This article contains full spoilers. If you have not completed the base game and DLC of Outer Wilds, please read with caution.
Preface
I actually haven't played that many games, even among the ones I love. Some of my particular favorites are the various Zelda games, Outer Wilds, It Takes Two, and Cyberpunk 2077. But if I had to pick my absolute favorite, I might not be able to choose between The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Outer Wilds.
Unlike Zelda, which opened up a new type of game, the experience of Outer Wilds is unique and irreplaceable, even though I would be happy to see more games like it.
Creative Background
Outer Wilds began as Alex Beachum's master's thesis project1.
Fun fact: I'm going to the same school for my Ph.D. lol
The thesis abstract explicitly describes the work's goal as "curiosity-driven space exploration" and discusses how to support free exploration through a simulated solar system. From its inception, Outer Wilds was about "designing the open world itself as a puzzle," rather than "an open world with puzzles." This is also where I think it differs noticeably from Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. When playing Outer Wilds, I explore the game world with even greater curiosity, because this world feels more "unknown."
In a 2015 interview with Game Developer, Alex summarized his creative motivations in two points: first, to capture the feeling of space adventure in Apollo 13 and 2001: A Space Odyssey—"navigating among forces beyond human control"; second, to make an open world where the sole purpose of exploration is to answer questions about the world itself, rather than grind for resources or upgrades2. These two points laid the foundation for Outer Wilds' success.
Getting Into It
Although I had long heard that Outer Wilds was an excellent game, I didn't get into it because of its gameplay. It was mainly because of its art style and the planet designs that amazed me at first glance. What left the deepest impression on me were the tornadoes on Giant's Deep and the geysers on Timber Hearth in the official trailer. I really like this simple yet distinctive rendering style.
What Makes It Unique
One of the biggest features of Outer Wilds is its "weak guidance." Aside from needing to go through the tutorial to get the elevator code and trigger the opening story, there are no quest prompts throughout the entire process, and opening the map will not reveal a pile of coordinate markers. By talking to NPCs, you may be guided toward a certain planet or location to explore, but you are also completely free to do whatever you want and follow your curiosity.
Another feature is the knowledge lock. A knowledge lock means that the player has everything needed to beat the game from the very beginning: no equipment, upgrades, or special items are required. The only limitation is knowledge. During exploration, the only reward you receive is updates to the ship log, which preserves the "knowledge" you have acquired. This means that when you clear the game or reach a certain milestone, you gain an intense, satisfying sense of sudden realization, marveling at the cleverness of the designer's work.
Even so, there are quite a few games that fit the formula of "weak guidance" + "knowledge lock." What makes Outer Wilds unique is inseparable from its story background, narrative, and the way these are combined with open-world gameplay. There is no need to say much about the open world or nonlinear narrative: Outer Wilds never requires you to follow specific paths, and you may even learn certain things in advance through the inspiration of random events. But more important are Outer Wilds' sci-fi setting and epic story. Whether it is roasting marshmallows beside a campfire under the stars, brute-forcing the coordinates of the Eye of the Universe through hundreds of thousands of time loops, or the Nomai as an entire civilization showing a spirit of exploration in which generation after generation presses forward, all of these give the game a unique romantic quality. This romantic quality reaches its peak in the ensemble at the game's ending, when a new universe arrives. The universe does not revolve around the player, and its end is not canceled because of the player. The player's efforts do not bring about a traditional "good ending" that saves everyone; instead, after all the mysteries are solved, they usher in the birth of a new universe.
Story
Just as cleverly as Tears of the Kingdom lets you see Zelda transformed into the Light Dragon right at the beginning, the final mystery of Outer Wilds—the 22-minute time loop—is placed right in front of you from the start. The three most noticeable oddities in the game—the time loop, the Quantum Moon, and ghost matter—correspond to three branches of exploration. No NPC assigns you a quest to investigate these things. Gabbro, the only other person also trapped in the time loop, chooses to lie flat on Giant's Deep. But driven by curiosity, the player will naturally go investigate. After all, what could be more exciting than figuring out how the Quantum Moon works? In the entire game, aside from the final ending, the moment that shocked me the most was meeting a "living Nomai" on the Quantum Moon.
Gameplay
As the creator mentioned, Outer Wilds was heavily inspired by the Zelda series, so you can find many places where the two share similarly ingenious design ideas. In Tears of the Kingdom, the eye of the storm contains the Wind Temple; in Outer Wilds, the eye of Giant's Deep's hurricane contains the Tower of Quantum Knowledge. Players who enjoy Zelda will most likely not find Outer Wilds' gameplay boring.
The only somewhat annoying part of exploration is that the routes to certain locations, such as the Southern Observatory, are rather complex and easy to get lost in. This is also why I looked up a guide once or twice.
About the DLC
One very interesting thing about the DLC is that the development team mentioned they wanted to create better dynamic water effects when designing it. Clearly, they succeeded—and they brought "tubular flow" along with them.
In the early stages of playing the DLC, I felt it was slightly disconnected from the base game: the space for exploration suddenly shrank from the entire solar system to an alien station, there was no information linkage between planets, and there weren't any events that strongly sparked curiosity. All of that vanished when I accidentally put down the artifact in the dream world and left the rendering range. In fact, the design of the DLC's three major puzzles—where the answer to each puzzle is also the key to quickly solving it—perfectly preserves the characteristics of Outer Wilds. And the DLC itself is actually doing the same thing as the base game: answering the final mystery—why the signal of the Eye of the Universe disappeared.
Although the DLC's mild horror may put some players off, I believe Outer Wilds is only a complete story when experienced together with the DLC, and only then can one fully let go.
Marshmallow Roasting Review
The last time I went home for Chinese New Year, I specifically bought a bag of marshmallows to roast. I usually don't like eating sweets, because I find them cloyingly sweet and lacking in texture. But roasted marshmallows taste really good. When roasted just right, the outside is crisp while the inside hasn't completely melted yet; the texture is rich and the aroma is tempting—though the calories are explosive.
Reference
[1] https://digitallibrary.usc.edu/asset-management/2A3BF163YX5A
[2] https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/road-to-the-igf-alex-beachum-s-i-outer-wilds-i-