you do is jump, use your jetpack to boost yourself, and walk around exploring... Oh, and also reading... There is a LOT of reading.
As a person whose attention span is barely enough to go through more than two pages of a book in one sitting, the game's texts never bothered me in the slightest. Because of their placement, contents, and form (of being divided into smaller, shorter messages that aren't difficult to comprehend) the game always made me giddy when I found any reading material, leaving me excited to find out more about its story. The way the story can be understood starting from its mid-point, or from the end, really intensifies the feeling of freedom. Having no order, of uncovering the plot, be imposed on you was so refreshing I can hardly put it into words. It was very unexpected, for me, and I found it was much more of a benefit to the experience, than I initially thought it to be.
Outer Wilds is the perfect example for the argument that games can tell stories just as great as books, if not greater, attributing this potential superiority to its interactive nature. I think everybody who likes good science fiction novels, and enjoys innovative games should at least give this one a try. It was an experience I will think about for many years to come.

I will try to keep it short with this review, since the game has been praised almost unanimously, by nearly everyone who played it. So then it should not be a controversial statement, if I call it a masterpiece of game story telling. Starting off in Timber Hearth, talking to everybody and getting to know the basic rules of playing the game. Tutorials in this starting area are great, and successfully mask themselves as reasonable things one could expect from a location in which they are located. Best of all - they can all be skipped entirely, if one only chooses to go straight to where you are supposed to, and not indulge any people with conversations. While by no means is it a revolutionary feature, nor has it been done for the first time ever, it sets the tone for the game masterfully, letting all the players know that one of the main attributes they hold in this world - is their freedom to do, or not do, anything they want. The gameplay is not particularly revolutionary either, except for the wonderful sense of liberty, that few games have the guts to grant their players. The interactive part of the game is mainly focused on exploration. Few puzzles exist, that don't prove too difficult even to people who don't normally have half a brain to solve such things (I'm speaking from experience here). However, overall, most of what you do is jump, use your jetpack to boost yourself, and walk around exploring... Oh, and also reading... There is a LOT of reading. As a person whose attention span is barely enough to go through more than two pages of a book in one sitting, the game's texts never bothered me in the slightest. Because of their placement, contents, and form (of being divided into smaller, shorter messages that aren't difficult to comprehend) the game always made me giddy when I found any reading material, leaving me excited to find out more about its story. The way the story can be understood starting from its mid-point, or from the end, really intensifies the feeling of freedom. Having no order, of uncovering the plot, be imposed on you was so refreshing I can hardly put it into words. It was very unexpected, for me, and I found it was much more of a benefit to the experience, than I initially thought it to be. Outer Wilds is the perfect example for the argument that games can tell stories just as great as books, if not greater, attributing this potential superiority to its interactive nature. I think everybody who likes good science fiction novels, and enjoys innovative games should at least give this one a try. It was an experience I will think about for many years to come.