The path forward.

Image credit: Xbox Game Studios

When 2025 wrapped up, Obsidian’s open-world fantasy RPG Avowed had been overlooked on many end-of-year lists. Despite garnering favourable reviews overall and delivering a type of Elder Scrolls-inspired experience that stands on its own, it wasn’t a massive hit. Later, The Outer Worlds 2 landed with similar results. Meanwhile, the mostly continuist survival crafting adventure Grounded 2 was enjoying lots of success.

According to Feargus Urquhart, head of Obsidian Entertainment, a lot can be learned from the studio’s busy 2025 and the end results. Jason Schreier’s latest for Bloomberg reveals what him and other prominent figures at the company have to say. About last year’s RPG behemoths, Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2, the veteran openly explained: "They’re not disasters... I’m not going to say this was a kick in the teeth. It was more like: ‘That sucks. What are we learning?’"

Of course, there’s an immediate read to be made after two triple-A giants failed to meet their targets and a scrappy, still-in-early-access survival crafting game landed Obsidian a big win. Urquhart says this situation has pushed the studio to "think a lot about how much we put into the games, how much we spend on them, how long they take." In the case of Avowed, the game ended up taking "nearly seven years" to put together, with a reboot to pivot away from making a mix of Skyrim and Destiny (multiplayer included) happening two years into the creative process. "I don’t think there’s a team on the planet that could execute on this," Fallout: New Vegas director Josh Sawyer stated.

While the press and gamers alike have been saying for a while the Western games industry should course-correct back into a more sustainable model, that kind of huge change doesn’t happen overnight, especially if those at the top want bigger returns. "I don’t think anybody really likes five-, six-, seven-year dev cycles," added Brandon Adler, director of The Outer Worlds 2. I’m now thinking about Bethesda’s The Elder Scrolls 6 for no reason.

Image credit: Xbox Game Studios

In spite of everything, Obsidian, has managed (so far) to succeed where many have failed under the scrutiny of Microsoft’s Xbox division... which is also under pressure as the tech giant demands better profit margins. The trick might be a good cadence of releases since the acquisition happened back in late 2018. With easy wins on a budget like Pentiment or the two Grounded games, it’s easy to offset the bigger disappointments. "You need to keep having at-bats, because at some point, if you can consistently make good stuff, you’ll get those breakout hits," said Marcus Morgan, VP of Operations at Obsidian.

The full piece is well worth a read and shines some light on Obsidian’s past, present, and future. It’s hard to predict what might be next for its veteran teams, but personally, I’d say news about a more realistic vision for the RPG maker are encouraging.

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