A colourful fantasy world. Satisfying combat, and beautifully Narrated Story.
This… Is Avowed.
If there’s one thing you can say about Avowed it’s that it’s not just a brown palette game. This
is a gorgeously colourful RPG. Obsidian’s pedigree when it comes to RPGs speaks for itself,
if you’re a fan of the genre then there’s good money on you having not only played one of
their games but it being somewhere up in your lists. From Star Wars to South Park they’ve
tried a bit of everything. Shout out to Alpha Protocol.
There’s a lot to talk about with Avowed, so let’s cut the pre-amble short and jump right in to
this. Obsidian Entertainment have 2 RPGs on the slate for this year, The Outer Worlds 2,
and Avowed. The later set in the Pillars of Eternity universe and taking place shortly after the
events of Pillars of Eternity 2. Don’t worry, this is a stand-alone affair. Pillars of Eternity fans
are rewarded with some lore snacks and more of the world to enjoy, but having played them
is not a requirement for Avowed. My experience with Pillars of Eternity is the board game,
and I survived Avowed without feeling like I was missing out on anything at any point.
Newcomers, you’ll be just fine.
You’ll start by customizing your character, choosing their appearance, setting their stats and
picking a background. There are no wrong options here, but the background is going to give
you some flavour options during speech sections of the game based on which one you
choose. For the Noble Scion these added a nice little bit of flair but honestly I found myself
picking other options more often than I thought I would. Your stats play the same role, each
one giving you specific bonuses while also unlocking speech options throughout the game.
You even have the option of hiding unavailable speech options to you.
There’s some nice touches in the character creator, picking whether or not your godlike
appearance shows and whether your pronouns are shown in the character sheet are
pleasant additions. So too are the information options available. You can reduce the UI to
nothing, giving you a world of hidden discoveries that are yours to try and uncover. Or if you
want an easier time through this, you can leave on glows, highlights and compass icons
giving you all the feedback you need.
And discover you can. Avowed manages to capture that discovery aspect in the right ways.
This isn’t Skyrim, no big flowing open world to play around in. We’re instead given a few
different biomes we travel through one at a time. Wrap up the main story in one, and on to
the next. You’re free to travel back and forth as needed but the next area will be locked off
for you until hitting a story beat that opens the gates for you. If you want to just mainline the
story you’ll clear the game in maybe 15 hours, spending time exploring each zone and
helping the locals with send that closer to 40 hours. For a comparison, here’s a zone where I
took my time, explored and did side quests Vs. A zone where I just hit the main story to see
the difference.
There’s a lot to discover in each of the Living Lands zones on display, and it’s actually worth
getting lost and exploring. Climb up the side of a building, you might find a unique weapon or
some crafting materials. It feels rewarding, rather than a chore. Curiosity and wonder about
this strange magical land you’re in makes sense, but truth be told it’s refreshing to want to
explore, rather than staring at all of the chest markers around Skellige and counting down
how many are left until you’re free.
I frequently found myself getting side tracked while trying to focus. I’d be intent on saving the
living lands and getting to the bottom of this Dreamscourge issue, and then jangling keys
would have me climbing the side of a windmill, or spotting a ruin off in the distance in the
wrong direction that I needed to go check… Just to be sure you know. Can’t be too careful
with those old ruins, no idea what people might leave behind.
Exploration is also the best way to prepare yourself for the dangers you’ll encounter in the
Living Lands. Enemies work on a Tier system the same as your weapons and armour. The
world isn’t scaling with you, so occasionally you might end up walking in to the wrong
neighbourhood. If enemies belong to a tier above you, they’ll do bonus damage. If your
weapons are a tier below the enemy, you’ll do reduced damage. It’s nice to see some danger
added to the world by not having it scale with the player. I love that moment of oops I
shouldn’t be here yet while climbing around, and Avowed was more than happy to humble
me occasionally for getting too confident. The system isn’t overly punishing with how it
handles the Tiers either. You’ll start to see the pattern emerge as you progress through the
areas. New Area? New Tier. It’s nice to see thought being put in to being able to upgrade
and downgrade the crafting materials. It prevents the need for going back to the earlier
zones just to find materials to upgrade the shiny new pistol you found.
There’s impressive restraint on show as well. It would be incredibly easy when making an
RPG like this to just let it balloon up. Creating giant areas with not much going on that are
just there to make the headlines regarding playtime higher. Someone has to buff up those
How Long To Beat times. Yes you’re going to see a fairly big difference between length when
you’re mainlining the story vs if you stop to smell the roses, but it never feels tiresome. And
that feels like the approach to everything going on. It’s refreshing to see and gives one of
those, well duh kind of responses when you’re explaining it to someone. Competency in the
RPG genre from a studio known for their RPG prowess? Who could have foreseen this
unexpected turn of events.
Svelt. Can we fit that word in to the review? Look at that I just did. Every system on display,
every idea feels managed and purposeful. There are 4 companions joining you, not an army.
There’s crafting and loot management, but you won’t need wikis to understand it. There’s 3
basic skill trees. Fighter, Ranger, Wizard. And yet, it never feels boring. Sure I found myself
occasionally holding on to skill points until I was a higher level as there weren’t any options
that appealed to me. That’s not the games fault though. I just was having too much fun with
the pistols to end up feeling the need to put many points in the Fighter tree.
Kudos to whomever it was at Obsidian that during the pitch meetings suggested “you know
what, fantasy guns are cool?” There’s a solid selection of weapon styles in Avowed, and I
dabbled with all of them, but nothing could pull me away from running either dual pistols or
pistol and spear. And I’m normally a melee person. I like a big choppa to chop. Not this time
though, the fun you can have in combat weapon swapping, throwing out debuffs and ranged
power attacks. I don’t need any fancy words to describe this. It’s fun. It’s enjoyable, it doesn’t
feel frustrating, and it’s downright fun.
You know what else is fun? Roaming around with a companion voiced by Brandon Keener.
Exploring the Living Lands and fighting the good fight with a character that sounds exactly
like Garrus from Mass Effect? That hits right. No notes on that one, perfect choice.
Unlike the story though, where it feels like there is no perfect choice to be made. Avowed
gives you choices throughout the game, some being more clearcut than others as to which
side is evil, and some end up with the, well this feels like all options suck route. Some
choices also being harder than others to achieve gives a lot of potential for replayability. I
don’t want to give any spoilers on this section, but for a story that would have worked as just
a linear idea, I’m intrigued to poke around under the hood on follow up playthroughs and see
just what outcomes I can change, as there are some big choices you can end up making.
There’s not a lot of flaws that I can find with Avowed, the polish and consideration applied to
the game really do make it shine. If you’re going to bounce off of this one, it’s either going to
be due to the hefty price tag with it being a £60 ($80?) game, or maybe you lean more
towards the JRPG end of this genre. Companions and Story are well written, combat
remains enjoyable throughout. A solid host of items and discoveries to be found. All nestled
in beautiful environments, with a great backing soundtrack.
Avowed carries a hefty price tag of £60 or $80. Our playthrough ended up clocking in at just
under 40 hours. During which time we unlocked 17 out of the 50 achievements. Most of
which are for completing all of something. All side quests, All Camps etc. It should be noted
that there is an achievement tied to playing on Path of the Damned difficulty as well, but
you’re going to need multiple playthroughs for the story achievements anyway. The game is
available on Gamepass as well, and there is a premium version that on top of the other stuff
also gives you 5 days “early access”. Don’t do that, just wait 5 days, you’re strong. I believe
in you.
Avowed captures the mystery of a fantasy land. Fills it with friends and foes alike, and asks
you to decide their fate. A refreshingly enjoyable RPG that shows the strength of the genre
and reminds us that sometimes restraint is a good thing. Avowed showcases Obsidians
strengths while spinning another story in the Pillars of Eternity universe. That wheel just
keeps on turning.
