The composer for Obsidian’s fantasy action RPGAvowedhas teased details of an ultra-rare ending that most players will probably never see.Avowedhas received decent reviews- perhaps not as great as other Obsidian games, but it’s certainly garnered some praise. One of its most popular aspects has beenthe depth and complexity of its story choices- something Obsidian has always excelled at.Screen Rantreviewer Kyle Gratton called these difficult decisions “often Avowed’s best trait.” These decisions affect not only the moment-to-moment gameplay and the development of the story, but also the ending you get.
As the game’s composer, Venus Theory, revealed in a recent interview withScreen Rant,there are five endings toAvowed, and one of them is “exceptionally rare.“Venus Theory goes on to explain that this rare ending probably “is not the canon ending because it is kind of a fun one.” He openly wonders whether any players will even find it, but hopes they will: “I’m very curious if anyone’s going to get it, because, musically, it’s also one of the fun ones that was really interesting to design. It was really challenging, but it worked pretty well.”
Everything We Know About The Secret Ending
Rare, But Not Necessarily Hard
Venus Theory is understandably cryptic about the nature of the ending, describes the process of getting to it in no uncertain terms. He saysit’s not necessarily difficult to achieve, but requires the player to make a certain, possibly counter-intuitive set of decisionsthroughout the game. “There are a lot of very specific choices you would have to make to get close to it, and then, effectively, there’s one speech check that you either pass or fail that determines if you get it.”
“It’s Actually Reasonable To Finish”: Avowed Composer Praises The Game’s Appeal To Casual Players
In a recent ScreenRant interview, Avowed composer Venus Theory praised the game’s ability to strike a balance between depth and casual appeal.
In fact, he says, it’s rather similar to a different ending that many more players are likely to achieve;it’s just a last-minute speech check that triggers the rarer variant of this ending. “Ifyou play through again, you’re probably thinking you’re getting the other ending that you may have already gotten before, but you failed that speech check, and now you get sort of the hidden ending.” In fact, he says, it’s probably not even going to become the rarest ending; there’s an even more secret one that he expects few players will ever see.
Secret Cutscenes Make Games More Fun
The Hunt Is On
Of course, there’s still a lot we don’t know. Discovering all these secret endings will inevitably take weeks of player experimentation. In fact,we don’t even know the full details of allAvowed’s endings just yet. I suspect we’ll see lots of players savescumming until they fail endgame dialogue checks.
So the hunt is on, and even though I suspect the mystery will be solved in a matter of days,it’s an exciting time to be playingAvowed. Anyone could be the first player to discover the new secret ending - even you, even me - and I can’t wait until they do. I still remember the thrill of everyone gradually discoveringNier: Automata’s 26 different endingswhen it first came out. I’m curious to see whether Venus Theory’s…well, theory about which ending is going to be the rarest pans out - I’d love to see Obsidian release a sort of player-choicestatistical breakdown like Larian did forBaldur’s Gate 3.
But that’s the real fun of secret endings: they give players something to look for. Even after you’ve played through the game fifteen times, and memorized the position of every single piece of treasure, a secret ending still gives you a new piece of content to look forward to in a game you thought you knew inside and out. It’ll likely be some time until players figure out how to getAvowed’s secret ending, but I look forward to the day the full details come out.
