Avowed vs. Skyrim: Both strike a chord the other can’t hit

I’m about only a dozen hours into Avowed, but the comparisons to Skyrim are inevitable. Yes, I am aware that the developer, Obsidian Entertainment, is smashing the “it’s not Skyrim” button, but it is what it is. Avowed and Skyrim are kindred spirits.

And while it's not fair to compare games with a 14-year gap when we're talking about technology and gameplay enhancements, everything else is fair game. That’s the journey I want to take you on; if you love Skyrim as I do, Avowed may strike a chord with you as the developers play a similar tune using different notes.

Now, if you do want a by-the-numbers breakdown, I’ve got you covered there, too; see the performance section at the end. I played Avowed on a desktop-level Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 GPU, an HP Omen 16 with a laptop-level Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, and an Xbox Series X. I break down how it performed on each, along with my anecdotal notes on the experience.

However, I want to lead off with all the notes Avowed hits that I didn’t experience in Skyrim and its siblings.

I eat up lore like an eldritch being

The lore in Avowed and Skyrim is encyclopedic. Both mythologies are built upon the backs of their predecessors, Avowed with Pillars of Eternity and Skyrim with The Elder Scrolls. I’ve played Pillars and its sequel, as well as Skyrim’s predecessor, Oblivion. With all of those titles under my belt, I can say I am infinitely more invested in the Pillars universe.

This comes down to their cosmology and pantheon. In the Pillars of Eternity games, you are so heavily involved with the gods that you reshape the laws of that universe. In Oblivion and Skyrim, you don’t interact with the gods and cosmology on that scale. That’s not to discredit those games; they’re great, but the stories were more grounded to the settings in which they took place.

With Pillars of Eternity, the gods weren’t a sidequest or a short page on a shelf in the College of Winterhold. They were in your face, threatening to roll credits if you made the wrong choice (literally, Rymrgand can grind your soul to dust if you dare him to). The mythology of the world was hammered into my brain because the decisions I made impacted the state of the universe. It also helps that you play the same character across Pillars of Eternity and Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire.

Likely one of the biggest reasons why Avowed takes place before the Pillars games is because the endings of Pillars II are so drastically world-changing that the context would be lost on newcomers. Meanwhile, The Elder Scrolls is a detached series of games that don’t serve that same impact.

The gods have plenty of influence in Avowed as well. You play a godlike, which is a humanoid that was blessed by a god before birth. There are a lot of interesting social and spiritual aspects to that, but the mystery of whose god you belong to is prevalent in this narrative. Not to mention that you’re a colonizer flying a banner for Woedica (goddess of justice) in a land with a diverse collection of worships, like Ondra (goddess of the sea), Hylea (goddess of the sky), and Galawain (god of the hunt). Top that off with the deific being that’s in sparse communication with you during your time in the Living Lands.

For those who have played Pillars of Eternity, and even those who haven’t, the mystery of our character’s god is compelling. I’m already playing the guessing game with the gods I do know.

I just want to kiss Kai, okay?

Pillars of Eternity offered the most fascinating cast of companions I’ve spent time with in an RPG. Edér? Adorable. Aloth? Heartbreaking. Xoti? Romanced.

Skyrim presented… followers… who — honestly, I cannot remember a single person. They were unimportant and didn’t have a serious impact upon the narrative.

Avowed easily fills this void. Again, I’m not far, so I’m dragging only Kai around with me (the first companion you meet). But he became instantly memorable in our first conversation. And that definitely has nothing to do with him sharing the voice of Mass Effect’s Garrus (Brandon Keener). And nothing to do with me wanting to kiss him. (Listen, I’m just saying, Obsidian dropped the ball on the lack of romance in this — let me kiss my friends.)

Romance tangent aside, in Avowed, you won’t warm that campfire alone at night. You have your companions to talk to about your journey — past, present, and future. And learning about them gives you insight into the world as well as their colorful personalities. I’m excited to meet the rest of them, but Kai alone fills a gap that all of Skyrim couldn’t offer.

If I don't 100% an area, I will cry

Scale is one of the primary reasons that the developers say you shouldn’t compare Avowed and Skyrim. Skyrim is an open-world game, while Avowed is an open-zone game, similar to The Outer Worlds. So you won’t get to bounce across The Living Lands at your discretion.

Some people may be disappointed with that, and I was to an extent, but I’m actually happy now that I’m playing it. Listen, I’m pushing 30, and I have a two-year-old at home; I don’t have time to explore a massive open-world RPG. But outside of my dwindling free time, Avowed features neat open zones accompanied by a completionist list beside the map. It is beyond satisfying to know that I’ve cleared all the important tasks in an area.

I cannot fathom completing something like that in Skyrim. Don’t get me wrong, I love The Elder Scrolls vibe, especially its open world, but I could never explore it all in one playthrough.

For better or worse, the one thing that Avowed doesn’t support is a criminal system. You can’t attack or steal from NPCs. I never play evil characters in RPGs anyway… except I do steal a lot. Hey, I’m not spending thousands of copper skeyts for just one Fine Arquebus. Since I can’t steal, I’ll just craft it, I guess. Overall, I’m fine with this, but I do feel like it eliminates the presence and impact on the world that you’d typically see in an RPG. You can murder anyone you want in The Outer Worlds, so it’s interesting that Obsidian Entertainment didn’t go that route for Avowed. (Well, we do come in as a colonizer, and you can argue that’s as evil as it gets.)

An appreciation, not a competition

Again, I love both Avowed and Skyrim, and they’re not intended to be compared to one another. One gives you something that the other cannot provide. If you want a colorful cast of companions, go to Avowed, and if you want an expansive open world with guilds and cities, go to Skyrim.

Having played the Pillars of Eternity series, I expected companions would be back, and having played The Outer Worlds, I knew the world would be similar in scope. However, I didn’t really consider the impact of knowing the lore. Avowed is so much more enjoyable as someone who understands how the pantheon and cosmology function in this universe.

Yes, play Avowed. But hot damn, play Pillars of Eternity. Where can you play it? Well, lucky for you, the Pillars series is available on Xbox Game Pass, just like Avowed. Let me warn you that those games are inspired by pausable real-time games like the original Baldur’s Gate. If that’s not your thing (it wasn’t mine), you can turn the difficulty down to Story Time and breeze through the narrative (trust me, that alone will keep you around).

But before you jump into Avowed next, consider where you should play it. Let’s jump into the performance before you decide.

How Avowed runs on PC (desktop / laptop) and Xbox Series X

This was a weird experience all around. But before I get into the anecdotal experience, take a look at the numbers. For context, everything below (outside of “Preferred”) has been tested with Ray Tracing enabled and Nvidia DLSS disabled (you’d get higher frame rates when those options are reversed).

To test this, I spent a minute on each setting throwing myself at the frustratingly overleveled Tempestuous Luandi on their little island with their little goons. Anyway, the numbers bounced around oddly, and it was difficult to get a steady 60 frames per second on most settings.

My preferred settings, as benchmarked above, would be max resolution, ray tracing enabled, Nvidia DLSS enabled and set to Ultra Performance, and overall settings set to Epic with the exception of Shadow Quality and Global Illumination Quality, which are set to High. Those two settings netted me an extra 10 fps when I turned them down one notch.

However, the lowest settings actually felt choppier than the rest, as the frames bounced from high to low. The higher the settings, the more stable the game felt — weird, I know. This is likely something to get fixed in future updates (I hope).

Playing on a desktop and laptop yielded similar experiences. The difference is that the RTX 4070 GPU had access to frame generation. You might’ve noticed I didn’t mention it in my preferred settings, and that’s because it didn’t help at all. In fact, I noticed lower frame rates when it was in use, and that may be because the technology was pushing the GPU too hard. But I can’t say for sure.

This may be a bit defamatory as a long-time Laptop Mag reviewer, but the Xbox Series X provided the best experience when playing Avowed. Unfortunately, I couldn't get accurate benchmarks for the Xbox Series X because my LG OLED TV kept reading the feed as 120 fps.

According to Obsidian Entertainment, however, the split is 30 fps (Quality), 40 fps (Balanced), and 60 fps (Performance). Despite that, there's an option to unlock the framerate, which is useful for TVs that support VRR (Variable Refresh Rates). That means you could potentially get a few extra frames out of each mode.

From my experience, Quality certainly felt like a 30 fps ride. However, Balanced and Performance seemed like they were getting more frames than advertised. But even if the cap is 60 fps, the overall gameplay on Xbox Series X felt much smoother than PC.

Ignoring the performance numbers, Avowed still looked best on the Xbox Series X. That’s because I encountered two weird experiences while playing on PC. One was a weird ghosting effect on my weapons, which would happen randomly when setting to lower graphics settings (I tested each setting and could not find the direct cause). Whenever I spun left or right with my weapon, reflections of where it was would multiply on screen (aka ghosting).

Then there’s the lighting, which is part art design and part technological issue. I noticed that the lighting looked worse on my monitor and laptop display. This was prevalent when going through The Strangleroot. The game gets unreasonably dark in areas with low lighting, to the point that I noticed Kai’s eyes were blacked out because part of his face was in shadow.

Again, I didn't notice this issue on the Xbox Series X via my LG OLED TV, or even my Pixel 6 via Remote Play. Those screens are brighter than my Alienware AW3225QF and the HP Omen 16, however. But it was tough to believe that even one of the best gaming monitors struggled to keep up with the lighting.

So I plugged the HP Omen 16 into my LG OLED TV to see if anything changed, but the darkness persisted. However, I noticed that the screen was dimmer overall. I went back to the Xbox Series X and realized that both HDR and Dolby Vision were in effect. When I disabled them, the entire game became dimmer and duller.

All of this to say, you can either play on the Xbox Series X for a smooth experience, or opt for the best gaming laptops for a potentially better experience (given you have or intend on getting a gaming laptop with an RTX 4080 or higher). No matter which you choose, I highly recommend acquiring a display with Dolby Vision and quality HDR.