We're On A Road Trip To Nowhere

Given my current circumstances, I've had to abandon my usual plan to play and review half a dozen demos from the current Next Fest. Instead, I'm limiting myself to a more achievable two or three. I already had a couple of definites in mind, one of which was Outbound.

The game's Steam Store page describes it as "a cozy open-world exploration game set in a utopian near future". I spent a few minutes yesterday, skimming the list of demos on offer and the first thing I noticed was just how many games like this there are now. I started at the top of the "Browse All Titles" list and worked my way down and eight of the top ten were some kind of survival sim. 

Of course, that's a list tailored to what Steam believes is likely to interest me. If I look at the options without being logged in, I get a much broader selection of genres. Even so, I notice I'm getting no point-and-click demos and very few tactical rpgs, both of which I play more than survival games. That's because there are far fewer of them, I'm betting.

In a crowded marketplace, most of the survival games make some vague attempt at grabbing attention with a trope or quirk that supposedly makes them special. Scanning down the list again I see, in order from the top, pirates, creature-collecting, medievalism, Old West, space, ranching and, after an unscheduled interruption from something that's not a survival game at all, Outbound, whose USP is that you drive a camper van.

I've often fantasized about buying a camper van and heading off into the unknown, just driving around, stopping anywhere that seemed interesting and staying as long as it stayed that way. That was what attracted me to outbound the first time I heard about it.

I have to say my fantasies of a life on the open road have never included making tools, on a workbench in the back of the camper, out of scrap metal and bits of wood picked up from the side of the road so I can repair broken barriers, clear fallen trees or rebuild collapsed bridges. Nor did I imagine I'd be living on berries scrounged up from the undergrowth or fueling my van with fallen tree branches I'd have to feed into some weird device in the engine compartment.

For that matter, I hadn't envisaged the van itself turning into some kind of Wacky Races house on wheels. One of the goals of the game appears to be to turn your compact camper into a traveling farmhouse-cum-luxury-apartment. Like this:

Who would live in a house like this? Professor Pat Pending, perhaps?

That monstrosity isn't my van. I doubt you can build anything like it in the demo. It is the ambition you're expected to have for your vehicle, though. I took the picture from the Steam Store page, where it's presumably supposed to trigger desire rather than, as it does in me, disbelief. 

After 78 minutes, my camper was much more modest. I hadn't built anything outside the van at all, just a couple of utilities inside, neither of them anything I would have envisaged needing on a road trip. Would you expect to build a trash compactor and a sawmill inside your camper van?

It's obvious Outbound has no interest in simulating an actual road trip, at least not in the demo, and since the demo is basically the first of the four biomes scheduled for launch, I guess the same will apply to the finished game. There's nothing particularly unusual about a lack of realism in a survival/crafting game but what did surprise me a little was the complete absence of any kind of plot or narrative.

I think all the games in this genre I've played have had some kind of story. It's not always very deep or convincing but there's at least a nominal reason for you to be pushing forwards, beyond a simple drive for self-improvement and desire to see what's over the next hill. In Outbound, as far as I can see, that's all there is.

Well, perhaps not exactly all. There may not be a narrative but that doesn't mean there's no structure. There are lots of short and medium term goals, called Objectives and Side Tasks, respectively. Objectives are things like "Build a Recycler on a Counter". Side Tasks are cumulative actions, such as "Light four campfires". 

The game constantly prompts you to make the next tool or utility and you really have no choice when you find an obstruction blocking the road. That happened to me three times in the first hour I played, meaning I had to make myself a wrench, an axe and ten planks before I could carry on driving.

As well as tasking you with removing obstacles, the game also asks you to visit specific locations, not all of which are close at hand. In other games, this would be part of a storyline but in Outbound there's no ostensible reason to go to any of them other than that the game is telling you that's what you need to do. Chances are you'd have gone there anyway, out of curiosity, though, so it doesn't feel as directive as it might.

When you get to the location, you may find something of practical interest. The Firewatch Tower had a blueprint terminal, for example. Blueprints are needed to make new tools and utilities and, well, anything, really. To download each blueprint you need a token. You get tokens by picking up litter and feeding it into your trash compactor. I guess they did say it was the near future.

There are Download Towers along the road and as far as I can tell, each tower offers specific items. I needed to make planks, for which I needed a Sawmill, but I couldn't find the blueprint until I went a long way up a side road to a tower I wouldn't have otherwise have passed. 

The rooftop patio of the surprisingly well-appointed Firewatch Tower, where I found two of three items I needed.

I'm not sure if the placement of blueprints is randomized or not. When I couldn't find the one I needed, I watched a YouTube video of someone else lookingg for one and they found theirs in the Firewatch Tower. When I was there, all I got was a blueprint for a food mixer. Of course, the game is still in development so maybe they just changed the locations.

The terminals in the regular towers are immediately accessible but the one in the Firewatch Tower required me to find three items first before I could switch it on. That was about the only puzzle I came across, if you can call a scavenger hunt a puzzle. Maybe there's more of that sort of "content" later but so far it's been the exception.

And that's OK. The game bills itself as "cozy" and describes the setting as "utopian". Threat of any kind doesn't enter into it and I very much doubt challenge does, either. You're on an extended vacation in some beautiful scenery, living off the land, which is exceptionally hospitable, providing everything you need. 

If that's not enough to keep you entertained, you probably need to look for another survival/crafting/exploration game. The good news there is you won't have to look far!

I really enjoyed the Outbound demo. Not that I've finished it. The map looks huge. It feels like I've hardly started to explore it. 

And exploring it is a pleasure. The landscape is very pretty, with a simple, attractive aesthetic that employs a lot of flat surfaces and plenty of saturated color. Sunrise and sunset are particularly delightful and night is a gorgeous, rich, velvety blue-black that feels oddly safe.

But then, the whole game feels safe. Not only are there no enemies, in nearly eighty minutes I didn't see another human being at all. Not one NPC. Very little wildlife, either. I think I saw a rabbit, once.

Perhaps more surprisingly, there are no other vehicles. I had the road to myself.

Just as well. I was driving in the middle of it half the time. Controlling the van isn't difficult but it's not particularly smooth or intuitive. There may have been some lurching. I might have hit a few rocks. 

Fortunately, there doesn't seem to be any way to damage the camper. Or to hurt yourself. If this is a survival game at all it's very much survival-lite. 

In true survival-sim style, though, there are a couple of meters that have to be kept topped-up. One for you and one for the van. Your meter measures how hungry you are and so, I suppose does the van's. It tells you when you're running out of fuel. What happens if either hits zero I can't say because I didn't let it happen but I doubt it's anything very bad.

The absence of anyone at all to communicate with does give the demo a somewhat lonesome feel. The game is co-op four up to four people, though, and in the full version of the game you get a dog to accompany you on your travels, so the final version ought to be a lot more social. (There's an apology at the start of the demo for the dog not being available yet.)

Leave the door open all night if you want. It's not like anyone's going to steal anything.

I really enjoyed Outbound. It wasn't exactly what I was expecting but I liked what I got. I didn't run into any bugs or glitches although my overall impression was that there might need to be some optimization before launch. The controls and movement felt a little off at times although not in a way I could really put my finger on.

I have some minor concerns about the complete absence of any kind of narrative structure, too. Not that the game necessarily needs one if it's supposed to be a building/crafting/survival sim. No, it's the use of the term "road trip" to describe the gameplay that worries me. I can't imagine how you can have a road trip without a goal or a destination or a purpose. Road trips always tell a story.

Without a story, it's not a trip, just an existence. And that's probably how the game should be framed; as a life-sim. You're not really going anywhere, just driving aimlessly around some beautiful countryside, enjoying your freedom. Honestly, who needs anything more?

I already had Outbound wishlisted. There's a decent chance I might even buy it, one day. If I do I'll definitely wait until I can have a dog to share my adventures.