History VideoGame / Outriders

* ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: The initial story paints Outriders as this, even after the incident in which the original corps were wiped out along with their scout ship, the Caravelle. Lord Seth only backs off from killing the protagonist upon seeing the Outrider patch on their sleeve, astonished that they survived.

After decades of environmental devastation, Earth has been rendered uninhabitable. Humanity's only hope lays in the colony ships sent to the Planet Enoch, each holding 500,000 humans aboard the ship. Of those two ships, only one, the Flores, made the journey. Among the remnants of humanity are the Outriders, a group of elite, highly-skilled explorers and soldiers whose job it is to establish the beginnings of Human Civilization on Enoch under the authority of the Enoch Colonization Authority.

** The initial codex unlocks summarize the ApocalypseHow that forced humans to escape Earth and colonize Enoch: tectonic activity destroyed the Earth civilization, and 500000 settlers were put on the colony ship "Flores" and sent to Enoch.

** [[spoiler: Monroy, the leader of the ''Caravel'' expedition which arrived on Enoch decades before the ''Flores'']], turns out to be inadvertently responsible for both the Altered and the planet Enoch's current state, but has no role in opposing you in the game itself [[spoiler: being a harmless old man living alone in the wreckage of the ''Caravel'' .]]

** Lord Seth name-drops [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Moloch]] as this after you defeat Gauss. He claims that Moloch is the most powerful and most evil of the Altered and it's Seth's business to defeat him, while the Protagonist should focus on guiding the ECA. [[spoiler: Subverted in that Moloch turns out to be the WakeUpCallBoss, and is merely the first major obstacle faced by the Outrider on his journey.]]

** Tricksters heal by doing damage. They heal less health than other classes, but generate shield charge in the process.

* PlotIrrelevantVillain: None of the major antagonists, including the FinalBoss, that the Outrider faces on their journey have any real connection to the Outrider or their party, or anything to do with the events that led to Enoch's current state and the failure of the ''Flores'' expedition. In fact the closest thing the game has to a BigBad is [[spoiler: Monroy, the man responsible for the planet's current state, who is now a harmless old man with no military resources to speak of, who has no grudge against you and actually mistakes you for a rescue party, and whom your group executes out of relative pettiness.]]

* VasquezAlwaysDies: in the prologue, the butch Cuthbert gets disintegrated, while the more feminine Shira becomes an important character. [[spoiler: Then, in the First City, the gung-ho sniper Jane gets pointlessly killed just as you rescue Zahedi. Subverted later in the Forest, where the short-shaven aggressive Bailey gets paralyzed by her own fault.]]

* AllForNothing: Channa's dream of reuniting with the protagonist in a field of flowers [[spoiler:turns out to be a vision of a ''picture'' of a field of flowers on a TV screen.

* AnyoneCanDie: Does a character appear early on and look like they're going to be a major character? Yeah, don't get attached. Cuthbert, Skarstedt, [[spoiler: Tanner, Maxwell, Jane, and Seth]] can vouch for that.

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: [[spoiler: After rescuing Jakub from the Hounds, he doesn't immediately recognize his savior as the friend he hasn't seen in three decades who looks exactly the same as the day they last saw each other. Because really, who would?]]

** During a side quest, the Outrider will say that they'd rather not take "the [[Creator/Ken Kesey electric Kool-Aid test]]."

* GiantSpider: The second boss, Molten Acari, is a massive, fire-spewing spider dwelling in a volcanic caldera.

* GoodScarsEvilScars: The Outrider falls under the "good scars" side, as the demo's character creator gives several options for stylish scarring. Lord Seth, by contrast, has scarring across his entire face, and vacillates between hostile and apathetic towards the Outrider throughout the demo.

* VasquezAlwaysDies: in the prologue, the butch Cuthbert gets disintegrated, while the more feminine Shira becomes an important character. [[spoiler: Then, in the First City, the gung-ho sniper Jane gets pointlessly killed just as you rescue Zahedi. Later in the Forest, the short-shaven aggressive Bailey dies if by her own fault while Channa survives.]]

* VasquezAlwaysDies: in the prologue, the butch Cuthbert gets disintegrated, while the more feminine Shira becomes an important character. [[spoiler: Then, in the First City, the gung-ho sniper Jane gets pointlessly killed just as you rescue Zahedi.]]

** There's a reasonably common pistol called the [[Anime/CowboyBebop Space Cowboy]].

* PlotIrrelevantVillain: None of the major antagonists, including the FinalBoss, that the Outrider faces on their journey has any real connection to them or anything to do with the events that led to Enoch's current state and the failure of the ''Flores'' expedition. In fact the closest thing the game has to a BigBad is [[spoiler: Monroy, the man responsible for the planet's current state, who is now a harmless old man with no military resources to speak of, who has no grudge against you and actually mistakes you for a rescue party, and whom your group executes out of relative pettiness.]]

* GreaterScopeVillain: Lord Seth name-drops [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Moloch]] as this after you defeat Gauss. He claims that Moloch is the most powerful and most evil of the Altered and it's Seth's business to defeat him, while the Protagonist should focus on guiding the ECA.

* GiantSpider: The first major boss, Molten Acari, is a massive, fire-spewing spider dwelling in a volcanic caldera.

* HealThyself: One of the "Mantras of Survival" in the trailer titled as such is "Kill to Heal". There are no healing items in the game and every character class has its own way of regaining lost health points, usually tied to their skills.

* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: Humans destroyed Earth, and it turns out [[spoiler: it only took them a couple years to destroy Enoch as well]].

%%no citation * BreadEggsMilkSquick: One of the loading screen tips reads "Some Altered are able to read minds, most are immortal, and a few urinate sulphuric acid."

Outriders is set to launch on April 1st, 2021. A demo containing the prologue and Chapter 1 of the story (with the caveat of game balance changes mentioned in the FAQ on the game's website) was released to the public on February 25th, 2021.

* BrokenPedestal: A majority of the human population of Enoch, such as the Exiles, feel this way about the ECA and the Outriders. The Outriders promised to lead humanity to planet Enoch, believed at the time to be a lush paradise, so they could build a new home for themselves and have a chance at a fresh start. What they got instead was a DeathWorld besieged by massive reality warping storms and vicious alien creatures, with humanity ending up no better than they were on Earth. You can learn it from Captain Reiner's MotiveRant in the demo.

* VasquezAlwaysDies: in the prologue, the butch Cuthbert gets disintegrated, while the more feminine Shira becomes an important character.

* AttackReflector: Devastator's Reflect Bullets skill, allows you to stop bullets with a telekinetic shield, and send them back at the enemies.

* DishingOutDirt: The Devastator class is heavily earth-themed, allowing you to perform a ShockwaveStomp in two different ways (with a GroundPunch Earthquake and an even more damaging GroundPound called Gravity Leap) and encase yourself in a stone armor called the Golem. Then, there's the GravityMaster skill called Infinite Mass that summons a massive boulder that pulls the enemies in.

* ElementalArmor: The Devastator class can summon stone armor for themselves with the Golem skill.

* GatlingGood: Technomancer's skill called Tools of Destruction allows them to summon a three-barreled minigun for limited use.

* AnIcePerson: The Technomancer class relies on freezing enemies: either with an ElementalPunch, a Cryo Turret that fires freezing projectiles or a Frost Nova that freezes everything around the player.

** The Devastator Class Feature reveals the Impale power that skewers the enemies on stone spikes popping out of the ground, holding them in place and granting health regeneration to all players in the team.

* NoIAmBehindYou: One of the abilities Trickster class has in the demo, Hunt the Prey, lets them teleport right behind an enemy's back.

* PlayingWithFire: As the name implies, all Pyromancer abilities are fire-related. ElementalPunch that sets people on fire, Flame Wave, Thermal Bomb that deals damage over time and makes the target explode if killed before the skill expires, the list goes on.
* PoisonousPerson: Another part of the Technomancer's bag of tricks. Not only there's a passive skill node that adds poison-based damage over time to their melee attack, but also a turret that hoses enemies down with toxic goo and a skill that enhances one magazine's worth of ammo with poison.

* TimeMaster: Trickster's second skill, Slow Trap, lets them put down a bubble in which every enemy, including enemy projectiles, is slowed down. Then, there's Borrowed Time, which allows the Trickster to "rewind" themselves to a previously placed anchor, similarly to ''VideoGame/{{Overwatch}}'''s Tracer.
* TheTurretMaster: Technomancers can drop down turrets that lay down suppression fire on enemies and draw aggro, allowing players to snipe at them.

* WhyAmITicking: Thermal Bomb, one of the first powers of the Pyromancer, sets one enemy on fire and if they die while under this power's effects, they explode with considerable force.