#TOW liveblog tag

[wetbloodworm]

sparrow’s thoughts on TOW companions so far

parvati: naive and kind, low self esteem, sparrow can get away with being surface-level nice to her but doesn’t have to really entertain her suggestions because she’ll likely apologize for speaking up in the first place. sometimes has good suggestions, though, like sparrow was down to talk to junlei because that’s a good connection to have and if their mechanic can get tips from her to keep their ship up and running better, then that’s time they don’t mind spending. overall parvati is alright, sparrow thinks she’s weak and foolish and her softness/kindness has the potential to be a liability, but overall she’s inoffensive and easy to deal with

sam: i’m still trying to decide if sparrow would put forth the effort to fix the robot when it’s kind of out of the way and they’ve run into enough robots that’d have their programming screwed up enough to attack people randomly. then again that worry wouldn’t be much stronger than any human companion turning on them so i suppose that wouldn’t be a special concern. i don’t think i’ve ever had sam actually run around with the party so i might try that out. sparrow WOULD like the idea of a companion that’s less likely to disagree or cause problems.

ellie: sparrow respects ellie the most because the two have similar mindsets. trust no one, owe no one, look out for yourself because nobody else is going to. they’d appreciate that, there’s always an almost kind of relief finding people who see the world for what it is because then sparrow doesn’t have to be mad at people for being stupid. i hesitate to say they’d LIKE her because they rarely like anybody, but it’s close, and they’d get along decently. even when sparrow’s playing nice with other people there’s a level of practicality to it and a line where things become too inconvenient for them to even play up to, and since their motive is never altruism they can explain themself to ellie if she doesn’t immediately understand why they’re doing something potentially without good reason. how honest they’ll be with ellie is the question, though, because she’s not the only person in the party and sparrow doesn’t want to lay all their cards out for parvati and felix. those two get to think that they do stuff to be nice. so there’s a balance that has to be struck between leaving an explanation at ‘it’s the nice thing to do’ vs going the step further and saying ‘and this person will give me something in return for doing a nice thing, or they’ll owe me, or they’re a good connection to have’ etc. 

felix: their first interaction is sparrow hearing that felix attacked his foreman because he insulted his favorite sportsball team, so sparrow’s impression is that he’s impulsive and dumb. their second interaction is felix’s pitch to join their ship where he actively shows that he has no clue what they do but is willing to do a number of morally uncertain things for them as their crew because he wants the job so bad. and sparrow’s just like ‘oh yeah i can absolutely work with that’. felix’s anti-board opinions are potentially problematic in that sparrow is more than willing to take money from the board, and the board is offering a LOT of it for welles, but the more time passes the more sparrow thinks they can get around that. if they can get felix more loyal to them than to his ideals then it doesn’t matter who or what they deal with. sparrow finds him a bit annoying, but he’s not too bad. he’s whatever.

nyoka: the first point against her was her being sloppy drunk in public when they met, and the second point against her was her immediately trying to take advantage of sparrow’s apparent kindness when they turned on the charm. not that sparrow doesn’t expect people to take advantage of kindness, that’s exactly what THEY do, but listen. that’s not the point. sparrow gets the vibe that she’s not easy to manipulate like parvati and felix are, but she’s also got her own sentimental bs with this talk of her ‘family’ or whatever. so they don't quite know how to feel about her aside from frustrated. she's capable and knows her way around monarch tho so she's useful.

max: an absolute tragedy that sparrow skipped over him. they didn't have a reason to talk to him, parvati suggested it for the moral issue re: edgewater vs the deserters and sparrow ignored her completely there. i'm trying to figure out an excuse to go back for him but i can't think of one. f to max

[doggytail-duck]

Soooo Kit was/is in love with Matthew, right? I mean... The whole chat with Diana about being “special” and all in regards to Matthew is so telling

[communistkenobi-archive]

ezra went on a space journey with the whales to go find his dad

[theunemployedrogue]

The Outer Worlds - 1. Getting Starting

Say hello to my first PC for TOW! He's a little white-bread, but he's got the spirit (I honestly just didn't feel like dicking around with the character creator for too long lol).

As usual, I dumped all of my starting stats into charisma and stealth skills. My combat skills are absolute garbage as you can see, but the game is set on story mode so I feel it won't really be an issue.

I've logged about an hour of gameplay and so far I've not really had any trouble, as the controls are almost identical to those in other RPGs I've played. My only gripes so far are looting (not sure how to pick and choose items) and the sprint function (the default key is l-shift, and due to my hand injury it's difficult to hold that and W at the same time). Otherwise, no real complaints!

Graphics are lovely in-game. I had to knock it down from Very High to High to get a better frame rate, but it runs well even on my rather low-end gaming computer.

I plan on making more of these posts as I continue to play. They will be tagged "TOW liveblog".

Playtime logged (as of 7/2/2021): 61 mins

[wetbloodworm]

the first time i did charlie’s TOW run i didn’t have them as fleshed out as i do now, so having some thoughts. namely that no way would they get frozen unless their mom and parker were on the hope with them. they’d be motivated to unfreeze the rest of the colonists regardless, but with those two needing them, there’d be nothing that could stop charlie. they’re fucking getting their mom and best friend back.

also makes the stuff you learn about on the hope all the more horrifying for charlie. not knowing if their mom or parker were one of welles’ failed experiments before them, or if they were cannibalized by the hope’s starving crew. charlie’d be decently calm the whole adventure under the assumption that their loved ones were stuck in stasis but safe, but the sudden realization that they could already be dead would be a hard blow so close to the end. i’m firmly decided that the two are fine and are successfully revived in the epilogue but that’d be a terrifying period of time for charlie, the not knowing.

thinking about changes to actual game decisions, i’m considering doing the edgewater-with-adelaide-in-charge choice. save more people that way, give everyone a better chance. i’m also thinking charlie might take 100% of the chemicals in byzantium vs just enough to avoid killing the test subjects. it’d be a hard fucking decision, one that’d weigh on them for the rest of their life, but like. the scientists weren’t having a high success rate reviving people. there’s not much of a chance that any of those people were going to leave that lab. and, honestly, charlie couldn’t take the chance that they wouldn’t have enough chemicals to wake up their mom and parker. they couldn’t risk it.

[wetbloodworm]

beat sparrow’s TOW run and i’m so mad about it. like i knew where we were going the whole time, this was my Bad Run, and i’m glad i did it! got to know this kid better and see parts of the game i never have before! but they don’t deserve to be rewarded! AND FELIX HAVING HIS SPIRIT CRUSHED BUT STICKING WITH THE CAPTAIN BECAUSE IT’S THE ONLY PLACE HE’S EVER FELT LIKE HE’S BELONGED, ARGH! MY BOY!!!!! AAAAAAA

need obsidian to get their spacer’s choice upgrade patch out so i can do charlie’s run again. need some humor and joy and goodness. need someone to be nice to felix

[wetbloodworm]

i’m enjoying sparrow’s run of TOW but the spacer’s choice upgrade being buggy as hell is the only thing preventing me from throwing myself immediately into a full replay of charlie’s run. i just love charlie so much. also, gotta put myself in the character’s mindspace to properly roleplay and charlie is more enjoyable to Be. i made a comment to ez yesterday when i played them a little bit that i wanted to take a brief break from sparrow so that i could play someone who knows how to experience joy. because god sparrow just doesn’t know how to have fun. they just hate everything and everyone and actually i have a post for this topic saved

anyway when i play sparrow, i generally don’t get to pick the funny dialogue choices. sarcastic sometimes, when they get fed up or think they can get away with it, but that’s it. sparrow plays at being nice to manipulate people but being funny or playful isn’t part of their manufactured charm. charlie jokes all the time, they like to keep things lighthearted when possible and they like to make people laugh, put people at ease, play around. charlie tries to live their life with as much joy as possible and they try their hardest to spread that joy.

playing sparrow is fun in that it’s interesting to me, and also it’s a new way to experience a game that i love. but they’re always looking for an angle and trying to figure out how best to play people to get what they want and it’s a very different mindset to put myself in, vs charlie who wants to be genuinely kind and friendly and cares about the people they’re talking to.

[wetbloodworm]

got the spacer’s choice edition upgrade for outer worlds, heard there’s some uhhhh performance fuckery on PC but it’s only been out for like... two days i think? i imagine there’ll be a patch. but until then i’m impatient and building charlie to redo their run. still have to finish sparrow’s but it’s FINE don’t WORRY ABOUT IT

you can actually fucking SEE in the character creator now which is EXCELLENT. don’t have to pull up a cheat sheet to figure out what hair color i’m selecting. for contrast, sparrow in the original creator

naked without their glasses

[wetbloodworm]

got to felix asking you to join the ship and god i love felix so much and i’m so nervous for how this run is going to treat him

charlie immediately agreeing to let felix join because he’s funny and clearly really wants it, why not give him a chance? seems like a nice guy! sparrow immediately agreeing to let felix join because they’ve already decided they’ve figured him out and that he’s a bit dumb, and clearly he really wants it and they can use that.

argh. my boy

[wetbloodworm]

i might start liveblogging sparrow’s TOW run here actually, i was going to keep a google doc but this is better i think

anyway on the groundbreaker rn (because i’m waking up earlier before work to play video games now fhskfjd), realized that sparrow is picking more of the more flattering/extra nice dialogue options than charlie was, because charlie was having a normal conversation with people while sparrow is looking for an angle. charlie is friendly and kind but they’re not always going to say the flattering thing because they’re not actively TRYING to be charming and get on people’s good side. they’re just like that naturally. if they disagree with someone on something inoffensive or if they have bad news to give they’ll try to be gentle or diplomatic about it but they don’t actively think ‘what do i need to say to make this person like/trust me or lower their guard’ like sparrow does. with charlie there is some level of constant analysis going into their interactions with others but that’s just an autism thing lol. 

it’s just interesting to me that this is specifically supposed to be my bad run and so far a lot of the interactions are surface-level pleasant. i’m not upset by it, though, it’s getting to figure out the reason behind the dialogue choices that’s interesting and fun to me so it’s alright if some of the dialogue or results are similar