For the first several hours of Avowed, I was properly transported to its world of artificial gods and colonial strife. Obsidian Entertainment, one of gaming’s most celebrated narrative houses, was meeting high expectations.

Then I noticed something I’ve never felt before during a game made by Obsidian, the studio that made Fallout: New Vegas and the Pillars of Eternity franchise, all writerly role-playing games focused on character-driven narratives that react to player choices. I stopped caring about the characters. My story choices didn’t matter much, either to the narrative or, more fatally, to myself.

Instead of a reactive narrative, I was loving the reactive physics, seeing enemies thrash every time I cleaved through monster mobs in hefty-feeling first-person combat that reminded me of the 2011 cult zombie hit Dead Island. I couldn’t wait to learn more spells with bigger, more devastating area-of-effect damage and upgrade my guns.

Avowed casts you as the imperial envoy sent to the Living Lands, an isolated and ungoverned island nation in Eora, the world of the Pillars of Eternity series. Something called the Dreamscourge is causing people to lose their minds in dangerous, zombielike ways, and you’ve been sent to investigate. You’re also a “godlike,” people with fungi growing on their heads to symbolize their connection with one of Eora’s 11 gods. Confused yet? This is where this game’s writing issues begin.

The game is eager to enchant us with its lore, which works if you’re like me, unfamiliar with the Pillars games. I wanted to learn more about the unique take on the nature of gods and the afterlife. The first two of four maps in this game do well to introduce it all. But the more I learned - I admit I did some extra reading online - I found the narrative overexplaining things.

The plot’s overarching hook isn’t compelling. Fantasy tropes are fine, and great stories have been told from this game’s premise of answering the call of a mysterious voice in your head. But the quest for knowledge doesn’t have a strong pull besides learning more lore.

It should fall to the characters to provide proper motivation. But some of the cast don’t feel fully vested in the adventure’s stakes. The shark-toothed Kai is the best and most developed as the first person you meet, and his voice, by veteran RPG actor Brandon Keener, brings familiar warmth. Giatta has a compelling backstory that sadly fails to explore anything interesting about a character who mostly functions as exposition, while dwarf Marius’ grumpy and constant contempt for so many things is wearying.

In fact, the party feels mostly like a tagalong group of commentators. Avowed tries to alleviate this by introducing the welcome “party camp” feature. Beyond providing rest and chances to upgrade equipment, party camps dim the game to a midnight vibe so the party can chat with you or among themselves independently. Freed from the constraints of RPG game design, Obsidian’s writing can finally shine with engaging interpersonal dynamics and banter.

So much of the game is about words and conversation. Obsidian is also best known for creating conversation trees that feel realistic, natural and don’t adhere to the binary “good or bad” morality scales that plagued games in the early aughts. Avowed at least continues this tradition, skipping the trap of utilitarian dialogue with many player responses that flesh out relationships or brighten conversation. In one situation, I opted to say that my player and an antagonist used to date, and that story thread continued throughout the 30-hour adventure. Later, a character accurately noted my reckless choices meant I was lackadaisical, unbothered to “expect winter before spring.” Obsidian doesn’t offer play options found in bigger games like Baldur’s Gate 3, but I relish its steady commitment to the written word and nice turns of phrase.

It’s why the latter half of the game was disappointing. Obsidian RPGs are known for letting players make monumental choices that affect the world or story, and I was surprised to find many important choices weren’t satisfying. Without going into detail, there are many nonbinary choices, but they all made me feel bad. I made them without confidence, and many mattered little to the world anyway.

Sometimes it gets messy. After making an endgame decision that dramatically changed my friend’s living situation, they gave me a stern lecture. Just four lines deeper into the dialogue tree, my transgressive act seemed to be forgotten, with this character now praising me (and almost flirting).

Still, I enjoyed my adventure because the four maps are proper playing fields filled with rewarding exploration. Platforming puzzles can lead to great loot, and I was always on the hunt for the next big sword or gun. The combat system allows for robust customization, allowing you to mix and match any skills under classes for warriors, rangers or magicians. I was tickled to walk around as a menace armed with a gun and a book. Avowed is now among the best games out there for spell casters, allowing eight unique spells to be prepped to go for devastating, dazzling damage.

The combat mechanics are a small but welcome evolution of the clumsy, limp fantasy battles of the much larger Elder Scrolls series. Dashing around enemies makes battles feel more like Doom than D&D. With so many abilities, I can excuse the limited control of party members during fights, and they’re equipped with more than enough abilities anyway. Parries and timed dodges slow frames down, making battles feel weighty and victories well earned, especially with its simple-to-understand crafting and loot system. Too bad the user inventory is clumsy to navigate.

Even when the writing didn’t meet its old standard, Avowed is a much richer narrative than the studio’s previous flat effort, the sci-fi capitalist critique of 2019’s The Outer Worlds. If the characters’ arcs don’t impress, they’re mostly a likable bunch and I even began to warm to their unintentional role as a traveling choir of expositing observers, thanks to how much I learn about each of them during the party camps, this game’s best feature.

Famed game designer and founding Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart tells me in an interview that Avowed is part of the studio’s journey to create the perfect RPG, an aspiration he acknowledges is impossible but worthy and fun to chase. It’s about doing their best to translate the genre’s imaginative pen-and-paper roots into our computers and consoles.

“The pathway of RPG games has always been how to get that dungeon master out of people’s heads and into the games,” Urquhart said. “That is the thing that has kept RPGs moving forward. It’s never perfect. ‘I wish the companions could do this,’ or ‘we could do more with motive and conversations here.’ We have these core tenets that’s always driving us, and it’s never good enough! We just have to make another game.”

Avowed is certainly good enough, and I hope to see Obsidian forever evolve toward that perfect adventure of our dreams.

Platforms: PC, Xbox series X/S

Online: avowed.obsidian.net