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"Your worlds, your way" is not just a motto for Obsidian—it's truly how they think about their players. Freedom lives within everything they do, informing how they design quests, regions, combat, and more—it's these elements that help make an "Obsidian RPG" great (and why "Obsidian RPG" is a term you can immediately recognize in the first place). Ahead of the Avowed launch on February 18, 2025, I spoke with the team behind the upcoming fantasy role-playing game to learn more about the process that offers players such a huge level of agency—and how this philosophy is being pushed in this game more than ever.
"There are choices you can make and consequences of actions you can take or not take, whether they are forecasted to you or not, that will impact the future of entire settlements, individual people, groups of people—the whole spectrum basically," says Region Director Berto Ritger. This felt evident as soon as I got off the boat in the game's first region, Dawnshore, as the entire zone is essentially laid out in front of you, waiting to be explored. Everywhere I looked was an opportunity to engage with this world, either through circumnavigating old houses to find loot, or talking to locals that would yield side quests—and this was all before I even stepped foot outside of the port city of Paradis.
One of those quests involved a group of xaurips forcing a local settler out of her home. This quest alone has a variety of outcomes: you could go straightforward and fight the xaurips in her home or play it more stealthily and scout the location to report back on what you discover. But, as with many Obsidian-designed quests, there's a bit more hiding under the surface if you decide to pry more information out of her, and that was the case here—I uncovered a more… spiritual connection to the xaurips that I was not expecting. This, as much as anything, encompasses Obsidian's philosophy: the more you engage, the more you should get in return.
"My inclination is always to leave as much as possible for the player to discover," says Narrative Designer Kate Dollarhyde. "When a world is easily digested and handed to the player, it takes away a lot of mystery because there's less to find. We want the content to be legible, so players know what's going on and how to move through quests, but I don't want the correct answer to be obvious every time. It's like a conversation between us, the designers, and the player. We give you a platform to have a conversation with us. We want you to engage in the conversation as much as we're engaging in it. We provide tools for that but leave room for you to play the way you want."
When designing choices, the narrative team breaks these down as short-term, medium-term, and long-term factors. Short-term choices involve decisions made during conversations that may result in an NPC revealing new information, offering a new way to end a quest, or reacting negatively. Medium-term choices may affect the outcome within the full length of a quest. Long-term choices influence events over the course of multiple quests or the entire game. "Whenever we sit down to design the critical path, the region stories, and the side quests, we're always thinking in terms of short, medium, and long-term choices. It does get a little complicated trying to figure out how it all works together, but thankfully design is iterative," adds Dollarhyde.
Obsidian has learned through iteration that sometimes these goals may be too hard to find for some players, so they would gradually layer in more hints, references, and suggestions. However, part of making choices feel personal for the player is feeling as though they're opting into them - Obsidian doesn't want players to feel like they're being led around by the nose. It's a balancing act achieved through playtesting, iteration, and careful attention.
The full preview feature—on Xbox Wire—can be found here.
Avowed is launching February 18, 2025, for Xbox Series X|S, the Xbox app for Windows PC, Battle.net, Steam, cloud, and will be available on day one with Game Pass. Players who purchase the game for either Xbox or Battle.net or have a Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass membership can play on both Xbox and Battle.net by linking their Xbox and Battle.net accounts.
Avowed is currently available for pre-order on the Xbox Store, Battle.net, and Steam. The Premium Edition offers up to five days early access, two premium skin packs, and access to the Avowed Digital Artbook & Soundtrack.
View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source
"There are choices you can make and consequences of actions you can take or not take, whether they are forecasted to you or not, that will impact the future of entire settlements, individual people, groups of people—the whole spectrum basically," says Region Director Berto Ritger. This felt evident as soon as I got off the boat in the game's first region, Dawnshore, as the entire zone is essentially laid out in front of you, waiting to be explored. Everywhere I looked was an opportunity to engage with this world, either through circumnavigating old houses to find loot, or talking to locals that would yield side quests—and this was all before I even stepped foot outside of the port city of Paradis.
One of those quests involved a group of xaurips forcing a local settler out of her home. This quest alone has a variety of outcomes: you could go straightforward and fight the xaurips in her home or play it more stealthily and scout the location to report back on what you discover. But, as with many Obsidian-designed quests, there's a bit more hiding under the surface if you decide to pry more information out of her, and that was the case here—I uncovered a more… spiritual connection to the xaurips that I was not expecting. This, as much as anything, encompasses Obsidian's philosophy: the more you engage, the more you should get in return.
"My inclination is always to leave as much as possible for the player to discover," says Narrative Designer Kate Dollarhyde. "When a world is easily digested and handed to the player, it takes away a lot of mystery because there's less to find. We want the content to be legible, so players know what's going on and how to move through quests, but I don't want the correct answer to be obvious every time. It's like a conversation between us, the designers, and the player. We give you a platform to have a conversation with us. We want you to engage in the conversation as much as we're engaging in it. We provide tools for that but leave room for you to play the way you want."
When designing choices, the narrative team breaks these down as short-term, medium-term, and long-term factors. Short-term choices involve decisions made during conversations that may result in an NPC revealing new information, offering a new way to end a quest, or reacting negatively. Medium-term choices may affect the outcome within the full length of a quest. Long-term choices influence events over the course of multiple quests or the entire game. "Whenever we sit down to design the critical path, the region stories, and the side quests, we're always thinking in terms of short, medium, and long-term choices. It does get a little complicated trying to figure out how it all works together, but thankfully design is iterative," adds Dollarhyde.
Obsidian has learned through iteration that sometimes these goals may be too hard to find for some players, so they would gradually layer in more hints, references, and suggestions. However, part of making choices feel personal for the player is feeling as though they're opting into them - Obsidian doesn't want players to feel like they're being led around by the nose. It's a balancing act achieved through playtesting, iteration, and careful attention.
The full preview feature—on Xbox Wire—can be found here.
Avowed is launching February 18, 2025, for Xbox Series X|S, the Xbox app for Windows PC, Battle.net, Steam, cloud, and will be available on day one with Game Pass. Players who purchase the game for either Xbox or Battle.net or have a Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass membership can play on both Xbox and Battle.net by linking their Xbox and Battle.net accounts.
Avowed is currently available for pre-order on the Xbox Store, Battle.net, and Steam. The Premium Edition offers up to five days early access, two premium skin packs, and access to the Avowed Digital Artbook & Soundtrack.
View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source
