Outriders Demo patch changes overview

The Outriders demo has been around for a little over two weeks now and the developers already released one server patch balancing the loot drops and today we get a client-side update that adds motion blur toggle feature, improves the game’s matchmaking and fixes a number of additional bugs. We also got a new story trailer and an interesting infographic for the player stats from the demo!

First demo server-side patch brought balance to loot drops

On March 5th the Outriders dev team delivered a balance patch for the demo, which was on the server side. This means that we had nothing to download, but our gameplay experience with the demo was changed. The devs think it was an improvement and proper balancing that they brought.

On social networks, reddit and other places you might encounter quite a few complaints about them nerfing early-discovered paths of quick and easy ways to find chests with loot and other unintended methods to obtain the few precious Legendary items that were available in the demo.

This first server-side patch also changed the bosses available in the game. Here is a quick list in case you have missed it earlier:

Changes to Captains
- The Captain mob ability “Healing Light” will have its effectiveness reduced.
- The Captain mob ability “From the Ashes” and “Phoenix Aura” will have their cooldowns increased.
  Some players were finding it hard to fully kill Captains who would trigger these abilities, making for a frustrating rather than a challenging but fun encounter.
Changes to Gauss
- Gauss will have his health points increased for repeat playthroughs.
  This is to ensure that he remains fun and challenging for players who are overpowered at this point in the story.
- Gauss healing from his ability “Steel Wall” will be increased.
Changes to loot drops
While we do not want to prevent farming runs (We get it!), the lootcave discovered via the triple chest-run, as well as the store exploit, do not feel to be within the spirit of the game. To that end, we are redirecting farming efforts to mechanics in the game that may be more enjoyable for players to play through and repeat.
- Epic items will no longer appear in shops and vendors (within the demo).
- Chests will no longer drop legendary items.
- Side quest rewards (on repeat runs) will now have a chance to drop legendary items.

A day later the developers changed their mind and brought back the Legendary weapons drops from the Gauss boss chest. This was a result of a community request. Good sign that they are listening.

Update Regarding Chests Dropping Legendaries in the Outriders Demo:

Having listened to very reasonable community feedback, we have enabled the Gauss boss chest to drop Legendaries again as we should indeed be rewarding boss runs.

Other chests still cannot drop Legendaries.
— Outriders (@Outriders) March 6, 2021

The demo was not intended for us all to farm it like hell and get all of the Legendaries we could to prepare not just for the full game’s release, but for its EndGame as well, because thanks to crafting and upgrading, we will be able to keep the Legendary weapons we get from the demo and use them throughout the whole story and maybe even beyond.

What’s new after the Outriders Demo Patch on the client side

Earlier today the Outriders demo was patched on the client-side as well. The changes this time around are more focused on bug-fixing and introducing new features to play with and test.

One of the most frequently requested feature was for us – the players – to be able to turn off the motion blur effect, which was most noticeable while running (sprinting) around.

Another major complaint, which I myself was most pleased to hear addressed is the insanely annoying 30 FPS lock during almost all of the cinematic cutscenes.

The full game will not have the cutscenes locked to 30 FPS, the devs announced earlier, but for the demo there’s little that can be done, it seems. Check out the full changes list below:

Added a Motion Blur Toggle [ALL PLATFORMS]
Made minor tweaks to frame rate output for certain items in cutscenes, however, we are working on a more comprehensive fix for the future [ALL PLATFORMS]
Made improvements to cut down on the time it takes to Matchmake [ALL PLATFORMS]
Made other minor improvements and fixes

Additional resolutions that apply only to PC:

Fixed a crash that repeatedly occurred when opening the menu or inventory [PC]
Fixed a bug that deletes player gear if their connection drops out during a transition [PC]
Improved subtitle display and synchronization during the “Bad Day” quest [PC]

Additional resolutions that apply only to Xbox Platforms:

Fixed menu prompts not displaying correctly in supported non-English languages [XBOX]

Additional resolutions that apply only to PlayStation Platforms:

Fixed store links on the “Buy Now” button in the Lobby [PS4/5]
Note that while the ingame button will be fixed with the patch, you can still search the PlayStation store for “Outriders” should you wish to already pre-order it.
Fixed bug that was causing an audio desynchronization in cutscenes [PS4/5]

The new Outriders story trailer is a let-down

Outriders wants to attract your attention with its story aspect as well as its loot-focused gameplay. The early pre-release promo campaigns kept telling us that the game will have an intriguing story to tell as we progress from level one to the level cap and into the EndGame.

A couple of days ago the People Can Fly and Square Enix released a 1min20 long trailer that seems to focus on the story of the game.

Why I said it was a letdown in the heading?

The game wants us to like its story and enjoy it. The demo gave us a nice little taste and while some things were expectedly boring (for me at least), I really liked the beginning of the narrative adventure.

The characters all had personality and the crazy camera shake during cutscenes did not bother me nearly as much as the silly trailer they released recently to promote that story.

On Discord the official Outriders account shared the following text alongside the link to the trailer:

“Earth is dead. Discover the events leading to the Outriders becoming humankind’s last hope”.

Nice, eh?

The narrator in the trailer, however, makes it sound like all of this is a joke. I didn’t appreciate this confusing new direction. I doubt anyone expected Otriders to blow us away, but it was advertised as a strong part of the game and this trailer kind of attempted to turn everything backwards.

I very much enjoyed how the story started in the demo and I absolutely love the music background in both the game and all of the pre-release marketing. It’s just the dismissive narrations of the recent trailer that make all of this sound like a joke before we even get to finish it and determine for ourselves if it was indeed a joke (word-play, heh).

What the Outriders demo stats teach us

Alongside the few tweets with the patch notes today the Outriders twitter account tweeted a few very funny and interesting infographics, revealing some of the stats we have achieved during the demo.

Over two million players have tried the game so far. And why not – it’s 100% free to download the demo on Steam, Playstation and Xbox. The average play time is a little under four and a half hours, which is just about the time you would need to complete the demo once on your first character and if you bother to read the tons of interesting text lore background you uncover as you play.

To my surprise the most popular class so far is the Trickster. Funny enough our first in-depth class guide will be focusing exactly on the Trickster. RubyRose is working hard on delivering you the most useful and helpful guides as soon as the game launches.

The Outriders Classes and Roles Guide for beginner players is already out and if you have not yet played the game, check Ruby’s guide here on VULKK.com to decide which class to try first!

Speaking of playing the demo, can you guess how many hours is the leading number for one player to spend with the demo? 254! So far! I certainly hope this record is not held by Ruby. When a game allows you to play new content for about three to four hours and you spend 254 before even the full game is out yet, that sounds a bit scary. Still, most impressive!

Whoever you are, brave Outrider, congratulations! I hope you have earned your Legendary items on all of the four classes already and are ready to face the full game release on April 1st head-on! I hope you didn’t get burned-out for the full game.

Want to check out the rest of the stats from the infographics? Here they are:

I hope you are as excited for the Outriders release on April 1st as we are. Don’t forget to frequently check out the Outriders category here on VULKK.com for new guides. Ruby is already finishing up the first few covering the basics and he will also have in-depth guides with builds and tips for each one of the four classes.

Outriders releases on April 1st 2021 for PC, Playstation 4, Playstation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X. You can play the demo for free now and pre-order the game in both physicals and digital formats.

Pre-ordering will grant you the Hell’s Rangers Content Pack of in-game items, which contains the following items: