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

[KVVRR]

I'd still take physics based style over substance over the purely lighting based ones tbh

I mean, I'd rather have good gameplay myself. Even if we're talking about non-gameplay issues, stuff like art direction would come well before "cups falling off a table in a physically accurate way." That kind of stuff simply isn't that important for most game.

If only there were a way to have both, eh?

 

[Raghar]

Avowed ranking as discount Greedfall would be very funny.

Greedfall was nice, but flawed.

 

[Raghar]

Avowed started off as a far more ambitious game and they couldn't do it. This was the best product they could ship.

Which just goes to show how much Obsidian have declined as a studio. Far smaller studios manage to deliver far better products.
They simply no longer have any talent left that can deliver a non-disappointing game.

Yea for example Underrail. That was nice game. Or Monomyth. Frankly even Prey was enjoyable game. It's not difficult to write interesting and engaging story, and keep game consistent.

It's not like normal people who are playing games don't want a nice simple story. And happy ending. They wasted 70 hours of their lives and they wanted to do something they enjoy. Aping to random black who are not even natives of that land. Being bossed by random females. Well, in real live their company could get ordered to get half developers as females, and they are enjoying a bimbo that was hired because university wanted to have more females as students in programming field, and they let her finish the university... with a degree.

Do you think they want to see that story in games as well? They experienced it in last half year and it sucks. (not their penis)

Basically movie producers, and companies that are developing PC games have no clue what they are doing. They have product, they expect sales, but they don't strive for high art that would be remembered 300 years later.

 

[Inec0rn]

Lol the logic in this thread.. the games irredeemable, even if you want to go with but meh story and plot, no it's crap.

I kind of already know, I'll never play another Beth, bioware or obsidian game again.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

I’m a bit confused by the angle “Stop forcing unfavourable comparisons on the game and appreciate it for what it is”.


Well, what it is if not dumb, dull, ugly and uninteresting?

 

[Maldoror]

nice review of avowed (he hated it, and it's pretty funny)

LMAO THERE'S FUCKING BROCCOLI HAIR, THE MULATTO PERM NO CAP ON GOD
you can hide the face shit and still have it accord with everyone treating you like a godlike abomination

there's something really funny to me about it, makes me want to mod broccoli haircuts into every Black Isle developed and or published game

Second time viewing this post and I only just noticed the bussin fr hair on Boo.
Well done. Well done.

 

[flushfire]

MotB is good, but the level and encounter design is mostly bad

I remember liking the skein for it's atmosphere and death god's vault also ice troll lodge for the challenging fights so gonna have to disagree.

 

[Inec0rn]

The excuses this dude was making for Obsidian earlier. They had 5 years budget, approximately 200 staff on the payroll, and they had already made TOW FPS (albeit an unfinished mess) to draw on.

There is virtually no additional features in this game to outer worlds lol, shows how little they care for their customers.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

I’m a bit confused by the angle “Stop forcing unfavourable comparisons on the game and appreciate it for what it is”.


Well, what it is if not dumb, dull, ugly and uninteresting?

Dumb, dull, and ugly, but Avowed does provide the Codex with considerable interest, for similar reasons as other recent big-budget CRPG disasters.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Name games not using Bethbryo released in the past ten years that aren't. Far as I'm concerned this is braindead criticism.

Jagged Alliance 3, nigger, you could smash through damn near anything with the right caliber bullet- probably made on Unity. Baldur's fucking Gate 3, where you could pick and move damned near anything- a fucking custom engine.

 

[sosmoflux]

13k peak CCU on Steam. Yeah even worse bomba than Pillars of Eternity 2 which had 22k peak ccc.

For those who don't know peak CCU on steam roughly translates into 1:10 ratio on pc sales and so far it is one of better statistic on sales in industry to the point where publishers are pushing valve to remove ccc numbers much like they did with sales.

So ~130k copies sold on pc.

*game will be released into gamepass later

Avowed has already made over $10m in the bank during EA
Add the Gamepass payday
Add release sales
They're doing fine actually, bet they're stoked

Where did you get this information?

It came to him in a dream.

13k~ peak users
130k~ EA sales at $90
Minus Gaben Tax
$10m~ out the gate
+ Xbox
+ Release
+ Consoles
+ Future sales
Obsidian can't stop winning

The excuses this dude was making for Obsidian earlier. They had 5 years budget, approximately 200 staff on the payroll, and they had already made TOW FPS (albeit an unfinished mess) to draw on.

There is virtually no additional features in this game to outer worlds lol, shows how little they care for their customers.

That Avowed will easily break even and then have a decently long tail shows how little you need to care about your customers

 

[Inec0rn]

well that's right, why bother with immersion, world interactivity, day night cycles, if retard gonna buy anyway.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Avowed may be a failure on its own merits but at least it shipped.

So did the Titanic.

 

[AwesomeButton]

You know what it's fair to compare Avowed against? A game Obsidian, the very same company, made in the past.

Like New Vegas

They didn't make the engine.

Did they make UE5?

 

[Orange Clock]

Not gonna quote everyone who argued about physics and such(am too lazy just like obsidian), but here’s something to consider:
1. Avowed(unlike any Bethesda game) has breakable objects, like pots and wooden boxes, you can break them with weapons or by simply walking over them, usually there’s some loot inside, in one dungeon I had to destroy several pots to enter a hidden room, I’d say it’s implemented on the same level as in AC:Origins(mentioned above). There’s also some walls you break down using specific ability, sure it’s just a scripted placement, but for example freezing or electrocuting water is not scripted, ie you can freeze any water surface you like, to reach some loot, or electrocute water to damage enemies. Could you do this in Oblivion?
2. Unlike in bethbryo titles, the buildings in Avowed are part of the same environment(CELL in CC terminology) as an outsides. You can enter them through windows or roof, you have actual working collisions, ladders, you don’t have constant loading screens and towns looks like actual towns, not villages with 5 people. Sure it’s all a set dressing, but for some people it’s more “immersive” than a simulationist approach.
3. Compared to TOW Avowed has a toggable 3D person mode,(sure it’s junky but it’s that people asked for), a bigger world, more open environments(see previous point) and arguably better visuals and combat. It lacks in player freedom(kill whoever you want), skills and viral marketing. But it’s all comes from different design approach: player driven narrative(eg Tim Cain) vs story driven narrative(eg MCA).

 

[Beastro]

 

[sebas]

Avowed started off as a far more ambitious game and they couldn't do it. This was the best product they could ship.

Technically, it's a fantastic game. It looks amazing, features fully open environments and is so very well optimized. So I am all on board about the "product" they shipped being as good as possible.

But the writing can not be excused in any way. It feels written by people who have no read a proper novel in their life, let alone studied literature. At this point game "writers" and "journalists" are the biggest quack professions I can think of.

 

[Poseidon00]

Remember when Oblivion tier was an insult? Now games are sub Oblivion tier. Thanks diversity hiring and ESG...

What strikes me the most here is something I noticed about modern games in general, not just Avowed, compared to games from the mid to late 00s: a lack of physics, or just response from the environment.

The mid to late 00s had a lot of decline, sure, but at least they experimented with physics and it looked like the future of gaming would become more and more interactive.
Half Life 2 started the trend, where almost every prop object in the environment reacts to physical forces. Shoot a barrel, it falls over. Throw a grenade on a table, it will launch everything on the table through the air.
I started replaying some games of that era recently, and it's insane how much better physics were at the time. Started Stranglehold yesterday, its core gameplay is a pretty mediocre third person shooter, but its environmental destruction is still unmatched. Almost EVERYTHING you shoot at will react. Most things will break apart, some things - like metal pots and pans - will simply move when shot. Nothing is static, everything reacts.
Not even gonna mention games that relied big time on destruction physics, like Red Faction Guerilla, or Crysis, or Silent Storm where you could blow up an entire ground floor and then the top floors of the building would collapse due to lack of support. Groundbreaking (pun not intended).

Play any game from the mid-late 00s, and you'll notice that a lot of environment objects will react to being hit. There's stuff on a table? Punch it or shoot it, and it will scatter.
Nowadays, many games have the average clutter items be completely static. They won't react to anything. Shoot an apple? It won't burst into juices like it did in Stranglehold, a game from 2007. Nor will it fly away like it did in Oblivion, a game from 2006. No, in 2025, your average big budget game's apples will simply remain in place, no matter how much you punch and kick and stab and shoot at it.

This laziness when it comes to world interactivity is the most glaring sign that the modern gaming industry has failed, and it's about time for it to collapse so devs who actually care can take their place.
This shit should be standard. It doesn't even take any effort, modern engines all come with physics engines incorporated. Fucking Thief, from 1998, managed to have most clutter items be pickupable and throwable and they'd react to being shot with arrows. 1998!!!
And before someone like Roguey comes in and says "But Obsidian never cared about a simulationist approach to game worlds, this isn't their focus" SHUT THE FUCK UP this should be standard, particularly in a first person game with relatively realistic-looking visuals. If Obsidian's devs aren't capable of simulating the most basic environmental interactions, maybe they shouldn't make first person RPGs.

New Vegas, which they also made, had more environmental reactivity than this. There is no excuse.

What pisses me off is how people are willing to excuse things like this too, as if they "don't matter". They do. If they aren't paying attention to the details then they are showing that they clearly don't give a shit. For a game like Avowed to have no basic item physics and hit collision is ridiculous and they should be mocked for that as much as for anything else.

 

[scytheavatar]

13k peak CCU on Steam. Yeah even worse bomba than Pillars of Eternity 2 which had 22k peak ccc.

For those who don't know peak CCU on steam roughly translates into 1:10 ratio on pc sales and so far it is one of better statistic on sales in industry to the point where publishers are pushing valve to remove ccc numbers much like they did with sales.

So ~130k copies sold on pc.

*game will be released into gamepass later

Avowed has already made over $10m in the bank during EA
Add the Gamepass payday
Add release sales
They're doing fine actually, bet they're stoked

Where did you get this information?

It came to him in a dream.

13k~ peak users
130k~ EA sales at $90
Minus Gaben Tax
$10m~ out the gate
+ Xbox
+ Release
+ Consoles
+ Future sales
Obsidian can't stop winning

The excuses this dude was making for Obsidian earlier. They had 5 years budget, approximately 200 staff on the payroll, and they had already made TOW FPS (albeit an unfinished mess) to draw on.

There is virtually no additional features in this game to outer worlds lol, shows how little they care for their customers.

That Avowed will easily break even and then have a decently long tail shows how little you need to care about your customers

30% steam cut means 8.1m out of the gate, but it doesn't matter cause those are some pretty pathetic numbers. The production + marketing cost of this game is going to be 150m at least, so there's a good chance the game is going to be losing a lot of money at the end of the day. And this is excluding the fact that this game is the main reason Microsoft brought Obsidian, so you should be factoring the Obsidian purchase cost into the game.

 

[sosmoflux]

13k peak CCU on Steam. Yeah even worse bomba than Pillars of Eternity 2 which had 22k peak ccc.

For those who don't know peak CCU on steam roughly translates into 1:10 ratio on pc sales and so far it is one of better statistic on sales in industry to the point where publishers are pushing valve to remove ccc numbers much like they did with sales.

So ~130k copies sold on pc.

*game will be released into gamepass later

Avowed has already made over $10m in the bank during EA
Add the Gamepass payday
Add release sales
They're doing fine actually, bet they're stoked

Where did you get this information?

It came to him in a dream.

13k~ peak users
130k~ EA sales at $90
Minus Gaben Tax
$10m~ out the gate
+ Xbox
+ Release
+ Consoles
+ Future sales
Obsidian can't stop winning

The excuses this dude was making for Obsidian earlier. They had 5 years budget, approximately 200 staff on the payroll, and they had already made TOW FPS (albeit an unfinished mess) to draw on.

There is virtually no additional features in this game to outer worlds lol, shows how little they care for their customers.

That Avowed will easily break even and then have a decently long tail shows how little you need to care about your customers

30% steam cut means 8.1m out of the gate, but it doesn't matter cause those are some pretty pathetic numbers. The production + marketing cost of this game is going to be 150m at least, so there's a good chance the game is going to be losing a lot of money at the end of the day. And this is excluding the fact that this game is the main reason Microsoft brought Obsidian, so you should be factoring the Obsidian purchase cost into the game.

150m on Avowed you reckon?
I'd guess less than 50m on the game and like 10m on marketing

 

[Alienman]

The Wall Welcome back

 

[Readher]

What pisses me off is how people are willing to excuse things like this too, as if they "don't matter". They do. If they aren't paying attention to the details then they are showing that they clearly don't give a shit. For a game like Avowed to have no basic item physics and hit collision is ridiculous and they should be mocked for that as much as for anything else.

Exactly. I also hated the argument used that a lot of cRPGs don't allow you to kill everyone and don't have interactive objects and whatnot. But we're talking about isometric games which are heavily abstracted by the virtue of the camera alone, and further abstracted by its combat systems (usually based on dice rolls). It's a translation of tabletop into a video game format. A first-person action game will and should have different expectations set upon it when it comes to world detail, interactivity and simulation, because it's more immersive by the virtue of the camera alone.

So yes, object physics, world simulation and interactivity are important in a game like Avowed. And the more abstract the genre (FPP -> TPP -> isometric), the less important they become, but should never be excused as "not mattering".

 

[luj1]

I’m a bit confused by the angle “Stop forcing unfavourable comparisons on the game and appreciate it for what it is”.

Sheep mentality, by apologetic cucked hipsters

Keep giving devs a free pass and getting fucked over

 

[Morgoth]

CEO Feargus Urquhart told me that in scope Avowed is more akin to Obsidian's past RPGs like The Outer Worlds in size than it is a sprawling open world a la Skyrim, though that was actually Obsidian's initial pitch. When the developers sat down and focused on what Obsidian does best—stories and companions, in particular—the more compact scale came naturally.

The compact scale came when they realized what an atrocious engine UE4 was for true open-world games. Gamebryo at least is a true game engine, and it shines in Skyrim or Fallout NV. UE4/5 are movie facade engines first, game engine second, and it really shows.

 

[JarlFrank]

Exactly. I also hated the argument used that a lot of cRPGs don't allow you to kill everyone and don't have interactive objects and whatnot. But we're talking about isometric games which are heavily abstracted by the virtue of the camera alone, and further abstracted by its combat systems (usually based on dice rolls). It's a translation of tabletop into a video game format. A first-person action game will and should have different expectations set upon it when it comes to world detail, interactivity and simulation, because it's more immersive by the virtue of the camera alone.

Classic isometric RPGs usually allowed you to kill people... Fallout, Arcanum, even Baldur's Gate lets you attack civilians.

Avowed, from what I've seen, has a completely sterile environment where nobody in town reacts to anything you do, whether it's stealing his food or bashing his head in or luring an enemy to a guard.