Avowed’s launch is inspiring the ‘most confidence’ this Baldur’s Gate and Fallout dev ever felt

Obsidian’s lead environment artist Dennis Presnell is more confident about Avowed’s release than he’s ever been about another RPG, and he’s been around for quite a few

Obsidian Entertainment

Obsidian’s lead environment artist Dennis Presnell is more confident about Avowed’s release than he’s ever been about another RPG. Presnell made the comments in a recent interview with GamesRadar, where he said the lead-up to Avowed’s launch is going as smoothly as anyone could hope.

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Presnell worked on Black Isle’s classic Baldur’s Gate and Fallout, along with Obsidian’s Fallout New Vegas and, more recently, The Outer Worlds, so he’s seen more than his fair share of RPG launches.

“The team is now closing things down and fixing bugs and working on perf, and I'm going to be really proud of this game when it's available to the public,” Presnell said. “I can't wait, actually.”

"Games are really hard to make, and every experience is different," he continued. "I've always felt a certain level of dread months before a game shipped, a case of the nerves. But this is the most confident I've ever been in my experience at this stage of the project."

Xbox head Phil Spencer expressed a similar level of confidence recently, when he reaffirmed that the reason Obsidian delayed Avowed was to give it breathing space – not as a result of game-breaking bugs. From what Presnell said, it sounds like we probably won’t even see that many little bugs, since the team is using this period to squash them and polish Avowed as much as possible.

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The effort seems like it might pay off, too GLHF’s Oliver Brandt came away from the latest round of previews with more positive feelings than they expected.

“I spent every moment in my two hours with Avowed being surprised and delighted by just how cohesive, enjoyable, and exciting it was,” Brandt said in their Avowed preview. “It’s not that I had low expectations, but I was entirely on the fence — it truly could have gone either way. Now that I’ve dismounted, I’ve landed on the side of excitement for the full release, with just a slight pang of concern mixed with hope that it’ll stick the landing.”

Avowed launches for Xbox Series X|S and PC via Windows and Steam on Feb. 18, 2024.