Today Square Enix and people are able to Fly hosted a panel in PAX East focusing on the recently re-revealed cross-generation co-op RPG shot Outriders.
The Programmers in charge of storytelling such as narrative designer Szymon Barchan and lead writer Joshua Rubin spoke about the game, the story, and the process of creating the game’s universe.
We get to see some new footage demonstrating the world and the other focusing on their gameplay and the firearms.
- The developers created about 200 years of lore for Outriders. In the game, you can find all that information.
- Everything in the story is determined by cause and effect and you can see it in the environment and the people.
- The developers consulted with experts on how the colonization process would look like in a hundred years. For instance, everything of the colonization ship would be reused, including the engines.
- When you first land on Enoch, it’s supposed to be inhabited, yet there is a signal coming from the other side of the planet. Anything more advanced than a lightbulb doesn’t work, and yet that keeps trasmitting. The only chance your team has is to find out what it is.
- The “anomaly” turns people into “Altered.” It manifests as a storm and radiates from inside the planet. It’s a complete mystery and hyperevolves the flora and fauna of the planet like a dog trying to shake off the fleas that humanity is. Some humans are transformed as well in unexpected ways.
- The powers given by the anomaly are grounded in the world. The three classes revealed so far (there is one more that has not been revealed), Trickster, Devastator, and Pyromancer, play differently depending on these powers.
- You can switch classes and even players playing together with the same classes may play in very different ways depending on the skills they use. There is a lot of synergy between these skills.
- Players can really play in the style they prefer. You can be ranged, melee, or even a mix of both.
- You have so much power that you could probably play this shooter without actually shooting anyone but simply using your powers.
- When you reach an area with your caravan of trucks you set up a camp with NPCs which works as a quest hub. Each level is different compared to the others, with different color palette, environments, mood, and more.
- The trucks can be decorated and kitted up with trophies like heads of giant animals you kill.
- You can revisit any area you have already been to, with new quests that unlock progressively.
- There is a world tier system. The level of the world is constantly growing with your own, so if you revisit an area at a higher level, it’s gonna be a very different experience.
- If you’re just there for the story, you can play at level 1 the entire way. That being said, higher tier means better rewards.
- Multiplayer is drop-in-drop-out at ant time. The story can be played fully in single-player or co-op changing at any time.
- Gameplay is basically World War I-style trench warfare in a sci-fi environment.
- There is branching dialogue, but the developers wanted to tell a story that was important to them, so there is one big ending.
- This is not a game-as-a-service. The whole game is in the box from the beginning to the end.
- There are no loot boxes or microtransactions.
- The game has three and a half hours of “really cinematic cinematics.” Yet, there’s plenty of environmental storytelling and interactions during gameplay to add to that.
- While there is an ending, the developers hope that, if they’re lucky, this is the beginning of a big universe.
- The developers have attempted to find the right balance between gameplay and storytelling. Yet, this is a game, so gameplay comes first.
- Rubin mentioned that a storyteller is “like the announcer at a strip club. People aren’t there for you.”
- The game has you fight against “the Insurgents” (but actually they call themselves “the Exiles”). While they are terrifying, there is also empathy with them. They’re part of the remains of the colonial expedition like you. There are many shades of grey and things to discover about them.
- The main characters will be customizable in terms of appearance and gender. They have different voice actors depending on who you play.
