Once upon a time, Outcast was considered a franchise well ahead of its time and may even have been perceived as a poster product for the future of gaming.

Visually, it was doing things most other games could only dream of in 1999. There was intriguing gameplay here and a style that stood out prominently. The future seemed bright and rich, with a sequel quickly entering development, but it was canned due to bankruptcy.

Things have been weird since, with the game getting a remaster in 2014, then a remake just a few short years later. And now, finally in our hands, a genuine sequel.

But don’t worry, you can go into this one pretty much having never played the games before. Whether you should is another matter as while this one does some good things, it’s definitely not as much of a trendsetter as its predecessor.

On the one hand, this definitely feels like a throwback to that era and to a game that drew so much attention at the time. It’s got that distinct AA vibe, with a living world that befits modern open world action adventures. But everything just comes across feeling quite bland and forgettable.

There is story here and the world-building is at least intriguing with some distinct characters living within it, but none of them especially stand out, nor do any of the missions really grip you or are especially memorable.

Moment to moment movement all feels quite clunky and stiff, between jumping, climbing, gunplay and traversal, and fast travelling the world feels unnecessarily convoluted with missions built into the map using box outs that don’t offer much in the way of context or provide any clear sense of direction. Instead, things are clustered together and don’t necessarily feel inituative or conducive to a good UI.

What’s more, the missions themselves are as generic as they come, generally fetch quests and all end up feeling very similar to the other despite the game’s best efforts to make it feel like they’re all fulfilling some grander purpose. This is further exasperated by very long conversations that I often found myself tuning out of between the line delivery and the dialogue itself.

Nothing feels particularly satisfying or enjoying about the game. Which might surprise you considering Cutter is equipped with a jetpack and a laser pistol. But so many other games have got that feel just right where Outcast: A New Beginning feels like it often struggles at the first hurdle.

And ultimately that’s where this one really struggles because its predecessor broke boundaries and set trends. This one just follows what’s come before and has been done so much better by many other great open world titles.

Even the game’s performance is choppy and regularly stutters just trying to get from A to B. And the cutscenes corrupted and broke at times on Performance Mode which just continually drew me out of the experience and even sometimes made it hard to follow what was going on.

I really wanted to like Outcast: A New Beginning but everything just so often set against itself and rarely is able to entertain you that you’ll probably find yourself tuning out shortly after you’ve started, realising you’ve seen this one so many times before in many other better guises.

Verdict

Outcast: A New Beginning feels anything but a fresh start for a series that broke barriers and laid foundations many years ago. Its generic missions, convoluted UI, and dry movement all feed into a story that you’ll end up switching off from because it just can’t sustain itself for long enough. A real shame.