Eternity Avowed - Obsidian's first person action-RPG in the Pillars of Eternity setting - coming February 18th

[NaturallyCarnivorousSheep]

It is fallout 3 melee dude.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Avowed's companions won't ditch you for making the 'wrong' choices: 'It's not about maintaining their approval, it's about getting to know them'​

Avowed, the upcoming first-person RPG from Obsidian, mixes and matches a few RPG standards in its approach to companion characters and their stories. Before we get into details, some basics—in an interview with game director Carrie Patel and gameplay director Gabe Paramo this week, we learned the following about Avowed's companions and party management:

• We'll meet multiple companion characters throughout Avowed (Obsidian isn't revealing how many there are yet), and they'll hang out at a "party camp"
• Two companions can come with you on adventures at a time
• There are "a few cases" where you must include a particular companion in your party because their knowledge or expertise is relevant to the situation, otherwise it's up to you
• It sounds like you can issue some basic orders to companions, but you won't "micromanage" your party in combat
• There's no "approval system," but conversations may influence our companions' decisions and stories

Avowed takes place in the same world as the Pillars of Eternity CRPGs, but its approach to companions and party management is much more like that of a Mass Effect game, or Obsidian's own Fallout: New Vegas. We might rely on their help in combat, but we won't be giving them granular instructions or controlling them directly.

"They have moment-to-moment gameplay combat abilities," Paramo told us. "They also have, outside of combat, more environmental interaction abilities. And so you can kind of order them to do those abilities both in combat and out of combat."

"We don't want players feeling like they have to micromanage a party," said Patel. "So, you know, certainly their abilities are there and they're very useful. But you're not going to be pulling up pause and feeling like you have to move them around every 30 seconds."

Storywise, companions will each have a "personal arc," said Patel, and they'll all be involved in each playthrough—it's not like Baldur's Gate 3 where you can walk by a hand sticking out of a portal, shrug it off, and leave Gale to his fate.

"You could recruit some of them a little bit earlier or a little bit later, but they all will join your party by certain known points in the game," said Patel, "which allows us to weave them a bit more intricately into events, conversations and all of the action that's happening."

We didn't want players feeling like they had to choose the 'right' options in order to maintain their companions.
Carrie Patel, Avowed game director
As has been so popular in Baldur's Gate 3 recently, the party camp will be a place for "heart to heart" conversations. Don't expect romance, though—it didn't come up in our interview, but it's not really Obsidian's thing—and there won't be an "approval system" that makes companions like the player-character more or less.

"You definitely have quest-based interactions with [companions], and they each have their own personal arc," said Patel. "As with all of our games, talking to them through [that arc] and influencing them down a particular course or another can shape what their story is, and maybe how they see some of their personal challenges. We didn't go with a strict approval system. We didn't want players feeling like they had to choose the 'right' options in order to maintain their companions. So it's not about maintaining their approval, it's about getting to know them, building relationships with them, and you know, finding points of commonality and strength where they're learning things from you as the player character, and you're getting a little bit of their perspective on the world."

From our interview, we also learned more about Avowed's combat, which may take after Vermintide, and its "classless" leveling system. Xbox has also posted a breakdown of the recent Avowed gameplay trailer with commentary from Patel and Paramo.

We don't have a firm Avowed release date yet, but it's scheduled to release this fall.

https://www.pcgamer.com/avoweds-com...heir-approval-its-about-getting-to-know-them/

So much fucking stupidity

 

[Justinian]

I hope the game is playable without any companions. Companions means we won't even get Deus Ex type level design, it'll just be a first person MMO.

But if we do I'm glad I don't have to deal with them getting butthurt and leaving. I honestly don't care about the story, I just hope they clean up the combat (it looks pretty awful). The environments look nice at least, Pillars aesthetic was underrated and for all their faults Obsidian did manage to create a unique mood for their setting, arguably the best since Morrowind.

Having said that, there are basically 0 1st person fantasy RPGs being made (other than real time blobber abominations like Grimrock) so I'll probably end up buying it at full price.

 

[Reinhardt]

I hope

 

[Readher]

I hope the game is playable without any companions.

You are literally forced to get all companions sooner or later in order to progress the story. Don't count on it.

You could recruit some of them a little bit earlier or a little bit later, but they all will join your party by certain known points in the game," said Patel, "which allows us to weave them a bit more intricately into events, conversations and all of the action that's happening.

 

[Justinian]

I hope the game is playable without any companions.

You are literally forced to get all companions sooner or later in order to progress the story. Don't count on it.

You could recruit some of them a little bit earlier or a little bit later, but they all will join your party by certain known points in the game," said Patel, "which allows us to weave them a bit more intricately into events, conversations and all of the action that's happening.

That's fine, as long as I don't actually have to bring them with me. A few companion quests/mandatory quests I can put up with, but if the game is designed around being played with them I will be very disappointed.

Actually, I'll probably be disappointed even if it isn't, but I'm still holding out hope that this will at least be a decent game.

 

[Roguey]

That's fine, as long as I don't actually have to bring them with me. A few companion quests/mandatory quests I can put up with, but if the game is designed around being played with them I will be very disappointed.

Actually, I'll probably be disappointed even if it isn't, but I'm still holding out hope that this will at least be a decent game.

Companions are mandatory, they're an integral part of the story.

In most of our games companions have been optional, which I think offers a wonderful degree of choice to players, but it means there's a limit to how deeply you can tie them into the core story. With Avowed we decided companions are going to be core. They're going to be part of the experience.

 

[Justinian]

mods will fix it

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.pcgamer.com/obsidians-next-rpg-avowed-wont-have-the-option-to-do-a-pure-pacifist-run/

Obsidian's next RPG Avowed won't have the option to do 'a pure pacifist run'​

Avowed has a 'focus on combat'.

Discovering just how many pacifist choices you could make in the original Fallout was a delight, because not only were you allowed to talk or sneak your way out of problems, but the game recognized you were doing that and rewarded you for it. Subsequent RPGs and immersive sims sprinkled peaceful options in, but an entirely pacifist playthrough often ends up being a masochistic challenge that feels more like you're breaking the game than playing it. Just have a look how much of a hassle it is beating The Outer Worlds as a pacifist.

Given that Avowed is drawing inspiration from Vermintide's best-in-class first-person combat, it's no surprise that Obsidian's upcoming RPG won't let you go 100% nonviolent. Speaking to PC Gamer this week, game director Carrie Patel said, "This isn't a game where you're gonna have a pure pacifist run."

That doesn't mean spilling blood will be the only way to clear your questlog, however. You'll still be able to talk your way out of some problems, like you could in Pillars of Eternity. "Players can expect to see solutions and opportunities to use dialogue, maybe take advantage of reactivity with regards to characters they might have helped or met earlier in," Patel went on, mentioning there will be "some stealth solutions," but players should expect a "focus on combat."

During development of The Outer Worlds, Obsidian experimented with adding a knockout gun to help facilitate less murdery playstyles, but ended up scrapping it because, as Tim Cain said in NoClip's documentary, "it was causing a lot of confusion." Players weren't sure how long enemies would stay unconscious for, and what does it mean to knock out a robot anyway? Plus, when bounties task you with collecting people's fingers, should you be able to knock them out and take them?

Though Avowed won't let you go full Gandhi, it sounds like giving you freedom in how it lets you explore and approach problems is one of Obsidian's aims. "We're not planning on one specific linear path that players are going to take through that world," Patel said. "So we're trying to account for the various places they could be, and the various points of interest they might find and what they might see from there."

We also found out that Avowed's companions won't ditch you for making the wrong choices, and that Avowed is embracing Skyrim-like ability trees rather than classes. As announced during the recent Xbox Developer Direct show, it'll be out this fall.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Enjoy a visual novel in Eora from a first-person perspective in this innovative walking sim by Obsidian. Get different ending slides based on your dialogue menus choices.

 

[SpaceWizardz]

Avowed's companions won't ditch you for making the 'wrong' choices: 'It's not about maintaining their approval, it's about getting to know them'​

Choices & No Consequences.

It's like Obsidian doesn't even wanna make CRPGs anymore.

Not necessarily a bad idea, having something like PST/KOTOR 2 in mind.
That's not what we're getting with Avowed though. Going back to Tyranny Obsidian has written their companions like a sitcom cast, the writers are just disinterested in humoring the idea that people won't find these characters and their antics endearing.

 

[Gargaune]

Companions are mandatory, they're an integral part of the story.

"Wake the fuck up, postenago..."

 

[The Wall]

This game will be Forspoken 2. Fuck Obsidian, fuck Micro$oft, fuck WOKE. To Death

 

[Rhobar121]

This game will be Forspoken 2. Fuck Obsidian, fuck Micro$oft, fuck WOKE. To Death

The Outer Worlds came out before m$ so the whole woke is 100% Obsidian.

 

[Ryzer]

This game will be Forspoken 2. Fuck Obsidian, fuck Micro$oft, fuck WOKE. To Death

The Outer Worlds came out before m$ so the whole woke is 100% Obsidian.

He said "fuck Obsidian" first.

 

[frajaq]

I'm pleasantly surprised there are gonna be more than 2 companions, this game was looking so low-effort that I was prepared for only the black foid and blue aumaua

 

[Tyranicon]

I don't think Obsidian learned anything from Deadfire.

Just like POE ruined Deadfire's chances for success, The Outer Worlds is going to ruin Avowed financially.

Nobody is blinded by "critics" and "journos" trying their hardest to shill for TOW, which was below mid slop in basically every way imaginable. We know what to expect in a first person open world from Obsidian now.

The days of F:NV are long over.

 

[Justinian]

I don't think Obsidian learned anything from Deadfire.

Just like POE ruined Deadfire's chances for success, The Outer Worlds is going to ruin Avowed financially.

Nobody is blinded by "critics" and "journos" trying their hardest to shill for TOW, which was below mid slop in basically every way imaginable. We know what to expect in a first person open world from Obsidian now.

The days of F:NV are long over.

How is ToW gonna ruin Avowed financially? It was a big commercial success.

 

[Alienman]

"I noticed that you killed that sweet old grandma in cold blood, so I like you *20 points* less now, but I will remain at your side despite your psychopathic tendencies."

 

[processdaemon]

"I noticed that you killed that sweet old grandma in cold blood, so I like you *20 points* less now, but I will remain at your side despite your psychopathic tendencies."

Apparently they don't even have an approval system, just the ability to influence a companion's personal quest arc, so if you do something that makes them mad during the main quest you'll probably just get a telling off in the immediate aftermath and then your goldfish brained companions will be distracted by something shiny and never speak of it again

 

[Tyranicon]

I don't think Obsidian learned anything from Deadfire.

Just like POE ruined Deadfire's chances for success, The Outer Worlds is going to ruin Avowed financially.

Nobody is blinded by "critics" and "journos" trying their hardest to shill for TOW, which was below mid slop in basically every way imaginable. We know what to expect in a first person open world from Obsidian now.

The days of F:NV are long over.

How is ToW gonna ruin Avowed financially? It was a big commercial success.

POE sold really well but Deadfire was... well, dead on arrival. A lot of people think this was because people bought POE based on the studio's reputation and big promises, but ultimately didn't like it.

Obsidian already over-leveraged their reputation as Fallout New Vegas makers to sell TOW. Now they're following that up with another first person RPG.

History is going to repeat itself.

 

[Atlantico]

Companions are mandatory, they're an integral part of the story.

Now you'll be forced to help the shy dike get groomed by the nigger hag.

Progress!

 

[luj1]

PoE2 is surprisingly good.

They shouldn't have made the first game a snoozefest. I'm not playing a direct sequel to a game I didn't finish...

This is exactly it.

 

[luj1]

I don't think Obsidian learned anything from Deadfire.

No shit sherlock.

I knew they were done even before Dumpsterfire, when I saw them ignoring huge red flags from Pillars 1 and shameful oversights in core systems.

Instead they focused on eye candy, cape physics and banal shite. Every development update was about exploding barrels or talking parrots. Soyer believed that that will sell the game and was coquetting like a prostitute on twitter.

 

[luj1]

It's extremely hard to argue that Obsidian is a master of the isometric genre on the level of Larian or Owlcat.

They all have their problems, but I will agree that Obsidian is the worst and most talentless.

Owlcat thinks that bloating the game systems is innovation.
Larian makes games which are mechanically sound, but they wear a teletubby suit.
Obsidian cannot design even remotely fun systems or write a compelling world/story.