At least one among Avowed’s companions may be romanced by the participant character, flying within the face of a number of pre-launch warnings by Obsidian that we should not anticipate that from them. We’re not speaking a full-on Baldur’s Gate 3 or Mass Effect multipart courting with premium cable nudity on the finish of the rainbow, however the romantic subplot we will verify to date is an fascinating outgrowth of an already standout companion quest. Mild Avowed spoilers, together with that companion’s identification, beneath.
Obsidian may be very a lot on the report because the anti-RPG romance developer. Studio design director Josh Sawyer has expressed a distaste for them that goes again many years, arguing they’re usually objectifying, crass want achievement. When there are romantic subplots or themes in Obsidian video games, they usually run towards the tragic or subversive:
- Wooing one among 4 partially cult deprogrammed weirdos in Knights of the Old Republic 2.
- Playing wingman for Parvati in The Outer Worlds.
- Seducing a nun, main her to terminate the ensuing being pregnant in Pentiment.
- The achingly tragic love lives of Boone, Arcade, and Veronica in New Vegas.
- And extra!
Obsidian explicitly denied that there’d be something of the kind in Avowed a number of instances within the run as much as the sport’s launch. “We are constructing considerate relationships with our companion characters,” undertaking lead Carrie Patel informed IGN final January on the again of Avowed’s first gameplay reveal. “Ultimately, I personally am a fan of creating that an choice, however I really feel like if you are going to do it, you actually, actually must commit and just remember to’re giving all to fulfilling that in a approach that feels each true to the character, but additionally creates an attractive participant expertise. So not one thing we’re doing for Avowed, however I would not say by no means.”
We have not seen the way it ends, however there’s an non-obligatory romantic factor to your relationship with Kai, Avowed’s poster boy and a brand new corridor of famer with regards to chummy RPG warrior companions. After finishing Kai’s a number of act companion quest, Battle Scars, there is a debrief dialog again at camp. Afterward, I had the dialogue choice “I really feel like we have actually gotten to know one another, have not we?” pop up in Kai’s normal dialogue tree. That begins a dialog the place you’ll be able to affirm your friendship with Kai, or say you need one thing extra.
And Kai’s sport! He reciprocates, however principally says “let’s speak extra about this after the ultimate boss.” There could also be one other dialog down the road to totally commit, however my guess is that this can be a alternative that may primarily play out in Kai’s Fallout-style epilogue card once I roll credit. Again, not Baldur’s Full Monty territory, however an specific a part of Kai’s story, and largely in step with what we noticed in Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire’s romances.
What we’re unsure about but is that if there’s some behind the scenes approval over your decisions within the sport that have an effect on whether or not or not you get this selection—I’m the one one to see it to date on the PC Gamer workforce. What’s extra, we do not know if each female and male characters can pursue Kai, or if he is solely serious about males, and there are a minimum of some indications that fellow companion Giatta might have her personal romantic subplot. We’ll must see as we make extra progress in our personal video games and extra individuals usually get their palms on Avowed, however I discover one thing very resonant, very Obsidian, to the chance that Avowed might have just one romance revolving round a homosexual shark-man. That’s videogames to me, child.
