Avowed Team Is ‘Actively Working on’ Making Combat More Impactful, Says Director

Obsidian Entertainment has responded to criticism revolving around its upcoming fantasy RPG, Avowed, saying that there is still work to be done before players try the experience for themselves.

This update on one of Xbox Game Studios’ most anticipated titles comes from the Dropped Frames podcast, which recently invited Avowed Game Director Carrie Patel on to talk about how development is going. She says it’s been interesting to work on Avowed while periodically unveiling slivers of content to the public. However, as fans get to peek behind the curtain and critique what they see, she hopes they realize that these demos represent somewhat dated builds.

Avowed has only shown up at events a handful of times, with one recent example being a gameplay-focused demo that appeared at the Xbox Developer Direct in January.

“We’re getting to show more and more, but all of that is while the game is still in progress, obviously,” Patel explained. “One of the heartening things has been seeing fans call out some of the things that we are actively working on, like the sense of hitting and impacts as you’re attacking enemies. It’s like, ‘Yep, what you all saw was still a few weeks behind where we were even when that footage was released just because of the nature of the way these things are put together, and the team’s been working on it.’”

Patel says it’s nice to see feedback like this and know Obsidian has already addressed those concerns or is at least in the process of addressing them. When asked how the studio incorporates online commentary surrounding Avowed, she said that “it’s definitely a point of discussion.”

“We’ve definitely got enough people who follow that stuff closely enough that, if there’s something that’s coming up a lot in commentary, we’re probably talking about it internally,” Patel said.

We recently learned a lot about how Avowed will compare to some of Obsidian’s past titles. Fans familiar with the studio will be happy to know that the adventure will have multiple endings to uncover. However, you won’t be able to romance your companions as you wander through the magical settings, and you’ll only be able to play as either a human or an elf.

Avowed is currently slated to launch for PC and Xbox Series X | S sometime this fall. In other Microsoft gaming news, Xbox head Phil Spencer just revealed that the company will talk about its future in interactive entertainment in a business update next week. This follows swarms of reports that the company is interested in bringing some of its titles to other platforms.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

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