Eternity Avowed - Obsidian's first person action-RPG in the Pillars of Eternity setting

[luj1]

According to you Tomb Raider or NOLF are Pozz.

Correct. Interview from 1998 https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/interview-with-toby-gard

You're on record as saying you're not really happy with some of the sleazier aspects of the Tomb Raider marketing machine. Do you take the relative failure of other copy-cat "cybertarts", such as Niki from Pandemonium or Red Lotus from Deathtrap Dungeon, to mean that OTT computer babes are not an automatic draw. What was it about Lara that worked so well and does this mean there'll be no semi-naked women in Galleon?

It was never the intention to create some kind of 'page 3' girl to star in Tomb Raider. The idea was to create a female character who was a heroine, you know, cool, collected, in control, that sort of thing. The problem with those other games is that the female characters are actually there for purely exploitative purposes. I know you could argue that Lara with her comic book style over-the top figure is exploitative, but I don't agree. I think it's ridiculous to say that portraying stylised people is degrading. You can represent an over the top hero figure by augmenting characteristics like a jutting jaw, wide shoulders, thin waist etc. and that is not degrading to men. It may well be a stereotype, but it seems to me that people are overanalysing this whole thing. It's pretty simple, if women in a game are only there to be the equivalent of quiz show floozies then they are being portrayed in a sexist way.

That quote says nothing relevant. Rofl.

Lara is stereotypical and exaggerated, but that isn't woke. What Avowed is doing (e.g. queers everywhere, etc.) is woke. I know you are trying to show how "it was always there" (as a way to amnesty Avowed) but it really wasn't.

 

[Lhynn]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Its both really.
Or can be both, depending on how its handled.

Girls Frontline is a franchise in which you play a military tactician that handles squads of "dolls", androids with female personality and appearance. You, as the commander, can be a liability on the field, since you are just some dude. But your decisions are followed unquestionably and you are rarely ever wrong. Even when under emotional stress and shown to be making rash decisions, they are good, well thought out decisions, and the game makes it a point to show you that. Every single one of your soldiers has the utmost respect for the commander.

The writing in the series is fairly good too, when you ignore the anime girl nonsense you will find that whomever the writer is, he understands warfare.
There arent many examples of this trope though, usually when you have strong females, you have emasculated men.

 

[Renfri]

I was curious and took gamepass trial for this and few other games. And after finishing Awoved, I have few thoughts:

Game was better than I expected. Definitely better than the Outer Worlds which I found rather lackluster. Combat was alright, dungeons were often well made, but I didn't like how every corner was filled with chests and other loot, it felt like loot piñata. Items were mostly very boring though. Fire fucker monsters who kept pushing you around and tripping were annoying as fuck. Also too many small shitty mobs.

Companions were mostly meh, only one who wasn't completely pussy turned out to be faggot, great job Obsidian. At first story wasn't interesting or first few areas, but I think things improved when game kept going. The last area was the best, strangely enough. Also I am happy I could end up joining up with the so called baddies, because I was worried game wouldn't let me.

 

[sosmoflux]

Notice how everyone who actually plays Avowed comes away liking it? I keep telling you guys it's actually (trigger warning) decent.

 

[frajaq]

Ok, they actually put a lot of good recipe in that Survivalist ability in the Ranger section, specially for people that like PASSING ATTRIBUTE CHECKS!!! like me

 

[jaekl]

That's because only retards play avowed

 

[Skinwalker]

Girls Frontline

Ah, sublime trolling. Hats off to you, pedro.

 

[Lhynn]

Girls Frontline

Ah, sublime trolling. Hats off to you, pedro.

You asked, faggot.

 

[Beastro]

Timelapse of an Avowed player:

 

[v1c70r14]

 

[frajaq]

sometimes... there's just too much shit on the screen

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

I know you are trying to show how "it was always there" (as a way to amnesty Avowed) but it really wasn't.

Ignore the subversives. They've lost the battle.

 

[Mauman]

To be completely fair, the setting had established that the coastal folk (blacks) were the majority compared to meadow folk (whites) as far back as PoE1.

PoE1 just took place in the fantasy equivalent of America so it wasn't that noticeable. It was a bit more noticeable in PoE2 considering the black Italians (Pallegina's people) were major players.

Still a bit cringe however.

 

[Raghar]

They did try to make a multiplayer RPG and ended up having to pivot to single player...........

When given the choice between Destiny or Skyrim, Parker chose Skryim.

They also had Grounded which was a huge success. 20 million players, the full release was September 2022 and it was still receiving content updates through last year. ROI-maxing would just be focusing on and monetizing Grounded-type games.

Now ask yourself how long it will take Microsoft executives to realize that Obsidian is incompetent at developing CRPGs but apparently can successfully create multiplayer online survival games such as Grounded.

Grounded was a pet project of about 20 people. It had decent art direction, and they spend effort to try simulate REAL insect behavior. If the rest of the Obsidian team spend as much effort with Avowed, it would run circles around Skyrim.

 

[Elttharion]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Hyppolita and her Amazons

Atalanta

Boudica

Ishtar

The Valkyries

Etc

 

[Mauman]

The Valkyries

I could note some discrepancies with a few of these (such as Boudica), but this one in particular is a bad example. Their job was to guide dead warriors to the afterlife. They were glorified maids, not warriors.

Context

 

[Elttharion]

The Valkyries

I could note a some discrepancies with a few of these (such as Boudica), but this one in particular is a bad example. Their job was to guide dead warriors to the afterlife. They were glorified maids, not warriors.

Context

Not in all of the Eddas

Helmeted valkyries came down from the sky
—the noise of spears grew loud—they protected the prince;
then said Sigrun—the wound-giving valkyries flew,
the troll-woman's mount was feasting on the fodder of ravens

Then light shone from Logafell,
and from that radiance there came bolts of lightning;
wearing helmets at Himingvani [came the valkyries].
Their byrnies were drenched in blood;
and rays shone from their spears

There was a queen who resided over the sea,
Whose like no one knew of anywhere.
She was exceedingly beautiful and great in physical strength.
She shot the shaft with bold knights – love was the prize

 

[Skinwalker]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Hyppolita and her Amazons

Atalanta

Boudica

Ishtar

The Valkyries

Etc

I think out of these only the amazons are warriors on par with men. And Artemis is a huntress. Valkyries are psychopompes rather than warriors. And none of these are "the norm", but rather exceedingly rare exceptions from the norm.

Even among the goddesses, the ones who engage in traditionally male activities are very rare. Most of them do womanly things. Hera is the queen of the gods, but spends most of her time getting cucked by Zeus and then impotently fuming at her husband and scheming again his bastard offspring. Aphrodite gets heavily wounded by Ares for roaming the battlefield during the battle for Troy, and when she complains about this to Zeus, he tells her to know her place and stay out of war. Athena is portrayed with warrior gear but doesn't actually do any fighting in any myths that I can remember. And what fighting does Ishtar do?

 

[Alex]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Its both really.
Or can be both, depending on how its handled.

Girls Frontline is a franchise in which you play a military tactician that handles squads of "dolls", androids with female personality and appearance. You, as the commander, can be a liability on the field, since you are just some dude. But your decisions are followed unquestionably and you are rarely ever wrong. Even when under emotional stress and shown to be making rash decisions, they are good, well thought out decisions, and the game makes it a point to show you that. Every single one of your soldiers has the utmost respect for the commander.

The writing in the series is fairly good too, when you ignore the anime girl nonsense you will find that whomever the writer is, he understands warfare.
There arent many examples of this trope though, usually when you have strong females, you have emasculated men.

Not necessarily. I suppose the thing is, many people want there to be some form of romance in the battlefield. The point is not to promote man over women, but to somehow mix up battlefield camaraderie with romance. The japanese do it a lot, but this is present in western modern fantasy too. Even Conan had that pirate queen. But the problem here is that even that view, while not outright emasculating, is promoting a view of the sexes not based on reality. The problem is not even so much that a woman can't fight. That capacity depends on many details of the setting (for instance, in the real world some women have turned into proficient snipers and shooters, so access to guns can at least reduce the issue). The problem is that they shouldn't fight. Losing track that it is part of masculinity's self sacrifice to fight for our mothers, wives, sisters and daughters can stunt a man's growth in responsibility and in virtue.

All this said, I am not saying everyone should just turn their backs to any media with the slightest amount of liberalism. Just that you should keep a sober mind when using the said media to avoid being influenced.

 

[BrainMuncher]

 

[Elttharion]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Hyppolita and her Amazons

Atalanta

Boudica

Ishtar

The Valkyries

Etc

I think out of these only the amazons are warriors on par with men. And Artemis is a huntress. Valkyries are psychopompes rather than warriors. And none of these are "the norm", but rather exceedingly rare exceptions from the norm.

Even among the goddesses, the ones who engage in traditionally male activities are very rare. Most of them do womanly things. Hera is the queen of the gods, but spends most of her time getting cucked by Zeus and then impotently fuming at her husband and scheming again his bastard offspring. Aphrodite gets heavily wounded by Ares for roaming the battlefield during the battle for Troy, and when she complains about this to Zeus, he tells her to know her place and stay out of war. Athena is portrayed with warrior gear but doesn't actually do any fighting in any myths that I can remember. And what fighting does Ishtar do?

Ishtar

Ishtar was known for being extremely ambitious; in another myth she storms the heavens and stages a divine coup.

Many of her myths involve her taking over the domains of other deities

She is also believed to have taken over the Eanna temple from An, the god of the sky

he destroyed Mount Ebih for having challenged her authority, unleashed her fury upon the gardener Shukaletuda after he raped her in her sleep, and tracked down the bandit woman Bilulu and killed her in divine retribution for having murdered Dumuzid.

Unlike other gods, whose roles were static and whose domains were limited, the stories of Inanna (Ishtar) describe her as moving from conquest to conquest

I also only chose the female warrior portrayed in what we could consider 'sexy outfits'. There are several asian cultures that depict female warriors but since they arent half naked I didnt include them.

Edit: I am not saying that female warriors were the norm but rather that in ancient times the rare few were always depicted as incredibly beautiful. Its a very modern thing to masculinize female heroes.

 

[Inec0rn]

How can Obsidian spend 6 years making a game and be satisfied with those sales numbers?

I'm surprised with MHW numbers, game is poorly optimized and yet managed to reach those numbers. No wonder devs don't optimize shit anymore, look at those numbers.

Monster Hunter Wilds is China slop and I imagine Obsidian is quite happy to not have either of those games' user scores.

the cope on this dude LMAO!!

 

[Harthwain]

Female action heroine is pure feminist propaganda.

More like a fantasy. Hot females in sexy outfits were a norm long before feminism became a thing.

Name a few.

Hyppolita and her Amazons [...] Atalanta [...] Boudica [...] Ishtar [...] The Valkyries

Etc

And that's mentioning the actual myths/legends, not even the LITERAL fantasy stuff:

Spoiler

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

The vast majority of female character design in vidya should be done in the interest of eye candy.

 

[Beastro]

sometimes... there's just too much shit on the screen

The issue to me is they're trying to evoke underwater flora, but if so, they need to go all in on it.

It's trying to be alien, but it isn't alien enough, hence that feeling of too much on screen.