Well, I finished Outer Wilds. That has to have been the most unexpected disappointment in years. Everything I read about the game made me think it would be evocative of the revelatory vibes that The Witness or FEZ explored, but it didn't really hit those notes for me. Setting aside perhaps unfair comparisons to two games I hold in very high regard, I ultimately didn't feel like it succeeded as a game or interactive experience all that much.
I found the actual moment to moment gameplay pretty lacking and all throughout my 15+ hours I was looking for these cool puzzles that people were talking about. I suppose I don't really think of puzzles in the same way others do. What comes to mind for me is learning a rule or something and then applying that in a certain way that requires a degree of creativity or lateral thinking. Most importantly, the solution is left open for you to figure out. Whereas in Outer Wilds, the game will just very directly tell you what to do and that's all there's to it -- it deflates that "aha" moment before you can get it. It has things that have the cadence of puzzles -- a general air of mystery, switches (only on/off though) and things like that -- but not puzzles per se.
I appreciate that a lot of other people really resonated with this game, and I can recognize a lot of things that are likeable about it -- I like probably like many of them too. It just also had a bunch of things that really didn't work for me. When it comes to games like these, usually my opinion doesn't stray that far from the general reception. I certainly didn't expect it beforehand, which is why I didn't hesitate much to jump on it. But here are. Odd. Really thought I'd love this game!
(I also have a slightly more elaborate and spoiler-free review posted on Steam, in case you have the appetite for that.)