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

[Tyranicon]

But you can't expect me not to laugh when someone with a BALDUR'S GATE profile picture complains about unrealistic combat barks, oh omnipresent authority figure!

But Gargaune has a rooster avatar.

I think the combat barks are really just extra helpings of straw on the camel's back at this point.

 

[Roguey]

Come on, having a couple of comic relief characters can't be enough to invalidate a game. I can't speak for Ragnarok, but the first God of War has a very serious atmosphere all around and doesn't resonate with what we're complaining about here.

It's been four years, so I struggle to remember, but at the time I was saying that it was a game written for late Xoomers/elder Millennials (putting me square in the demographic) and not really young people.

A few Millennial-isms did creep in though.

Roguey: My God of Soy experience so far includes a kid using the word "duh" in a sentence and an overly-long fight against an annoying hipster. What a drag it is going back to awful modern American writing

 

[Gargaune]

But you can't expect me not to laugh when someone with a BALDUR'S GATE profile picture complains about unrealistic combat barks, oh omnipresent authority figure!

But Gargaune has a rooster avatar.

I think the combat barks are really just extra helpings of straw on the camel's back at this point.

I suppose it's overexposure leading to oversensitivity, even the little things end up pushing your buttons. It's kinda like you spend all day suffering your neighbour renovating and making a racket, then you head out and someone sneezes on the street and you're all like "FUCK YOU AND YOUR WHORE MOTHER!!"

 

[S.torch]

I'm just not convinced that this "trend" is as widespread and ruinous as you're claiming. If I'm living in a protected bubble where I miraculously haven't had to touch anything like that in years, I probably won't be able to identify that as a problem until said bubble explodes.

Saying that the whole state of culture where everything is deadly stupid, puerile, sarcastic and idiotic it's a trend would be falling short. A real possibility if you're not noticing this if that you're unconsciously ignoring it as a means of mental self-preservation. Which is something I do myself from time to time.

However, the thing has gotten pretty bad. The bubble you're talking about is already exploding. Massive lay-offs, studios shutting down and even journos getting the boot is a thing currently happening. And we may only be seeing the start of it.

 

[Late Bloomer]

Kotaku doing what they do best.

Obsidian’s Blockbuster Avowed Feels Like The Perfect Combination Of First-Person And Classic RPG
The follow-up to Pillars of Eternity finally shows us its RPG muscles

https://kotaku.com/avowed-preview-obsidian-rpg-pillars-eternity-1851631371

Part of the global infantilization of society

Proof

I think that’s likely the most useful bit of information to take away from all this: I exclaimed like an affronted nine-year-old when I realized how long I have to wait to be able to play any more.

These people never play for combat anyways.

The one thing I didn’t have time to get to grips with properly was combat. I managed fine, although I felt slight shame at how many health potions I was glugging, but clearly performing as the rogue when things get close-up is going to take some practice.

Not from the article, but look at this dialogue.

 

[Old Hans]

Obsidian’s Blockbuster Avowed Feels Like The Perfect Combination Of First-Person And Classic RPG

that def comes off sounding like it was written by an AI

 

[FreeKaner]

You're all acting as if every single character in this godforsaken game will yap like that and I can't understand why. Both PoE games have had a way more serious tone than BG1 and arguably BG2.

First PoE was a Sawyer/Fenstermaker production, then it was a Sawyer/Patel with a noticeable shift towards goofiness. Now it's Patel/Lo. Lo may be a Gen Xer but he's still a clown apparently.

Goofiness wasn't because Patel likes to write goofy, in fact Patel wrote Devil of Caroc which is about as dark as it gets with a bleak resolution whatever you do. It was because Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback, he takes it at face value but also doubles down.

He read the feedback that PoE1 was "too dark" so they went for "lighter" themes in Deadfire, except it's still as "dark" a story it is just presented with goof. Secondly and this is worse, he read the feedback that people couldn't connect to the main storyline and instead of making a more focused and clear story, he instead at the same time put the main story all the way back to the four disconnected checkpoints in the background, while also putting the incessant yapping of god-AI to forefront, when all the "good" god interactions in PoE1 have been the minor intercessions and interventions they did.

As ever, he is decent at making critique, terrible at finding solutions and too autistic to even parse feedback.

 

[Infinitron]

https://www.pcmag.com/news/avowed-hands-on-xboxs-skyrim-inspired-rpg

Hands On With Avowed, Xbox's Skyrim-Inspired RPG​

The action-packed role-playing game comes to Xbox Series X/S and PC on Feb. 18.

Avowed was originally pitched as Obsidian's take on The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and it certainly shows. The magical fantasy vibes are reminiscent of Bethesda’s popular role-playing game, but the real-time combat, humor, and rich game world give it a unique flavor. Avowed is set for PC and Xbox Series X/S release on Feb. 18, 2025, but you can read my early thoughts on the upcoming RPG right now.

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Hard-Hitting Combat, Vibrant Environments​

Avowed is set in the Living Lands, a part of the world of Eora. It's a spin-off of Obsidian’s Pillars of Eternity series, and it primarily uses a first-person perspective (more on that later) instead of the original games' top-down view. In Avowed, you play as an envoy of the Aedyr Empire, and you're tasked with investigating a mysterious plague called the Dreamscourge.

The one-hour Avowed demo kicked things off by asking me to choose a character from three available archetypes: barbarian, mage, and ranger. The barbarian specializes in close combat, while the mage and ranger fight from a distance.

I chose the barbarian, who carried hammer and sword weapons. The melee fighting was surprisingly fluid, and bashing the reptilian enemies with the hammer reminded me of downing enemies with Halo's Gravity Hammer. The weighty weapon also possessed freezing properties that gave it extra utility. After several hits, enemies were immobilized and encrusted with ice, allowing me to score extra blows.

(Credit: Obsidian Entertainment)
I entered an unfamiliar cave with Kai, a blue-skinned humanoid companion who fulfilled the tank role. As a result, it took many enemy hits to drop Kai. He’s one of four companions who can join your quest (though you can only bring two with you into battle at a time). Avowed Production Director Ryan Warden said Obsidian balances each companion so they pull their own weight in battle.

“We've actually got a combat encounter strike team that's going through the entire game right now, region by region, and taking a look at every single encounter to make sure that it's fun, diverse, and readable, and that includes with our various companions,” he explained.

Besides the combat, I was impressed by Avowed's graphics and color variety. Video game caves are often depicted as dark and gloomy, but Avowed’s caves are well-lit, and the worn-down bookshelves littering the area indicate that it was lived in for some time. Colors are vibrant, and crystals scattered throughout the cave give the location a mystical feel.

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(Credit: Obsidian Entertainment)

Funny Encounters and Perspective Options​

I encountered an injured NPC named Caedan deeper in the cave, and the conversation spotlighted Avowed’s dialogue trees. Caedan badly needed a potion, but the situation proved humorous due to his offhand comment about how he didn’t want to die because he hadn't touched a woman. Will that impact the story? That's unknown.

As I headed farther into the cave, I triggered a trap that revealed roughly a dozen skeletons that prevented me from leaving. I couldn’t aimlessly swing my weapon; I had to manage a stamina meter. If I ran out of juice, I couldn’t attack. Plus, whiffing an attack left the barbarian open for a counterattack.

Unfortunately, Avowed's first-person perspective made it difficult to tell when off-screen enemies were about to hit you. Kai offered audio cues, such as yelling, “To your right!” However, they came way too late for me to react to the attack. I longed for God of War-like visual signals.

Art Director Matt Hansen says the game’s user interface is still in development and that combat will incorporate visual cues similar to those in God of War. An optional third-person camera view will also be included as an accessibility feature, he adds.

“A lot of people struggle with motion sickness and can't play games in first-person, so we want to make sure that they still have the opportunity to play the game and enjoy it,” Hansen says.

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Testing the Mage and Ranger​

After finishing the demo with the barbarian, I replayed it two more times to get a feel for the mage and ranger. The mage was the most consistent damage dealer, being able to continuously fire off magic bullets that tracked enemies. However, when attacked, the mage suffered big damage, so I engaged enemies from a safe distance.

The ranger, though, needed manual aim for its shots. Its two pistols were deadly, able to OHKO many smaller enemies, but they needed to be reloaded after every shot. So if you missed, you’d pay the price of being vulnerable to attacks.

It was fun to experiment with the different builds, and I saw the pros and cons of each. Ryan Warden mentioned that Avowed was built to be a “classless” game, meaning that eventually, players will be able to mix and match different skills and weapons. Want to have a sword in one hand and a grimoire book in the other? A spell blade built like that is certainly possible.

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Get Ready for RPG Action Early Next Year​

Matt Hansen emphasized that newcomers won’t feel left out of Avowed if they didn’t play the Pillars of Eternity series. However, there are fun Easter eggs to spot throughout the adventure for people familiar with the game series. Avowed launches on Feb. 18 for PC and Xbox Series X|S.

https://www.newgamenetwork.com/article/2799/avowed-preview-gamescom-2024/

Avowed Preview - Gamescom 2024​

Obsidian take us dungeon crawling in their upcoming action RPG​

Obsidian Entertainment are considered by many to be a top tier studio that delivers great RPG and adventure style games. Their catalog is indeed very impressive, ranging from Fallout: New Vegas and The Outer Worlds, to Alpha Protocol and Pentiment. Their next project, Avowed, is a first person RPG set in the fantasy world of Eora, and we got a chance to see a live demo of the game at Gamescom 2024.

Our demo was hosted by narrative designer on the game Kate Dollarhyde, and driving the demo was a seasoned member of the QA team. The demo was focused on one of the first dungeons within the game, and the story goes that the player character has ventured down here in search of a missing group of explorers. This expedition was looking for a holy relic, but did not return. Upon entering the dungeon, we quickly encounter an Oracle. This golden-skinned character says he is a devoted follower of an ancient god, who also seeks the relic. However, the path to it has been blocked, and he has not seen the expedition pass by. Using typical plentiful dialogue options, we are able to learn more about the ancient god and the Oracle's traditions and motivations. Avowed will include a helpful tooltip system in the dialogue that highlights key words such as names and locations, and through the historical chat log, it's possible to review some basic background on those keywords. The conversation itself had a familiar RPG flow, with back and forth responses; the camera was static, but did change angles a few times for a bit of dynamism.

Having agreed to help recover the relic, we proceeded deeper into the ruins, which were typical fantasy fare, with lush greenery and partially collapsed rock formations, blocked paths and some bodies of water. The art style of Avowed also leans on the slightly cartoony and magic infused. We broke some wooden boards to open new paths, did some basic first person climbing across vines, and found optional chests that contained new gear such as an accessory that provided passive buffs when equipped. We got a quick glimpse at the inventory screens to manage gear, and the attributes screen where points could be assigned to the expected categories like might, dexterity, perception, and so on. There was also the ability system, where points could be spent to increase the effectiveness of our special attack skills.

Proceeding through the dungeon, we had to do a bit of swimming and some environmental navigation to find a path into an old library, where the quest indicator was guiding us. After a brief diversion to solve a puzzle to restore power, we entered the library where some enemy spiders spawned, along with a boss, so the player had to do some focused combat. As a caster in this demo, using various ranged spells was the way to handle things, while AI companion Kai was taking on direct aggro. The boss had a big energy bar as well as a stun meter, depleting this allowed for some extra damage while it was recovering. An enemy caster soon appeared, so he had to be prioritized first as he was casting protection spells on other enemies.

Following this battle, the player ventured further in, again doing some traversal and following a quick sidepath to open doors that are blocked by sigils. This time, the player was faced with some skeleton enemies, that also needed some precision casting to eliminate. With the room clear and relic in hand, the player had a choice on how to proceed - just take the relic and return to town, where someone could know better what to do with it; return to the Oracle; or keep going a bit further. The player decided to keep exploring and it wasn't long before we found a workshop, and the dead members of the expedition within it. We spoke to companion Kai to get his thoughts on the situation, and agreed that we should confront the Oracle on what happened.

We returned to the start of the dungeon and spoke to him. He confessed that the expedition members may be dead, but their souls have apparently been transferred into the statue of the god that resides in this cave. Sadly that didn't seem to be enough to activate the statue, so perhaps the artifact was the missing piece. The Oracle asked us to hand over the hardware, and the player chose to do so. But even with the artifact, the statue was not able to get activated - so the Oracle's next wild plan was to sacrifice another soul directly. The response options included a fight, acceptance, or convincing him to self-sacrifice. Based on our demo audience, it was chosen that the player will accept to become the sacrifice of this ritual. Kai tried a few times to make sure our mind was clear and made up, and we persisted. Unsurprisingly, this resulted in the character's death and a game over screen.

It's clear that Obsidian are working in familiar territory here, as Avowed looks like any other solid modern RPG, with its fantasy setting being well-envisioned, if a bit generic. The combat also didn't look all that engaging, but perhaps to be expected for the genre. The narrative choices are likely to play a key role, and in the demo seemed to be fairly varied. Players looking for their next RPG fix should definitely keep Avowed in mind - it doesn't look like anything groundbreaking, but much like The Outer Worlds, it knows what it does best. Avowed is expected in 2025 for PC and Xbox Series X|S.

 

[Roguey]

Goofiness wasn't because Patel likes to write goofy, in fact Patel wrote Devil of Caroc which is about as dark as it gets with a bleak resolution whatever you do. It was because Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback, he takes it at face value but also doubles down.

Sawyer and Fenstermaker were still the leads on The White March. Patel having more of a voice gave us Deadfire and then Peril on Gorgon.

 

[Fedora Master]

As ever, he is decent at making critique, terrible at finding solutions and too autistic to even parse feedback.

Now I understand why the Codex staff love him so.

 

[H. P. Lovecraft's Cat]

Dark Souls came out in the same year as Skyrim and provided an easy to replicate template for functional fantasy action-RPG combat.

If it's so easy to replicate, why is there only one person who ever succeeded? (Tanimura, Miyazaki's student)
Witcher 3 tried to replicate it, shat the bed, the game's combat is unplayable.

Wat? Witcher 3's combat is nothing like Dark Souls.

 

[Tyranicon]

Journos write boring ass canned articles praising the game

Goddamn, can I short their stock or something?

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

can I short their stock

You're welcome to try, Bryan.

Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback,

It's funny to me that literal dollar tree cashier can create an account here and claim superior intelligence compared to literal artist.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback,

It's funny to me that literal dollar tree cashier can create an account here and claim superior intelligence compared to literal artist.

You work at Dollar Tree?

That explains a lot actually.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

You work at Dollar Tree?

Failing reading comprehension. Classic RPG Cuckdexian move.

 

[mediocrepoet]

You work at Dollar Tree?

Failing reading comprehension. Classic RPG Cuckdexian move.

Yeah, that's what I mean. It explains a ton.

Anyway, this thread is for discussing Avoid, the next slam dunk extravaganza from Obsidian Entertainment, not your inhalant of choice to huff during breaks.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

It explains a ton.

Of your mental retardation. Yes. Plenty of thing abortion could've fix. I'll tell your mother this the next time I visit the whorehouse.

Avowed will likely be a fine game, I'm enjoying retarded take from idiots and inbred, like you, trying to argue the game is somehow bad based on smoke and farts.

 

[scytheavatar]

She sounds fatigued. They're putting her front and center for all these things.

Was Josh Sawyer in the public eye as much during Pillars of Eternity 1, or is Avowed getting more marketing? Roguey

He was everywhere, but he's a guy who loves talking about games. Patel's strengths apparently don't involve marketing so they're in an awkward position here.

Yeah this is something I don't understand, you have producers and community managers who can be the face of the game and interact with the public. While creative who are often if not usually uncomfortable with public appearances can just focus on making them. Why they are forcing Patel to a role she is clearly not comfortable with, I am not sure.

 

[Silverfish]

It's funny to me that literal dollar tree cashier can create an account here and claim superior intelligence compared to literal artist.

It's funnier that he's correct.

 

[PunchYouInTheFace]

It's funnier that he's correct.

"I agree" =/= Opinion Correct.

Come on retard try harder lmao.

 

[Longes]

Seeing Avowed at Gamescom was weird. On one hand, the game looks better than I expected. On the other hand, I had a constant feeling that I'm seeing a draugr dungeon in modded Skyrim. There's just something about the combat and dungeon design that feels very Skyrim-y.

 

[Alienman]

The noble mission to make as many mortal enemies as possible on the Codex continues unabated for PunchYouInTheFace

 

[NaturallyCarnivorousSheep]

Honestly I saw some material from it, and I think my assumption it'll be fantasy outer worlds quality wise isn't far from the truth.
Combat looks functional although I dislike some of their choices - we can see that pistols reload very quickly for instance(2-3 seconds), which I don't really like, especially given their key concept for gameplay are le loadouts you'd think a build which starts from a pistol salvo and then moves to melee(blackjacket fighter in PoE2 can do kinda that) would be something perfectly fitting the game, but they've nullified it.
Also it seems that they've settled on the guns not being matchlock.
Melee looks floaty they've also make skeletons spew blood when hit, wtf.
Magic they've only shown low level so I guess I can understand it's basically farting in someone's face, but yeah nothing amazing.
I think the big problem here may be sound effects, everything sounds very muffled and lacks punch. Probably can fix it by just remixing the effects but will it be done?

Other than that it's hard to tell from a single quest how the game will look like(remember the quest CP2077 showed in their demo? That was the single most branched out and varied quest in the game), but it seems that, given their insistence on "there are many routes to get to your target" kind of spiel I think it seems again that at least it'll have some replayability. Wonder if another thing they insist on, "verticality" of the level design will feel good, because that, and the quality of the unique weapons they promise will be the only things I believe can put it above TOW(as in make it anything other than filler game).

Sawyer needs to make PoE3. Fact.

 

[Infinitron]

Goofiness wasn't because Patel likes to write goofy, in fact Patel wrote Devil of Caroc which is about as dark as it gets with a bleak resolution whatever you do. It was because Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback, he takes it at face value but also doubles down.

Sawyer and Fenstermaker were still the leads on The White March. Patel having more of a voice gave us Deadfire and then Peril on Gorgon.

Fwiw, Peril on Gorgon isn't sillier than base TOW and is bleak at times.

 

[Fedora Master]

Goofiness wasn't because Patel likes to write goofy, in fact Patel wrote Devil of Caroc which is about as dark as it gets with a bleak resolution whatever you do. It was because Sawyer can't read and doesn't understand feedback, he takes it at face value but also doubles down.

Sawyer and Fenstermaker were still the leads on The White March. Patel having more of a voice gave us Deadfire and then Peril on Gorgon.

Fwiw, Peril of Gorgon isn't sillier than base TOW and is bleak at times.

How would you know? You don't play RPGs.