Outer Wilds is a game about the end of the world.

Lil Indigestion's playthrough:    • Launch Day Me Daddy -- Outer Wilds BL...  

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Pointcrow's playthrough:    • PointCrow Plays Outer Wilds for the F...  

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#outerwilds #echoesoftheeye

Outer Wilds is a game about the end of the world. If that sentence is enough to intrigue you, then you can stop watching. Outer Wilds is best experienced without any spoilers, to the point where some could argue that this very sentence is one that gives away far too much. There is no other game that has stuck with me as much as Outer Wilds and its expansion Echos of The Eye. Any discussion of the game is a spoiler because your progression is directly linked to your knowledge of the world, so please, I beg you to experience it for yourself; thank me later. Since I know many of you will hang around anyways so I will try to avoid as many spoilers as possible in terms of specifics, but there will be spoilers. You have been warned. I have never been more profoundly impacted or scared by a game like I have with Outer Wilds, and I’d like to talk about what Outer Wilds says about the end of the world, the past, the future, fear, and existence. Yet, these are ideas merely teased at the beginning, as we wake to the night sky, with as many stars as there are possibilities, and our attention among all of these monolithic points of interest is grabbed by a shooting star. I can’t imagine a single person, who upon witnessing these sights, does not want to immediately explore, but we are barred off, first needing to traverse our home world of Timber Hearth, which despite being inhabited by Hearthians, akin to pop culture depictions of aliens, is familiar, feeling like a slice of our own floating space rock.

The opening tutorial is not just one of the most tranquil areas in gaming, and it is crucial to building a sense of comfort within the player. Fear is relative to comfort and knowledge. We are comfortable in what we know, and I felt very comfortable in Timber Hearth. The homes looked like ones from Earth, the music was relaxed, and the dialogue, despite the extraterrestrial characters they come from, felt entirely human. This is important to establish because it sets up a very reasonable fear of space. The great unknown is not terrifying because it’s an infinite void of nothing... but of something, and you don’t know what. Every rule is broken, and there's no safety net. No gravity to keep you grounded. The fear of space is closely similar to a fear of the ocean because they share the shame qualities, endless space where you are entirely vulnerable, and with what lies below being unknown. There's also fear in the sheer vastness of space.

When you have basic space knowledge, knowing that our sun is a star, and seeing other stars, other solar systems in the distance, gives us perspective on our own size. Things that are small are insignificant. When we see an ant on the sidewalk, we see a tiny, thoughtless creature, and often, we don’t care whether it lives or dies. In space, we’re the ants. These planets, their colossal creatures, these unknown entities, don’t think twice about our lives or our deaths. This isn’t to say that these planets or the sun are intelligent, they likely aren't, and that makes it worse. The idea of being an intelligent lifeform among a world that simply is, terrifies me. It makes me feel small. This idea comes together most prominently near the game's conclusion, but before we get there I want to talk about the other side of fear, which is the desire for refuge.

Outer Wilds and it's expansion Echoes of The Eye is a game I struggled to write about, and further one I struggled to make an analysis, critique, review, or even explanation for. So this is more of a personal reflection on the game. The Outer Wilds soundtrack was not mentioned as much in this video, but it is genuinely some of the best I've heard.