Known for its unique and signature twists on existing game genres and titles, Obsidian Entertainment’s Avowed makes for its most ambitious title yet. While it only feels like yesterday when the Irvine developer was making the best South Park game in the form of The Stick of Truth, or even further back arguably the best Fallout game in New Vegas, Obsidian has been building momentum over the years with newer hits like The Outer Worlds and Pentiment.?
While not without its issues along the way, Avowed is new territory in the form of an immersive first-person fantasy RPG. Thankfully, the game benefits from the studio’s experience and the lessons it’s learned along the way. Avowed is a fantastic culmination of the Obsidian games that came before, even if it’s still imperfect.?
In a sprawling fantasy world called The Living Lands, Avowed takes place as a hideous blight called the Dreamscourge ravages territories amidst further chaos in the region; you’re an Imperial Envoy of the Aedyr Empire sent to investigate and hopefully restore order.?
In typical RPG fashion, you’re also the special among special characters by being a Godlike: a being whose soul was touched by a deity and, in addition to the fungal-like disfigurements of your choosing, you’re granted extra abilities to use along with your plethora of spells, blades, and firearms. You’ll also have some help in the form of your recruitable companions—who travel with you across The Living Lands as you investigate the Dreamscourge and make decisions that decide the fate of its inhabitants.?
While Avowed’s premise sounds like so many games that came before, there’s a lot that sets itself apart. The first of which is the graphics, which smack you in the face from the first cutscene with bright and vivid color pallets and details added to every NPC you interact with. It’s made better by the game’s smooth performance mode, which runs at 60FPS and 1800p on Xbox Series X.
The game’s setting and structure encourage as much exploration as possible as you journey through various territories like the starting Fort Northreach, Paradis, Emerald Stair, and beyond. Utilizing careful lighting, the well-designed features of each landscape, and the extraordinary creatures and people who populate them, it never felt like a chore to venture off the beaten path in search of crafting materials or just to see what might be hiding down a weaving path.
While still a large map, Avowed’s is nowhere near the size of its genre contemporaries. Instead, Avowed is an example of the phrase “less is more”. Maps from games like Skyrim or Breath of the Wild will dwarf it in comparison, but it’s packed with wildernesses and bustling cities with voice-acted NPCs that make you want to stop and listen. This all combines to make the world feel immersive and lived-in.?
Without going too much into spoilers, both the story and the large amount of side quests do an excellent job of balancing exposition on the Dreamscourge crisis at hand and world-building lore to fill you in on its history without feeling too overwhelmed. Even if you aren’t familiar with the universe of the Pillar of Eternity games this adventure is set in, it won’t take long before you feel right at home and are picking up on the terminology of the Living Lands.?
While Avowed originally began as ‘Obsidian’s Skyrim,’ as the developer’s CEO once told PC Gamer in a 2023 interview, the team thankfully backed up and wanted to go down its own path. The Skyrim comparison with Avowed is still going to be inevitable for many. The two share many of the staple RPG systems like looting, health and mana (or “Essence”) potions, varied weaponry and spells assigned to multi-handed builds, fate-altering decisions, and companions.
Although familiar, Avowed’s execution of these mechanics means it’s closer to optimizing the wheel rather than reinventing it. Companions like Kai and Marius are terrific examples of this, with your recruitable crew’s variety of eclectic personalities making up for your silent protagonist.?
With exemplary voice work all around—Brandon Keener, the voice behind Mass Effect’s Garrus, playing Kai as the standout—each team member walks that fine line between entertaining camaraderie and earnest in their own right without being overbearing; that’s whether they’re joining conversations you’re having with other NPCs or you’re having one-on-one chats around the campfire at night.
The true fun of this kind of RPG comes from trying out different character classes and the decisions you can make in the main story and side quests, and Avowed has that in spades. Called “backgrounds,” your Envoy has an array of backstories to choose from—each offering exclusive avenues for many NPC conversations whether just in passing or during the main story.?
For instance, my background ‘War Hero,’ gave us options to either intimidate enemies where that wouldn’t be possible otherwise or get there far quicker. That’s along with extra dialog you can unlock by boosting certain stats like ‘Might’ and ‘Constitution.’?
Even if you make a wrong dialog option outside of your background, the game’s generous autosave system makes it very easy to go back to a close enough point and correct your mistake.?It’s also quite handy if you just want to see what would have happened if you picked another option without starting an entirely new playthrough.
Depending on how you upgrade their abilities, each companion can be just as formidable as they are charming. When it comes to you as the Envoy, though, this is where you and Avowed can truly shine.
The huge variety of weapons available to you makes the opening hours of Avowed some of the most enjoyable rounds of trial and error you can have. Swords, guns, spell grimoires, guns, maces, axes, spears, bows, grenades, and much more can all be mixed and matched to suit your playstyle. Obsidian has done a fantastic job in ensuring each weapon holds its own. Combat is snappy and satisfying, with each weapon having its distinctions.?
Sword or axe-slashing has that satisfying slicing sound and heft to them, wands are fast-paced medium weapons with a “Stupefy!” from Harry Potter-like appeal, grimoire spells are devastatingly gratifying, and charging weapons like the arquebus rifles give off a devilish crackle before you blow enemies away. As you land critical hits, your controller lets out a satisfying rumble that makes encounters more intense.?
Some elements hold this back, however, The lack of a target lock can make the frequent need to dodge enemy attacks a constant frustration as you need to shift your point-of-view back. Only allowing for up to two assigned weapons loadouts at once also means those who like to try multiple combinations need to navigate through the messy inventory menus to un-equip and re-equip gear.
Even if you do have more than two loadout’s worth of favorites, Avowed’s heavy reliance on upgrade material for weapons and armor—which you have to grind for through side quests, finding merchants, and exploring the Living Lands—will discourage you from venturing outside of the two-to-four weapons you’re already carrying.?
Unless you’re the type of RPG player who loves exploring every nook and cranny of an area before finishing the story, there is quite a difficulty curve for those playing on Normal and above. On one hand, this means you have to explore more of this beautiful world and see what its legion of interesting side missions and characters have to offer.
On the other, those who like to finish the story first with a modicum of challenge will be punished by hitting a wall and the need to farm herbs like Paradisian’s Root and Hylea’s Talon at regular intervals.?
Finally, ironically following the path of a Bethesda game, Avowed does have its share of bugs as well. Along with asset pop-in, framerate drops, NPCs for missions not being present, and stuttering heads, a particular recurring issue was in-game audio for companions, either being barely audible, distorted, or sounding like they’re underwater.
This will assumingly be resolved in a quick patch and can be solved in the meantime by re-loading the game, but it is a slight knock on the overall experience, no matter how small.
Despite these flaws, Avowed offers a fantastic RPG excursion to the Living Lands, with an intriguing world to explore, a gripping narrative that’ll keep you hooked, and sumptuously satisfying combat against a varied cast of enemies. With a few bugs to address and a requirement to grind out crafting materials for upgrades, it’s by no means perfect, but Avowed offers a further iteration on the tried and tested RPG formula loved by so many, and will no doubt be played for years to come.
- Beautiful immersive world
- Addictive combat variety
- Great companion characters
- Massively replayable
- Audio issues
- Sharp difficulty curve
- Grind-intensive
Published: Feb 13, 2025 09:00 am