Avowed

I've played Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, multiple times, for hundreds of hours. What happened to those writers? This game's dialogue choices absolutely suck. Clearly pigeonholed. Aedyrans = bad. Colonization = bad. Absolutely worst companions in any RPG i've played. Atleast at the end with INCREDIBLY SPECIFIC choices can you defy the intention of these writers.

After reading plenty of reviews I got this on a sale, and it's... a decent enough game. It leans more into the action-adventure genre, throwing you into a world filled with treasures and secrets to discover and solve, but it doesn't feel much like a "real" place. You can't attack any friendly NPCs, nobody cares if you loot their homes or businesses, it's sad how lifeless all the towns feel... The combat isn't that great either, it feels very, I dunno, floaty and slidey? Like, your character moves so fast (especially with some +movement speed gear/buffs), that it becomes silly, you just slide from one enemy to the next... I'm not sure how playing a spellcaster feels, but melee isn't that fun, and ranged, well, it's not the best either. Not so awful as to make you quit, but not good enough to make you think "damn, I can't wait to find the next group of 6 skeletons to fight!" either. There are some choices in the game, but your companions seem way too quickly to forget and forgive whenever you do something that they are totally against. In the end, it's not a terrible game, it's mostly average with some positives and negatives, but it's worth picking up on a sale if you enjoy running around looking for treasures. If you expect a deep RPG with plenty of choices and a well-built world (Skyrim, BG3, KCD2), you won't find it here. Just know that if you don't enjoy the first 2 hours, you probably won't enjoy the rest either, so don't be afraid to hit that "Refund" button if you do decide to give it a try!

It's so [i] bland [/i]. Like the script, the designs, the concepts, everything went through HR, corporate, meetings after meetings until anything vaguely offensive, edgy or frankly interesting was polished off, and what remains is [i] inoffensive [/i] and frankly boring. The level of polish is excellent and the game is well crafted. Competent. Like art made by a graphic designer to sell in a store that sells interior decoration. Competent, well made, but sadly uninteresting. Corporate. Soulless.

Man, Avoweds preety good when you dont have a videogame critic in your ear constantly complaining about how bad it is.

A game that unfortunately got caught in the crossfire of the shift in views of modern gaming. It does have its fair share of Marvel writing, particularly with the companions who I wasn't massively in love with (Kai is fun, Marius has surprising depth past the generic dwarf trope, Yatzli is beyond irritating, and Giatta is... there I guess?) But the plot and the lore drops make it worthy to be a Pillars of Eternity spinoff. It delves into some heavy themes, vengeance and forgiveness, all the while adding a genuinely intriguing new addition to the complicated world of Eora's God problem. Combat is a ton of fun, especially as a magic user which is hard to pull off. Exploration and movement is incredible, and a big reason why I stuck around. A lot of games say they reward exploration but this one truly does, even if it's just for a new view. Genuinely excited for Avowed 2 if it survives the mass purge Microsoft is doing to their game studios at the time of writing. At the very least it brings me hope for Pillars 3

I remember being over the moon when this dropped. I was already a big fan of the Pillars of Eternity world, and I loved the Godless and their lore, so I was excited to explore more of it. I originally stopped playing when it first came out because I ran into a glitch that wouldn’t let me finish one of the quests the way I wanted to. I thought maybe the next patch would fix it, but when it didn’t, I kind of fell off. Now, over a year later, I decided to hop back in. I built a new character, looked up some recommended builds, went with a gun mage, and had a fantastic time. I cared about the choices I made, and I really enjoyed the companions. My only downside is that I wish there was more party dialogue while traveling instead of most of it happening at camp. I feel like I missed a lot because I wanted to keep moving with the story, and just standing around camp waiting for dialogue to trigger wasn’t my favorite. Otherwise, I loved the game and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of Dragon Age or Fable. Definitely give this one a shot!

I’ll start with the good. The story and gear options are great. It’s a decent enough continuation of the lore from Pillars 1&2, but… The combat is absolutely abysmal. Everything is a health sponge, magic doesn’t get exponentially stronger as you go, it just is- the targeting for AOE is god awful and dodge is tied to jump. You’re not playing a skills based souls like or a power fantasy like Skyrim, you’re waiting for stamina to replenish or a spell to come off cooldown while running around trying to avoid enemy with AI that follows you perfectly with AoE spells. Its tolerable for a portion of the game but if we break the five zones into chapters around chapter 4 I about had given up on the game just powering through to finish it so I can never have to play it again. The bosses are a joke compared to the final boss of the game that comes up every time the developer couldn’t think of anything, “just keep spawning more guys lol”

This game is what RPG's should be. No bethestda slop, just pure fun and good lore