Outriders is a game that isn't defined by big new ideas, but rather a variety of familiar elements mixed together in experimental ways. It's a role-playing game with loot-shooter elements; it's a serious, dark sci-fi outing with a big dose of goofiness and humor; it's a cover shooter that demands you rush out and smash enemies with your ludicrously lethal magic powers. Whether this mixture works for you will determine how much you'll enjoy exploring the war-torn planet of Enoch and the last desperate vestige of humanity clinging to life there.

Outriders blends well-known video game elements into something new and challenging, and while it takes itself seriously, it isn't self-serious. The world of Enoch seems huge and strange, and while the game is literally about the last gasp of the human race that has ripped itself apart, its heavy themes are always lightened up by a general blockbuster goofiness and characters defined by their gallows humor. Your place within it is as an accidental superbeing with space magic powers, and you're mostly just annoyed that irritating people are wasting your time with their gopher chores. It's a fun, self-aware fit.

Though Outriders looks like a live game of the loot-shooter persuasion, it's actually much more Mass Effect 3 than Destiny 2--like Mass Effect, RPG progression and cover-shooting are more the engine of the game than chasing the next new gun. Outriders is, in fact, a cover-shooter RPG with a hearty dose of gear progression, leaning heavily into an epic story told with tons of dialogue, cutscenes, character interactions, and collectible lore.

Outriders is a game that isn't defined by big new ideas, but rather a variety of familiar elements mixed together in experimental ways. It's a role-playing game with loot-shooter elements; it's a serious, dark sci-fi outing with a big dose of goofiness and humor; it's a cover shooter that demands you rush out and smash enemies with your ludicrously lethal magic powers. Whether this mixture works for you will determine how much you'll enjoy exploring the war-torn planet of Enoch and the last desperate vestige of humanity clinging to life there.

Outriders blends well-known video game elements into something new and challenging, and while it takes itself seriously, it isn't self-serious. The world of Enoch seems huge and strange, and while the game is literally about the last gasp of the human race that has ripped itself apart, its heavy themes are always lightened up by a general blockbuster goofiness and characters defined by their gallows humor. Your place within it is as an accidental superbeing with space magic powers, and you're mostly just annoyed that irritating people are wasting your time with their gopher chores. It's a fun, self-aware fit.

Though Outriders looks like a live game of the loot-shooter persuasion, it's actually much more Mass Effect 3 than Destiny 2--like Mass Effect, RPG progression and cover-shooting are more the engine of the game than chasing the next new gun. Outriders is, in fact, a cover-shooter RPG with a hearty dose of gear progression, leaning heavily into an epic story told with tons of dialogue, cutscenes, character interactions, and collectible lore.