Outer Wilds

For every thing, there is something bigger. Something so much bigger than you could ever comprehend, getting farther and farther away from you every second. And for every thing that is bigger, there is something bigger than that, so much bigger than that thing could ever comprehend. All getting farther and farther away. At some point, it will be gone. That thing that you are, that thing that is bigger, the things that are smaller, they all go away eventually. Will we ever know why it all goes away? Can we stop it from leaving, even just a little bit? I'm not so sure that we can. We can certainly try, though. Effort into this multi-dimensional quest for meaning is something that has been a part of human psychology since humans knew they were humans. It has taken us this long to get this far, and we are still so very very far away, and it keeps getting farther away. And even if we find something, a lead, it's just a bigger thing with other bigger things yet to find, also getting farther and farther away.

Maybe it's better to appreciate what's here now. The friends we make, the history we learn, the past we remember, that's what has survived. It's why we try at all. Because at the end of the day trying and failing is something we will all do, but it's failing together that makes the landing just a bit softer. The meaning isn't anything more than beginning and end. What's in between is up to you, and it helps when you know that out there somewhere in the unobservable, someone is playing the same song with you.

Both an almost quintessential expression of the design concepts of immersive and emergent story-telling, and a rare synthesis of heart and head - blending the intellectual depth of concepts from real-world theoretical physics, understanding of which is present everywhere throughout the game's concept and execution, and an evocation of the thrill of scientific discovery, with the emotional and creative depth of empathetic writing, genuinely inspired lore, and touchingly-evoked exploration of the lives, concerns and experiences of ancient sentient species.

Themes that particularly intrigued me included:

The relationship between science and religion, and the potential for scientific concepts and inquiries to gain almost religion-like status, as they come to define the structuring of our societies, play a vital role in giving our lives a sense of meaning and purpose, and bond communities together through shared structure, goals and purpose.

Consciousness and its relationship to the physical universe of space, time and matter - more specifically, the role of consciousness in quantum mechanics (quantum superposition in particular) and the possibility that consciousness may be an essential and fundamental aspect of reality.

There's also a lot here that evokes the human experiences of loss, grief, belonging, mortality, and our need for some kind of higher purpose, particularly as societies.

The groundedness of the game's simulation of gravity and momentum does arguably make movement and platforming a tad frustrating at times, and the time loop mechanic sometimes adds a degree of time-pressure and repetition that isn't ideal (though this is mainly an issue in the DLC rather than the main game), but, if you can get past those niggles, this is, in my view, an almost uniformly great game across every area of consideration.

made me cry . 10/10 perfect tbe

I'm a game designer, and this is my primary inspiration. I want to one day create something as important and perfect as this. Literally a peak execution of the medium, a game that invokes emotion, feelings and actions using methods only a video game could achieve.

The insanely creative sci-fi concepts explored by the planets, story and mechanics of this game are just the icing on the cake. But the cake itself? An experience that will feel like the discovery, confusion and mythology of playing games as a kid. The beauty of discovery here however isn't fuelled by playground rumours or bad game design. Instead, the game is built around piecing together scraps of information and trial-and-error playfulness. The experience of piecing together the story and end goals of this is more satisfying than any loot or materialistic reward most games would give you.

It may not be your thing, you might come to games for something else. Maybe you want a more traditional narrative, maybe you want incredible combat, maybe you want in depth strategy/simulation. This isn't made for everyone, but you don't want to risk missing out on potentially the greatest media experience of your life by not giving it a chance.

I have no words to explain how important this game is to me.

Outer Wilds is one of the most powerful experiences this hobby has to offer, and it has no equal in its genre. Not one element is out of place - the experience of flying and exploring the solar system is impeccable and beautifully seamless, and the worlds it offers, despite looking small, contain more depth than every "open-world" release of the past decade combined. No other game has, to me, ever felt so wide, so deep, and so beautifully cosmic, nor has it left me with such a positive outlook on the darkest inevitabilities of the natural universe it adeptly emulates.

The core gameplay of Outer Wilds is space exploration. You direct a tiny spaceship and an even-tinier drone around a toybox solar system, each planet featuring a unique environment with its own challenges and locales. I don't hesitate to say that the flight in this game is perfect. From your dizzying first steps in the Zero-G training facility on Timber Hearth (your adorable home planet) to your last cycles spent zipping around the solar system at irresponsible speeds, the response you get from using the most basic of physical laws to push your little tin can around the incomprehensibility of the cosmos is immaculate. No other game has ever emulated the feel of space travel in a way that felt personally relevant. In Outer Wilds, you do not direct a spaceship. You fly one.

Your precious aluminum rocket coffin was built by your planet's most adept engineers (out of a population of about fifty) to bring you to every corner of a delicate solar system that spins around an angry sun, which will inevitably explode and erase your entire world in twenty-two minutes. Helpfully, you wake up at the start of that cycle every time you die from any cause - whether it be the sun's rage or the simple mistake of running out of oxygen on a foreign planet. This simple combination of exploration and time loop is the foundation of a beautifully laid-out mystery that you piece together as you fly.

This is one of the few games in human history that can truly be described as nonlinear. You can wake up on your first day, fly straight to any point on the map, and reconstruct from that destination the entire plot and experience of the game by simply following the clues waiting for you there. The path you take through Outer Wilds will be one that you really do choose - but if you're ever stuck, you always have at least one lead to follow.

The puzzles that decorate and make up this worlds are numerous and wondrous. Words can't truly capture the feeling of figuring out how to use the twisters on the gas giant to your advantage, nor can they explain the importance of the revelation gained when you first pause a quantum object using a photograph. They are fully-realized a-ha moments that fit naturally into the world that surrounds them.

Crowning this trifecta of flight, choice, and puzzles, the story of Outer Wilds is one of incredible emotional weight to anyone who has looked up at the night sky before. It is a story about the generational love of discovery and exploration, a story about how we share that love with others, and ultimately, a moral about how that endless curiosity uncovers and expresses a mathematical love seemingly baked into the fabric of the universe. It is about why we value a seemingly uncaring universe, and how our attitude defines whether we fear or love our place in it.

If there will ever be another game where you can sit on the moon and watch every star in the universe blink out until it reaches maximum entropy, I doubt it'll come in any of our lifetimes. This is perfect in a way that nothing else can ever be. It is a powerful defense of emotion in a universe that appears to be devoid of it - although, Outer Wilds contests even that idea with stunning aptitude and unrivaled beauty.