Before we get into Avowed – a video game certain well-known Americans should play – do you remember how, in the 2010s, seemingly every gaming critic praised the then-young studio Obsidian Entertainment for what they achieved with Fallout: New Vegas? They brought back all the beloved elements of the first two Fallout games within Bethesda’s refreshed open-world, post-apocalyptic 3D universe, including the originals’ signature cunning and edgy dialogue. Only Count Godefroy de Montmirail could have failed to predict the team’s bright future.
Founded in 2003 by veterans of the late Black Isle Studios—famous for developing the original Fallout and Icewind Dale games and publishing the first two Baldur’s Gate installments—this studio has long been seen as a bold team of promising RPG makers for the entirety of its existence. Meanwhile, BioWare, the creator of Baldur’s Gate, Mass Effect, and Dragon Age series, is regarded as the true king of the genre. In reality, this point of view has long been misguided.
While BioWare has been in deep crisis over the past decade following the flops of Mass Effect: Andromeda and Anthem, Obsidian Entertainment has gradually taken its place. After the success with Fallout: New Vegas in 2010, the studio made two solid RPGs from the animated sitcom South Park, launched the spiritual successor to the Fallout franchise, The Outer Worlds, had fun with the medieval manuscripts-inspired 2D RPG Pentiment, and revived mass interest in isometric role-playing games with the Kickstarter-backed Pillars of Eternity duology.
Despite a long track record of successful AAA projects, it took Obsidian two decades to tackle its first true major-league open-world fantasy RPG. Avowed became the quintessential embodiment of all their ideas—drawing from their early days at Black Isle Studios to their experiments within the RPG genre over the past two decades—and its story ties directly to the Pillars of Eternity series. While not a direct sequel, it is set in the same universe and builds upon familiar lore.
Avowed‘s World
As an envoy of the Aedyr Empire, you are seconded to the outskirts of the world—the wild and dangerous island known as the Living Lands. A representative of the most powerful and influential faction in the Pillars of Eternity universe, you are tasked with stopping the spread of Dreamscourge. This fungal-based plague converts living beings and the land into something like The Last of Us’ infected. Beyond this comparison, the overall plot also strongly echoes Spiders’ GreedFall.
Yet, this deadly disease is only part of the problem because you are not a common human, elf, dwarf, aumaua, or orlan—you are godlike, an offspring of a mysterious deity you seek to trace. That’s not the only complication, as all godlikes in the world of Pillars of Eternity have, well, unusual appearances, provoking a range of unpredictable reactions from those who see them. This can be tricky, considering that a third of your adventure revolves around countless conversations.
However, after moving past the prologue and stepping into the open world of the Living Lands, you’ll quickly forget about any tasks and storylines and become fascinated with the grand world before you. Instead of a traditional, sizeable, seamless map like Skyrim, game director Carrie Patel opted for so-called “open zones”, separate yet expansive regions. Each represents a distinct ecosystem packed with secrets, intriguing locations, and micro-events, making it almost impossible to resist exploring them.
Having thrown you into this sprawling, fairy-tale-like world that is at times reminiscent of Hogwarts Legacy, Avowed doesn’t lead you by the hand. You must figure out where to go and what to say. Except for quest markers on the map, completely unknown territories lie somewhere out there, veiled in a fog of mystery—waiting for you to roam like a rolling stone. You can easily miss a crucial, story-changing segment simply by overlooking a hidden cave. Likewise, it’s easy to pass by interesting NPCs or side quests if you’re too lazy to check out this tower or that canyon.
What’s even more crucial is that the same approach applies to dialogues. Unlike most modern RPGs, Avowed doesn’t highlight good or bad answers nor indicate whether your companions appreciate your behavior—much like in good old genre icons such as Gothic, where a single hasty remark could get you killed without question. So, the only way to achieve the desired outcome in Obsidian’s game is to carefully listen to your interlocutors and read through every conversation attentively… or reload saves after every wrong phrase.
For example, being a smart talker in the side quest, Dawntreader can lead to vastly different outcomes. You’ll either step into a boss fight with the oracle Sargamis, agree to sacrifice yourself, or persuade him to annihilate himself… in a rather cringe-worthy way. There are so many subtle choices buried deep within every dialogue in Avowed that it’s easy to overlook entire branches of them – or even ruin a character’s life, whether by having them imprisoned or left to starve to death – with a single careless phrase.
Because of a not-so-spectacular plot presentation and the sheer amount of lore, which is primarily conveyed through the in-game glossary, it’s difficult to empathize with the characters—but only until you start paying attention to their words. Their struggles aren’t laid out in spectacular cutscenes—you have to listen to what they say about their hardships and feelings. Sometimes, you might accidentally encounter a minor NPC with a very sad story. Other times, an optional conversation can unfold into a fun and inventive tale, much like in Disco Elysium.
A third of the gameplay is built around intense and colorful battles against reptilian humanoids known as xaurips, gigantic spiders, ghosts, and… bears. Avowed’s combat system is so flexible that you can easily combine different sets of weapons on the go and use them all at once—ranging from swords, axes, and bows to pistols, arquebuses, and grimoires. Sometimes, when you cast an electric spell into the water where an enemy stands, the game almost reaches a Divinity: Original Sin level of attention to detail. Nonetheless, mainly through talking, you will affect the story.
No one highlights the correct answers in real life, and nobody tells us which words to choose to achieve our goals or help someone navigate difficult emotions. The same applies here. You will be on your own with countless options across many dialogues. The only way to grasp the true meaning and possible effect of your words is to read what you’re about to say carefully. Their impact will become clear only through the consequences that unfold later in the game.
This simple trick, revived from classic RPGs, clearly showcases the long-forgotten power of words. In modern games, you always know in advance whether your dialogue choices are positive, ironic, or cruel. In real life, things are more complex. Or are they?
On social media, we distance ourselves from our authentic selves, acting through avatars and thus downplaying or exaggerating the seriousness of people’s intentions. For example, in America’s current climate, Kanye West posts hundreds of misogynistic and antisemitic remarks to millions of his followers with little real-world reprisal. Similarly, America’s current president casually calls Ukraine’s democratically elected president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a dictator—only to pretend days later that it never happened.
Indeed, in these times, video games can teach us more valuable lessons than real life by presenting clearer, more isolated examples of how our decisions play out. Letting a few characters down, you unwittingly analyize what could you could have done differently—why one phrase or another led to such a regrettable outcome. Finally, unlike in reality, you can replay such moments and discover the differences. While they may not truly teach us the art of communication, such video games can at least subconsciously plant the idea that words carry weight; be mindful before hurtling them.
Obsidian’s employees have learned the value of verbal interaction firsthand. Avowed went through six long and challenging years of development, undergoing two reboots and a major shift away from its Initial conception as an MMORPG. Ultimately, this game became a reality thanks to the development team’s ability to negotiate and listen to each other within the studio and colleagues at its parent company, Microsoft’s Xbox.
That said, Avowed is a real blast from the past, a true old-school RPG in the best traditions of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Piranha Bytes’ games, miraculously reviving all those feelings of exploring fantasy worlds. This marks the first—and quite possibly successful—big step for Obsidian Entertainment into the highly competitive realm of AAA fantasy role-playing games. Perhaps better, Avowed shows players that conversations, discussions, and negotiations are not just a game that can be reloaded.