Moral complication doesn't have to be done in a way that undermines the fundamental characterization of key players like Phineas or the Board, or their broad intents. RELATED: Is The Outer Worlds 2 Coming to PS4/PS5? While RPGs should allow the player the option to be evil, really great RPG stories don't just give players a binary option rather a variety of reasons to believe that different sides can be considered the "good" side in a certain conflict. They can choose to side with Phineas Welles and be good, or they can choose to side with the Board and be evil. Players have a moral choice in the main quest, but it isn't complicated at all. Nevertheless, elements are introduced that might sway a player trying to do the right thing in a different direction than they had initially intended. Spacer's Choice is still a massive, authoritarian corporation, and Adelaide's people are clearly the underdogs. Not only that, but companion Parvati will suggest that Adelaide wants to see Edgewater's inhabitants suffer.Īlthough it has some big reveals, the twist in this quest doesn't totally redefine the story's moral landscape, it just complicates it. It turns out, however, that Adelaide's settlement is only able to support itself using fertilizer made from human corpses. Initially, Edgewater seems morally black and white - Halcyon's corporations and Reed are the bad guys, the deserters are the good guys. The player needs a power regulator, which they can get by cutting off power to either Edgewater or the separatist lab. The town's administrator, Reed Tobson, wants them back. It turns out workers are abandoning Edgewater to go and live with deserters under a woman named Adelaide McDevitt. On the game's very first planet players visit the town of Edgewater. In contrast, some of the game's smaller questlines show how moral complications and twists can be explored in a way that the overarching plot never does. Within the first five minutes of the game, the player gets a broad strokes picture of the Halcyon Colony, which remains practically unchanged throughout the entire plot. Phineas' motivations are as entirely altruistic as he first paints them, and the Board is exclusively motivated by greed. The opening suggests that the Board simply doesn't want to risk its bottom line, which turns out to be true. When the player is brought out of their cryogenic sleep, Phineas explains to them he needs their help to revive the Hope's colonists. The problem is that The Outer Worlds never fulfills its early promises of moral complication. Phineas' entrance also sees him identified as a "fugitive, wanted to by Halcyon Holdings Board for Crime Against the Colony." What exactly those crimes may be is left unclear, making Phineas a morally ambiguous character - at first. Disgraceful." However, the possibility for this simple summary to become more complicated is hinted at. Left to drift out here forever, just to keep from damaging the Board's bottom line. As Phineas Welles enters the Hope he sums up Halcyon's situation succinctly: "Hundreds of thousands of colonists. In the opening cutscene of The Outer Worlds, the game's moral divide is put before the player in simple terms. This left most without doubt that the corporate entities shown in the trailers would be far more sinister than their cheery mascots let on, with Spacer's Choice mascot Moon Man taking the place of Vault-Tec mascot Vault Boy. The game was directed by Fallout creators Leonard Boyarsky and Tim Cain, and between its satirical tone, sci-fi setting, and development by the studio behind Fallout: New Vegas, fans quickly assumed Obsidian was attempting to line up a spiritual successor to the Fallout franchise. Before even beginning The Outer Worlds, most players had a certain set of expectations about the story.