"It Was Honestly A Challenge": Avowed Took Six Years And Two Reboots To Get Where It Is Today, But There's More To Come

Shortly after the launch of Obsidian's newest RPG, Avowed, the game's director shed some light on the game's troubled development in a new interview. After it was first revealed in 2020, Avowed took five years to release, during which time the game shifted direction drastically from what was shown in the initial trailer - seemingly for the better, as the game has released to generally positive reviews. According to director Carrie Patel, however, that shift in direction posed some major challenges while the game was still in development.

In an interview with Jason Schreier of Bloomberg, Patel revealed that Avowed went through some significant challenges while in development, including two reboots - the second of which resulted in the project being placed under Patel's leadership. According to the Bloomberg article, the initial pitch for Avowed in 2018 included a full open-world environment and multiplayer elements, described by Schreier as "a cross between Destiny and Skyrim", and development under Patel involved pivoting away from those two aspects.

Avowed Was A Major Challenge For Obsidian, According To Director

Avowed Director Carrie Patel Reveals Development Struggles In A New Interview

As revealed by the Bloomberg interview, even at the time of Avowed's initial reveal in 2020, the game's development was in dire straits, enough so that it was rebooted for what would be the second time in January of the following year, placing Patel in charge.

This reboot, according to the interview, came with significant challenges and resulted in the decision to more heavily emphasize the game's shared narrative elements with Pillars of Eternity, and a shift away from an entirely continuous open world, instead opting for the separate open areas that are present in the final release.

Though Obsidian is notable for having achieved an uncommonly high rate of release at a time when many other major developers are slowing down - The Outer Worlds 2, set to launch later in 2025, will be the studio's sixth game within a seven-year period. The development struggles revealed by Patel's interview with Bloomberg highlight the difficulties that the studio still faces when developing these larger titles. As of right now, however, the trouble that Avowed's development team went through seems to have been worth it.

After Launch, Avowed Proves To Be Worth The Effort

Avowed's Long And Troubled Development Seems To Have (Mostly) Paid Off

Screenshot showing location of Shatterscarp Ancient Memory

Despite - or because of - the issues that Avowed faced while in development, the game has been released to a generally positive reception, with Screen Rant's own review from Kyle Gratton giving the game a 9/10. In particular, the lack of an open world and strong connection to the lore of Eora, the setting established by the Pillars of Eternity games, has been praised by multiple reviewers.

Gratton writes "Avowed skipped the opportunity to feature a fully open world, and I think it's much better off because of it." At the same time, however, Avowed hasn't quite hit home for everyone, and other reviews have criticized the game's writing and lack of innovation.

A group of Skeleton enemies from Avowed.

Avowed Reviews Are In, But The Scores Fall Short Of Obsidian's Other Great RPGs

Leading up to the full release of Avowed, the game has garnered generally positive reviews, but with a score that falls short of other Obsidian RPGs.

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While not bad, the game's publicly visible numbers, like the peak player count of around 18,000 on Steam (as shown on SteamDB), don't quite paint the picture of a major success, either. It's worth mentioning that those numbers have likely been impacted by both the game's early access release for Premium Edition players and its availability on Xbox Game Pass. Still, Patel hints that Obsidian might have future plans for Avowed DLC or sequels, saying "Now that we've built this wonderful world[...]I'd love to see us do more with it."

Source: Bloomberg, SteamDB