Dishonored®: Death of the Outsider™

Everything that made D2 magnificient is gone. The amazing level design ? Gone. The customisation of the power set ? Gone. The charistamtic characters ? Gone. The worlderful world of Dishonored ? Gone. And you end up with an empty shell, that forces you to play a very specific way through some uninspired level design and boring missions. I loved Dishonored 2, but everything that I loved about it, is missing from this game. I got it on sales at 6€ and I still regret it. Don't waste your money.

Death of the outsider is an okay sequel and a nice wrap-up for the whole story. Gameplay-wise the game struggles a little with less skills, less choices and less mechanics compared to D1 and D2, but the story is pretty good if a bit short. For those who liked D1 & DLCs as well as D2 I don't see much wrong with also playing this sequel. However, unlike D1 and D2 I don't think I will be replaying this iteration.

Considering how great the first 2 Dishonored games were though, that's not saying much. I still had plenty of fun playing as Billie Lurk. I also already thought she was a great character, so it was cool getting to know more about her. I dunno about the main story regarding the Outsider though. It wasn't bad or anything, but it didn't captivate me like the first 2 games did. What kept me interested was frankly just more learning more details about Billie's past. The gameplay is kind of strange. Outside of the bonecharm crafting and the upgradeable weapons and equipment, there's no powers to learn or upgrade. So there's none of those "rune" upgrade items to collect. You also just have to wait for your supernatural energy/mana pool to regenerate (no mana potions). The 3 powers you automatically learn are pretty cool. The blink and dark vision powers have some interesting new gimmicks to them, but I never really used the third power. Oh and you also get these "contracts" to complete at the black market bulletin too. They're pretty fun and gives the player interesting optional objectives in already huge missions. It's also worth mentioning that there's no "chaos" rating and the world around you doesn't change depending on how many you kill. I actually kinda liked this, because even though I always use a non-lethal approach in these games, now there's no penalty for butchering these annoying NPCs (except for the wolfhounds. The animal lover in me always feels bad for them). The game definitely shines and saves the day with its massive, open-ended levels. The levels are gigantic and exploration is still incentivized and really fun because those useful upgrades are quite pricey. So thieving and combing through these big maps are always a thrill. The "original game plus" game mode stinks though. You just get different powers. I really wished they kept new game plus. Still had a lot of fun though, so I recommend it!

What this sequel has going for it better than Dishonored 2 are two things: 1) The shackles are off and you can kill and go Rambo without affecting the story / endings, giving more variety and options. 2) The locations are a bit more interesting and lived in. Dishonored 2's environments were kinda stale, but in this one you have a boxing club, a pub, a bank, plenty of apartments and homes to snoop around in. My other problem with Dishonored 2 was how one-dimensional it was. The original game had a party to mingle in for example, but D2 was just going in and incapacitating everyone. But this game sees more subtlety thanks to the ability to impersonate others, leading to some unique paths if you're clever. It's also more of a sandbox, with extra little missions you can do on the map, and you may even stumble on more crazy goings on yourself. But basically, when confronted with a big bad group of witches, it's much more fun having the choice of blowing them up with a good ol' grenade.

Short but a fine way to send the series off. Broadly more enjoyable than Dishonored 2 without the highs and lows that that game had.