'The Outer Worlds' Gameplay Video Has Commentary and a Head-Shrinking Weapon

Obsidian showed off a gameplay preview of The Outer Worlds during PAX East and walked viewers through the game's dialogue options, combat, and some interesting weapons. One of those is a melee tool called the Mandibular Rearranger that shrinks or enlarges enemies' heads by smacking them with a hi-tech baton, but that's just one of several weapons shown in the gameplay demo. The demo does represent an alpha version of the game though, so not everything that's shown there might look the same when the game officially releases.

The gameplay demo was streamed live during PAX East during a panel hosted by Obsidian, though the most relevant parts of the stream were captured in the video below from MrRedRivers. Developers provided commentary on the game and walked players through the interactions they'll have in Byzantium, a city that looks flashy and wealthy at a first glance but actually isn't put together as well as one would think. Ads litter the city and holes in walls expose the guts of buildings, the developers pointed out, though many of the NPCs prowling the streets are referred to as wealthy citizens.

Dialogue options when speaking to different characters were shown throughout the video, though due to the alpha nature of the demo, the voices weren't yet in the game. The main character's allies, Nyoka and Felix, chime in every now and then with their own quips during conversations or after fights. These allies can also instigate fights at the commands of the player. Around 12 minutes into the video, Felix is commanded to dropkick an enemy to kick off a neon-filled fight against several guards that are blasted with gatling guns and other weapons. Enemies disintegrate or corrode depending on what they're hit with, those effects shown likely just a few of the outcomes that'll be in the full game.

Around the 14:30 mark, the developers reveal the Mandibular Rearranger that alters enemies' appearances once they're hit with it. Sometimes it shrinks someone's head and other times it causes their head to grow larger. The developers explained that the weapon was a feature born out of a bug that caused the same effect to happen, but the developers enjoyed it so much that they kept it in the game as a unique weapon.

The Outer Worlds is scheduled to release this year and will be available on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC platform via the Epic Games Store and the Windows Store.

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