Avowed, the upcoming action-RPG from Obsidian Entertainment, was recently delayed and is now set to release on PC and current-gen Xbox consoles on February 18, 2025. Now, the developer has confirmed that the game will run at 30 fps on both Xbox Series X and Series S. More details about the game emerged at the ongoing Gamescom 2024 event, where Obsidian revealed that Avowed will have multiple possible endings, reaching into the double digits.
Claimed performance on Xbox Series S/X
Obsidian shared details about Avowed’s performance on Xbox Series S/X on the Iron Lords Podcast on the sidelines of Gamescom in Los Angeles. Speaking on the podcast, published on YouTube on Friday, the game’s art director Matt Hansen said the studio is “targeting a 30fps baseline” for RPGs on Xbox consoles.
“Our primary goal is 30 fps, the bare minimum,” Hansen said, responding to a question about the game’s console performance. “Those are expectations.”
The game’s developer recognized that players didn’t necessarily need 60 frames per second in a single-player, first-person game, and 30 frames per second allowed Obsidian to improve the quality of the graphics and lighting.
“It’s a compromise we made relatively early on, and we’re really happy with it. The game runs pretty smoothly considering how dense it is visually, which was always our goal,” Hansen said. “But in terms of better understanding the performance specs, we’re still figuring that out. It’s one of the last things that gets done,” he added.
Avowed isn’t the first Xbox first-party title to launch with performance locked at 30 fps on consoles. Bethesda’s Starfield launched at 30 fps on Xbox Series S/X last year, as did Arkane Austin’s Redfall. Both games later received a patch that bumped performance to 60 fps on consoles, though. In fact, the latest Starfield update added 60 fps performance for the game on the lower-end Xbox Series S earlier this week.
Declared possible endings
In a separate interview with IGN on the sidelines of Gamescom earlier this week, Avowed game director Carrie Patel confirmed that the game will feature multiple possible endings. “I can tell you that our ending slides are in the double digits, you could end up with a lot of different combinations of them,” Patel said.
“I mean, it’s an Obsidian game, so the ending is really the sum of your choices throughout the game, across a lot of content, depending on what you encountered and what you did when you found it,” she added.
Avowed was originally set to release in late 2024. After the announcement of a delay that gave Obsidian’s RPG some breathing room in the busy video game release schedule in late 2024, the game has now been confirmed to release on February 18, 2025 for PC, Xbox Series S/X, and Game Pass.
