Outriders: Review of the new Worldslayer expansion

And it is precisely to the second row of gamers that it seems to be addressed Worldslayer additional content that expands the title of People Can Fly with a brand new campaign, additional endgame modes and rivers of loot. For the launch of the DLC, we removed the ash from our Pyromancer and returned to Enoch to face a terrifying elemental enemy.

Fleeing the Storm

Those who have reached the end credits of Outriders will remember well that, despite having foiled a terrible threat, the situation on the surface of Enoch is far from being under control, since to the ferocious warfare between factions is added a problem that is then the spark that kicks off the Worldslayer campaign: the rampant storms. The peculiar atmospheric phenomena of the planet are increasingly out of control and it is necessary to find a solution as soon as possible, in order to prevent the few survivors from being fried by lightning, at best, or transformed into monsters with great powers such as the beautiful Ereshkigal.

The red-haired woman, commander of the rebels, will stand between the Outriders and their target but without sufficient sceen time. Basically, we are talking about a wasted opportunity to tell and deepen an interesting character both from an aesthetic point of view and as regards the narrative background. In addition to being not very elaborate, the plot of the expansion of the People Can Fly title struggling to take off in the approximately three and a half hours that separate the warriors from the credits and even those few twists present turn out to be more than predictable.

From a playful point of view, there are no big differences between the Outriders campaign and that of Worldslayer, with the expansion that leads us to places with always well-defined borders and paths. very linear.

These are areas never explored before and populated mainly by the same creatures that we have already defeated during the first trip, with a few small exceptions represented by the three bosses that meet along the way. In addition to a frozen wasteland and a red rock canyon partially covered by snow, the DLC also lets us explore the desolate Black Gulchthe territory under the control of the rebels led by Ereshkigal, which is strongly inspired by the post-apocalyptic atmosphere of Mad Max. Finally, we mention the splendid city of Tarya Gratarwhich instead re-proposes the aesthetics and architecture of the Pax with greater care and attention than what was seen in the final stages of the base game.

The power of the Anomaly grows

The most interesting aspect of Worldslayer is therefore not the campaign but what revolves around it. Access to additional content also includes and above all new methods to make the protagonist stronger and stronger and immeasurably improve its capabilities. By eliminating mobs and accumulating experience, two types of new skill points are obtained, to be spent in the screens related to PAX And Ascension Day.

The first system is very reminiscent of Borderlands’ Hard Points, as it gives the player the opportunity to upgrade any parameter in a small percentage, ranging from damage inflicted with weapons to the healing power of skills, up to the maximum amount of health and shield. Closer to the basic skill tree is the Ascension menu, which is in fact a mini-tree parallel to the first which can be reset at any time and which also contributes to the diversification of the builds.

Linked to the accumulation of power by the protagonist is also the Apocalypse degree, which replaces the levels of the world with a mechanic that, although similar, offers a better distributed character growth. The way it works is always the same: kill enemies, reach a new rank and access more effective equipment. In this regard, one of the statistics that goes hand in hand with the difficulty is the probability that the loot is ‘Apocalyptic’: Whether it’s epic or legendary items, those in this band boast one third mod and, as you can easily guess, having a whole set of this type has a major impact on gameplay and makes the slaughter of opponents even more smooth and fun.

Discovering the Lost City

To support the DLC (and, to be honest, also to justify the cost) is the brand new endgame mode that takes the name of Proof of Tarya Gratar. This mystical place that is reached after the end of the short campaign is in fact at the center of the expansion’s main activity and offers a completely different game structure from the Expeditions.

When the huge city gate opens in front of the group of Outriders, they find themselves facing a real dungeon which alternates freely explorable areas with multiple access routes: some lead to dead ends with boss And rewards (we are talking about luminescent chests full to the brim with loot), others allow you to continue in the I walk towards the heart of the city to discover its terrible secrets. The peculiarity of this test consists in the randomness of the enemies: although the rooms are always the same, what you will find inside them is random and in the same arena you might face the creatures of Enoch once and the dangerous rebels at another, just to give an example.

It is impossible today to establish the resistance of an activity of this kind but we are still faced with a more consistent endgame than the repetitive Expeditions, which are still playable at the challenge levels introduced with Worldslayer and expand the range of missions that warriors can face for accumulate loot. If you are reading this review after finishing Outriders, chances are you want answers on the loot, an element managed with superficiality both in the first version of the game, and with the debut of New Horizons. People Can Fly’s looter shooter was harshly criticized for having a drop rate of legendary items too low for its category: we are not dealing with a game as a service and the vast majority of users will not spend hundreds of hours on the servers but will stop at a few tens after completing the story and playing for a little bit about the endgame.

And it is precisely for this reason that the lack of rare equipment is a huge problem for such a product: you risk reaching the final stages without legendary pieces, whose characteristics make the gameplay much more fun.

From this point of view Worldslayer it mitigates the problem but does not completely solve it, especially if you take into account the likelihood of finding a non-apocalyptic legendary. Tarya Gratar’s chests contain rivers of epic loot and don’t necessarily have a golden piece inside. Fortunately, however, we have noticed that the progress of the difficulty clearly affects the drop rate: This should grant access to quite a few gold weapons and armor to those brave and skilled enough to overcome the toughest challenges.

Still speaking of the equipment, the developers have introduced a very interesting change to the Worldslayer campaign only and which, therefore, does not involve the rest of the adventure. For the entire duration of the story all tough enemies drop an epic itemwhich makes the progression of the Apocalyptic Degrees more fluid thanks to the continuous exchange of guns and armor.

Recurring problems

If technically there are no news to report, we must with some regret confirm that People Can Fly has not invested resources in solving some problems of Outriders, which now persist from day one.

The menus continue to be difficult to navigate for anyone who uses a controller and the mechanism by which individual items in the inventory can be highlighted is difficult to digest. We must also emphasize that even in Worldslayer we find the same poor quality sound effects that characterized the original adventure: we refer specifically to firearms such as miniguns wielded by rebel soldiers. In short, the launch of the DLC was not accompanied by significant improvements as regards the so-called ‘quality of life’ and, from that point of view, everything is at a standstill in New Horizons.

Finally, we cannot but spend a few words on weapon and armor design, which continues to be one of the most successful elements of the production. Worldslayer includes a lot of new equipment and each item – especially the legendary ones – offers an attractive aesthetic style thanks to the presence of bones, rags, tribal masks, luminous devices and other trappings, which make the various sets unique.