With the release of Outriders Worldslayer expansion, it has been a little over a year since our last visit to planet Enoch, and now the time has come to make another trip. For those who have already completed Outriders, Square Enix and People Can Fly have created this expansion that lets players take up exactly where the original game left off. With Tarya Gratar's inclusion, Worldslayer's Story campaign now offers more things to accomplish; most of them are geared toward the growth of the end game. Additional content updates, a new narrative campaign, even more weaponry, bug improvements, and a new endgame are all included in the Worldslayer expansion. Is it the game we anticipated it would be, or does it fall short? Let's find out.

As the expansion picks up after the main game's finale, we will first be required to finish the primary campaign to access this expansion. It is not essential to have completed the game to have access to this addition; instead, all that is required is creating a new character who will begin at level 30 without advancing through the levels. If you already have a character generated, you can import that character straight to the expansion and immediately reach level 30. This is another option available to us if we already have a half-game.

Outriders Worldslayer continues the quest to find pods and the riches they hold to continue the main game's story. Humans continue their pursuit of resources on the planet Enoch, and during one of their raids, a scientist finds an abnormality courtesy of the research of another hostile scientist. While looking for one of these pods, they learn that something is drastically happening on Enoch: the Anomaly, a storm constantly raging and lowering the temperature, is causing the dangerous storms to worsen. In our quest to find a solution to this issue, we will face the terrifying Commander Ereshkigal and unearth the long-lost city of Tarya Gratar, formerly home to the Pax.

As the narrative of Outriders Wordslayer faithfully continues in the same vein as the previous game, the plot is unimportant except for a few intriguing aspects, most of which focus on worldbuilding. Ereshkigal is more significant for its design than for the causes that propel it. The story's progression is linear, and in terms of material, we are not even very well positioned, given that after around five to six hours, most of the campaign will be finished. After that begins the Trial of Tarya Gratar, an endgame mode meant to be played repeatedly to the tale ending on a cliffhanger. Due to this, despite its short length, the campaign mode provides many gameplay hours.

The intrigue in the new quest was peeked at first, but it was rapidly lost as it began to unfold since the events taking place in the expansion seemed to be happening too quickly. The continuance of the tale is cut off all of a sudden, and there is no real sense of satisfaction or finality to the way it ends. You are just presented with additional questions to which you have no answers. The main antagonist of Outriders Worldslayer, Ereshkigal, was underutilized, as she was not given sufficient screen time to shine entirely or for the player to get a meaningful image of the character. This left a sour taste in the player's mouth. Unfortunately, the design of her character and her charisma could leave an impact that would stay. She seemed to be only a means to a goal, which was a regrettable waste of what might have been a compelling antagonist for the game.

Despite its new narrative, the core gameplay has not been altered from its original. Outriders Wordslayer continues to impress as a third-person looter shooter, and our previous assessment of the game's gameplay also holds true for this iteration. You have the impression that you are an unstoppable force, and the only time you make a mistake is when you give in to the pressure of having a large number of enemies attacking you at once. Because additional material may only be accessed by characters who have already achieved the game's maximum level, the update may be challenging for players just starting out. There is a strong chance that new players who bypass the basic game and go right into Outriders Worldslayer will have a difficult time if they don't already know how to play their class or Outriders, especially if anyone wants to bypass the main game and go straight to the expansion.

The fighting mechanism has always been where Outriders has excelled in the game. Many encounters in this expansion will hurl swarms of enemies at you from every direction. This is all part of how Outriders wants you to play the game, rushing into the battle and leveraging special abilities during the fights. While playing with two other players, I selected the Trickster class. I quickly fell into the intended pattern of rushing into the midst of the action, unleashing a pair of time-warping abilities, and then pulling back again.

Outriders Worldslayer's Apocalypse Tiers operate in much the same manner, except for some additional modifiers and the inclusion of a chance to get a new sort of treasure along with an extra mod slot. Therefore, except for a couple more skill trees and a brand-new plot, it is a substantial portion of more of the same, which has both positive and negative implications. The most significant new features in this update are the apocalyptic items, which operate like enchanted gear but include powers in addition to those that are inherent to the essential things. Because many traits go into making builds, items like this one, regardless of how rare they are, always end up being used last.

Even though legendary goods will always be the most sought, adding this new category results in a wider variety of playable possibilities. This is particularly true now that the difficulty level may reach 40, and your character can achieve a maximum hero level of 75. A new PAX skill tree is also introduced, with two distinct branches for each class. In addition, there is a system for gaining per-level bonuses, which creates levels of ascension and enhancements that may range from attack multipliers to improved health and armor.

Sadly, Outriders Worldslayer does not feature any new classes. Still, because of the addition of Pax Trees, each of the four existing classes has access to two more skill branches, making them more versatile and adaptable. Each helps you fine-tune your playstyle, but players can change these at any time, allowing greater versatility. Take, for instance, the Pyromancer, who now can construct skill trees for both the Gunblazer and the Pyromaniac. The addition of these new capabilities and a large quantity of new treasure makes the game seem more like a third-person dungeon crawling shooter, compelling players to experiment with different builds and continually improve upon those they have already developed.

The categories of the Apocalypse are another one of the new elements that come with this release. If you played the original game, you may recall that you could adjust the difficulty level at any point, giving you a greater or lesser sense of accomplishment as you progressed through the game. On the other hand, the apocalypse categories are exactly the same as the standard ones, but they have a higher number of variations across the different difficulty levels. The upside is that we can use the apocalypse categories in the standard game, which will award special awards.

The landscapes appear as grand and strange as ever, but because they're merely containers with waist-high walls to hide behind, they might feel like glass tube pathways at an aquarium — lovely things to stare at, but with the disconnected sense of being walled in by unseen walls. In addition, some strange gameplay choices from the original game are still included in the expanded edition. Life-leech weapons are still an essential need, to the point that any weapon that does not have one is entirely useless, making a good portion of your treasure worthless as well.

A constant, excruciating latency that progressively worsens as more action takes place in the fighting zone affects everyone who isn't the host player. This is related to the adverse effects of enemy scaling; when more enemies are spawned, guest players are immediately at a disadvantage regarding hits absorbed or registered relative to the host.

While Outriders Worldslayer is an excellent addition to the original game, it is only worth your time if you were already fans of Outriders and were eager to add more content. The expansion does not address all of the game's fundamental issues stated in our Outriders Xbox Series X Review. Fresh content will attract new players; rather, it will keep the gamers invested in the game engaged. There's always space for improvement for all the hours I've spent working through the new endgame. I also see the opportunity to discover new strategies as I can access better weapons and perk combinations.

It's unlikely that Outriders Worldslayer will sway the opinions for those not already captivated by this third-person looter shooter. There is enough fun in the fierce front-foot fighting, but many of the game's fundamental problems are still apparent. Although Worldslayer's amount of content may not be sufficient to warrant the asking price, the game is undeniably enjoyable. Even if there aren't many of them, the expansion is plenty to provide a pleasant return to Enoch and fantastic amusement for many hours.
 

Azfar Rayan (@AzfarRayan)
Editor, NoobFeed