Obsidian’s The Outer Worlds 2 gets its first story expansion on 2 December. Side Effects Guaranteed is part one of two, priced at $14.99, with the second half due in spring 2027. Everyone, DLC owner or not, also gets a free update that allows respeccing at will.
You answer a call from a drifting wreck and find its crew frozen in suspension, plus a puddle that was once a person. The captain’s recorded message says a heist infected them, and without a cure they will die by what she jokingly calls liquefaction. That sends you to Sub Rosa agent Gordon Hazen, who points you at Elysium Valley, a new area on Eden holding a neglected colony of ex-Protectorate subjects.
Another Sub Rosa agent, Algernon Lankester, wants your help exploiting those settlers, so the fate of the frozen agents, the settlement and the group itself rests on your choices. Those choices carry into part two, as Xbox Wire explains.
Five weapons come with it. The Immobilizer removes gravity around a target so it floats while you switch guns, and works well with grenades or the Tactical Time Dilation device. The 1/6 Resolver packs an extra-strong shot into every sixth bullet, so a character built for criticals need not empty the magazine to land one. The remaining three are a plasma gun, a Tossball Stick and a gun built to hurt animals more. New armour and outfits for each companion are also in.
Characters level up further: the cap rises from 30 to 36, with 15 new perks and four new flaws. One flaw, Lethally Tolerant, raises your maximum toxicity but means a toxicity crash kills you outright. Another, Must Have Been the Wind, marks a combat target; killing it gives a 20% damage and speed boost, while missing it or hitting anyone else costs you 10% for 30 seconds.
The expansion adds new enemies, among them vicious canids and primal sprats, which are ordinary sprats about 100 times larger. A Sub Rosa radio station brings 20 new songs.
The DLC begins just before the main game’s point of no return. If you would rather not replay, PlayStation Blog says a new-game option on the main menu starts a premade level 27 character at the DLC’s opening, and you assign skill points and perks yourself.
The respec update arrives with it for all players, along with a custom-game setting that changes how many skill points you earn per level. Side Effects Guaranteed is also part of the Premium Edition and the Premium Edition upgrade.
