Avowed is a single-player action RPG developed by Obsidian Entertainment and set in the Living Lands region of the Eora world. Players take on the role of an Envoy investigating a spreading plague while navigating political tensions, ancient threats, and personal choices that influence outcomes. The game launched on PC in February 2025 and later expanded to additional platforms, with ongoing support through major updates that refined its systems.
Gameplay
Combat emphasizes real-time action with seamless switching between loadouts. Players combine melee weapons such as swords, axes, and spears with firearms like pistols and muskets, alongside magic channeled through wands, tomes, or elemental spells. Freezing or entangling enemies sets up follow-up strikes, and abilities from multiple skill trees can be mixed without class restrictions. Three core trees cover Fighter, Ranger, and Wizard approaches, with later patches adding abilities and passives to balance options across builds. Equipment power determines effective difficulty rather than traditional level scaling, making upgrades and crafting essential for progression.
Traversal stands out through responsive movement that includes climbing, jumping gaps, and sliding across terrain. Regions feature distinct environments that reward exploration, with player abilities sometimes altering the surroundings. Character creation supports flexible builds from the start, and post-launch additions expanded options with new playable races including dwarves, aumaua, and orlan. A camp mirror allows appearance adjustments at any time, while custom difficulty sliders let players tweak enemy behavior, economy, and other parameters independently.
Game Modes
The core experience centers on a single-player campaign focused on story progression, companion interactions, and decision-making across the Living Lands. New Game Plus became available after the main story through the Anniversary Update, carrying over unlocked abilities, attributes, and certain gear while resetting equipment levels and increasing enemy strength with modifiers. This mode supports higher attribute caps and encourages experimentation with different builds on subsequent playthroughs. No separate multiplayer or competitive modes exist.
Updates and Current State
Post-launch patches introduced new abilities for the Fighter and Ranger trees, additional unique weapons and armor in early regions, and quality-of-life improvements such as portable workbenches. The Anniversary Update in February 2026 added New Game Plus, three new playable races, photo mode, a quarterstaff weapon, and expanded difficulty customization. These changes enhanced replayability without altering the main narrative. The game remains supported with refinements to combat variety and accessibility features.
Is It Worth Playing?
Avowed delivers a focused single-player action RPG experience built around combat experimentation and exploration in a distinctive fantasy setting. Critics gave it generally favorable marks, and updates have addressed replayability through New Game Plus and customization tools. It suits players who enjoy mixing weapon types and magic in real time, tackling choices that affect companions and story branches, and revisiting the campaign with stronger builds. Those seeking extensive world reactivity or multiplayer elements may find the scope narrower, but the polished traversal and combat systems provide consistent engagement for fans of Obsidian-style RPGs on PC.
