Outpost

by Sierra

Product Features

• Build mankinds future in space
• Consult your artificial intelligence computer for help.
• Deal with hostile colonies.
• Exploit robots and much more. Award winning title. Rare collectors item.
• PC: Windows 3,1, Windows 95, Windows 98

Product Details

• ASIN: B0002TYABE
• Media: CD-ROM
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #26,515 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)

Product Description

The legacy of earth depends on your survival. Based on current Nasa research of planetary science , robotics, terraforming, and isnterstellar space craft design. Outpost places you in control of a most comprehensive strategy simulation for your PC. Earth is destroyed by a catastrophic event and you are responsible for rebuilsding civilization on antoher planet. Shape a new society, perform genetic research, explot robots, deal wit hostile rebel colonies and much more. A bestseller.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The game that changed the reviewer paradigm, November 7, 2008

By 

S. Lawrenz "Lendorien" (Milwaukee, WI) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

= Fun:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Outpost (CD-ROM)

OUTPOST

Synopsis:
Outpost follows a colony settled on an alien planet by survivors of Earth after a rogue asteroid destroys it. The player takes control of the colony from initial settlement, choosing what supplies to start out with (that were brought on the colony ship) trying to balance growth with the needs of the colony to survive. Later in the game, a rebel faction breaks away, competing for resources. Outpost can be best described as an almost pure colony simulation game. Players must expand the colony by building and placing different types of structures, balancing colonist needs and population growth with the available resources.

Review:
Outpost is a game with a little bit of notoriety. Published by Sierra Online for DOS, Windows and Macs in 1994, the game received strong reviews from gaming magazines at the time. The reviews were based on betas that were provided by the developer. The betas were not complete, and the developers misled the gaming magazines about what the game would include. This resulted in wildly inaccurate reviews. Most notoriously, PC-gamer rated it at 93%, which was the highest rating the magazine had ever given to a game to that time. Other magazines followed this trend.

What the consuming public got was a lot less than had been promised. Due to time pressures, the game was released minus significant features that were shown or promised to game reviewers, and with serious bugs that severely hampered gameplay. Customers who bought the game based on the reviews became irate at the gaming magazines, resulting in PC-Gamer completely revising how they did reviews. Almost all gaming magazines, online or otherwise, now review the complete and final product rather than developer provided betas. Outpost is one of the reasons.

Patches were released for the game (though this was before the internet was prevalent and 3.5" floppy disks were still common) and some of the issues were resolved, though the cut features were never added, even in later rereleases of the game. Surprisingly, it was successful enough to spawn a sequel and a fan following even 14 years after its initial release.

Outpost is a mediocre game, though its unique gameplay focusing on colony management gave it something of a fan following. For it's age, it has moderate complexity, but there's only so many times a person can play it before its flaws become glaring. I remember originally playing it and wondering what all the hype was. It was incredibly boring and monotonous, and it seemed to have no end game, at least not that I ever saw.

Added to that, replaying recently it has revealed that it has not aged well as a strategy simulation. The faults and production cuts that haunted it have become even more glaring with the passage of time. Games that followed after it with similar concepts such as Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri were far better and more playable. I'd suggest looking that one up as an alternative.

I own the DOS version of this game, in one of the rereleases. I managed to get it to work under dosbox, but if you're not knowledgeable about using dosbox (A 386/486 computer emulator available for free online), you might find getting this game to work to be quite daunting. I have no idea how it works under windows, but a search to the web reveals that there are a few fan websites still in existence which provide installation instructions for Windows XP.

2.0 out of 5 stars Great intro, May 31, 2011

By 

coltrautman (anytown usa) - See all my reviews

= Fun:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Outpost (CD-ROM)

I got this game when I was a kid. I loved everything to do with space so I thought I would love to play this game. Outpost starts out with a great intro about the end of the world. You play the leader of the last humans and you are on a mission to find a new planet. You start out by equipping your ship with supplies, picking a star to travel to and fueling up. The intro uses a great voice over and better graphics to make you get in the mood of the game.

Here is where the problem starts.
After all the cool cinematic and cool voice over you finally get to the colony building stage. This is the game you have been waiting for. Guess what? It's terrible. I had no idea what I was doing, if I was doing anything right. I built things that I had no idea what they were or what they did. It didn't matter what I did nothing happened. I remember trying to figure out what to do but I never did.

This game had a great intro but terrible gameplay.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars One of the suckiest games ever written., March 3, 2008

By 

Doug - See all my reviews

= Fun:1.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Outpost (CD-ROM)

If your goal is to have a game that is absolutely no fun at all, this is your winner. I bought this back when it was released and sadly I didn't believe the guy in the store who was desperately trying to convince me to do something better with my money, like burn it or flush it down the toilet.