Amazing game, though I do want to share 2 points of critique.

[Ouroboros226]

General forum does not allow spoilers, so I'm writing this here instead. I hope that's not a problem. I'm not gonna share the positives, because there is so much good about this game that writing all that  would end up in a gigantic wall of text. However there is two big points of critique I want to share in hopes that it reaches the ears of the devs for the future in hopes of improvement.  

  Warning: SPOILERS

1) The ship and crew part. The crew and the ship was really cool. One of my favorite aspects of Mass Effect and Kotor. However I felt this part was heavily underused and lacked reaching its possible potential. In Kotor, the ships felt more... atmospheric? The ship in the Outer Worlds felt more bland. There are crew interactions but saw multiples of the same scenes over and over. I also felt that the crew and the ship wasn't big enough for the story, in that, it could have been utilized more. The Mass Effect 2 suicide mission for me, was and still is the pinnacle of "Crew and ship" use in gaming. I think the ship could have been better made, and the crew and the ship having a better atmosphere and having been utilized better within the story would have been nice. That one crew meeting was good, but it felt kinda underwhelming.  

 

2) The story arc was basically just "You are revived, find and free the colonists" that's it. I was expecting this to be the first story arc out of 3 big story arcs. So the problem here from a narrative perspective is that there are no cool plot twists or meaningful extentions of the story. In a way, you had the entire narrative laid out before you from the get-go. I was hoping for a longer and more complex main story. In the end, the story felt too short and predictable.  

  

As for point 1. Maybe the devs didn't want to take the crew and ship to the extent of how far it was taken in Kotor and ME (ME2 in particular). If this was a conscious choice, there is no criticism. If reaching that feeling was an actual goal, I think it failed. As for point 2. If a deeper, longer and more complex story wasn't intended, that's fine too. And for both of these - I understand that the many, many branching dialogues and skill checks is a huge investment in opportunity cost. Adding so many options to every dialogue and quest, will have a cost somewhere. If the crew and ship + main narrative was the cost, I'm fine with it because the dialogue and writing was so damn good. 

 

In the future. If Obsidian has more time and resources, I'd really like to see the quality and care given to the dialogue and writing in the Outer Worlds - but with the longer and more epic storylines of Kotor. And with the level of crew + ship content of ME2 and Kotor. Other than that I don't really have much to say. Other than these two points of critique, the game was pretty damn awesome. 

[LordBlade]

I do agree that the whole crew thing does feel quite underused. They could have had a lot more interactions with the crew (and especially not just repeat the same ones constantly).

There should have been more interactions between each pairing (or groups) of crew. Along with various opportunities for you to take part. Say two of them are talking about a show, you could give your opinion on it. When two are arguing, you could take a side, or try to mediate, or just let them hash it out.

I am really enjoying the game, I just wish there was "more" to it.