The Outer Worlds 2’s Factions Fail to Match Fallout: New Vegas

While The Outer Worlds 2 naturally draws comparisons to Fallout: New Vegas due to shared developers and a focus on deep role-playing mechanics, its approach to world-building and faction dynamics ultimately falls short of the benchmark set by its celebrated predecessor. Game director Brandon Adler and creative director Leonard Boyarsky have openly acknowledged New Vegas as a significant influence, pointing to its complex factions and open-ended storytelling as qualities they aimed to replicate. However, despite these ambitions, the factions in The Outer Worlds 2 lack the ideological depth and narrative weight that made the conflicts in New Vegas so compelling and enduring.

Fallout: New Vegas presents a gritty, post-apocalyptic struggle where the future of a broken society hangs in the balance. Factions like the New California Republic, Caesar’s Legion, and the enigmatic rulers of New Vegas itself are driven by powerful, conflicting ideologies. Players engage with visions ranging from democratic restoration and authoritarian rebirth to total capitalist control, ultimately deciding which path, or new one of their own making, will guide the wasteland. These groups feel like active, dynamic forces shaping the world, with leadership that embodies their core philosophies.

In contrast, The Outer Worlds 2 frames its central conflict around the player’s mission to prevent a scientific catastrophe. The three main factions, the collectivist Protectorate, the corporate invaders of Auntie’s Choice, and the determinist Order of the Ascendant, often seem like background elements to this primary goal. Their involvement typically relates to how they help or hinder the player’s progress, rather than presenting meaningful ideological choices that reshape the game’s universe. As a result, they come across as less participatory in the world’s evolution compared to those in a truly faction-driven RPG.

Recent interviews with the developers shed light on this design philosophy. Boyarsky explained that their games often explore what happens when people gain power, but clarified that The Outer Worlds 2 was not intended to comment on any specific real-world moment. When questioned about a potential “meaner undercurrent” in the sequel’s satire, particularly regarding corporate overreach and fascism, Boyarsky suggested that powerful individuals are often just as trapped by systemic forces as anyone else. He described a world where people in authority lack true control, reacting based on ingrained beliefs rather than conscious choice, and often find themselves bewildered by their circumstances.

This perspective effectively excuses those in power from accountability for their far-reaching decisions. While everyone is influenced by their environment, attributing outcomes solely to an impersonal “system” feels overly simplistic and cynical. Privilege plays a critical role in determining one’s ability to escape or change oppressive conditions. Marginalized individuals frequently face situations they didn’t create, without the resources to alter their fate. Therefore, criticism is more effectively directed at specific individuals who possess the capacity to drive change, figures like corporate leaders or political influencers, rather than vaguely blaming abstract concepts like capitalism. Systems don’t operate autonomously; they are upheld and advanced by people who benefit from them or use them to suppress others.

Within The Outer Worlds 2, we see clear examples of individuals making consequential choices. Corporate leader Auntie initiates a hostile takeover of Spacer’s Choice and invades the Arcadia star system to secure her position. The Protectorate’s leadership enforces brutal “mental refreshment” procedures on dissenters and engages in internal power struggles at the expense of their citizens. Bishop Ruth Basar of the Order of the Ascendant becomes so absorbed in theoretical solutions that she fails to prevent a radical faction from planning mass murder. These are not helpless victims of circumstance; they are active participants in the systems they oversee.

Yet, The Outer Worlds 2 does not seriously challenge these characters or hold them accountable. Beyond the option to eliminate them violently, players have few means to influence these factions or redirect their ideologies. This aligns with Boyarsky’s view that no one truly holds significant power over their own destiny or the world around them. The game adopts a cynical stance, reducing conflicts to practical struggles and treating ideologies as little more than empty slogans used to justify self-interested behavior.

This nihilistic interpretation of societal function sets The Outer Worlds 2 on a distinctly different path from Fallout: New Vegas. Where New Vegas invited players to engage deeply with philosophical debates and shape the moral future of its world, The Outer Worlds 2 presents a universe where ideology is superficial and systemic change seems implausible. The result is an RPG that, while entertaining, doesn’t leverage its faction system to deliver the same level of narrative impact or player agency.

(Source: Rock Paper Shotgun)