Xbox's Avowed Is 'One Of The Best' Unreal Engine 5 Games So Far, Says Digital Foundry

"Ultimately, though, Avowed mostly impressed me. I really didn't expect much going into it but walked away having had a great time. It's beautiful, plays surprisingly well, features great characters and story telling and, quite frankly, has all the markings of a future cult classic. Obsidian did a fantastic job with this one."

High praise indeed. In fact, high-praise throughout. Cant wait to get stuck in - the reviews alone have been great!

@Kaloudz Yep, I have it pre-downloaded for next week. I watched a quick 15-20 mins of the opening yesterday. It looked really good!

@FarmDog08 It looks stunning doesn't it. The fact that it's not a vast open world is very ideal for me too - what with AC Shadows looming soon. Avowed will tie nicely into that for me.

I bet the developer must be delighted with this reception and, most of all, being able to build more ambitious games as an Xbox Game Studio. Digital Foundry recommends performance mode on Series X connected to variable refresh rate displays, balanced mode on Series X connected to regular displays and quality mode on Series S.

@Kaloudz It is stunning. I fully expected that this will get me to South of Midnight, which will get me to Claire Obscure: Expedition 33. My first half of 2025 is set!

Really excited for this one, skimmed over a few reviews yesterday to get the gist of it. Visually it looks stunning and as mentioned above, I for one am glad the areas are somewhat more contained rather than another bloated open world outing. Bring on next Thursday!

@Deckard85 I thought it came out on Tuesday?

@FarmDog08 Wait what? When is SoM due? Is that soon?

@Kaloudz April 8th, I think for South of Midnight and April 23rd for Claire Obscure: Expedition 33.

Doesn’t surprise me in the least. On a whim I bought the Steam version so I could run it natively on my Steam Deck when I’m away from home. It’s runs surprisingly well considering it’s not fully optimized for SD yet and doesn’t have verification. Did need to turn off the default ray tracing and such, but I can run it all medium with a stable 30fps or I can set stuff lower and get a stable 40, or even 45 if I really tone stuff down. But 45 def compromises visuals!

Still, solid game and even more impressive optimization from Obsidian.

@FarmDog08 Man, what a packed first half of the year 😳😳😳

@Kaloudz And I think Doom is May, right? I'm not interested, but I know a lot are.

Was never expecting this game to be anything special graphics wise ..so nice suprise ....this game has come at a bad time for me....as I am trying my best to play Kingdom come 2....and I feel this game is to similar to start it up while playing that .. hopefully I will get around to avowed in the future though

@FarmDog08 apologies, you are correct, it is Tuesday! Great that it's sooner but it's half term here in the UK so wife and kids off school, unfortunate timing 😂

Sadly that's not a high bar when it comes to UE5 performance, though this still requires a very high end CPU to bypass the usual traversal stutters to a degree at least.

Still I'm eager to give it a go on PC on its second release date

@Deckard85 Haha, bummer. I do all of my gaming in about a 2hr window each night after the fam is asleep.

@Banjo- John said go with balanced mode on Series X not performance on a 120hz display, on regular displays balanced mode wouldn't be available anyway as that's the 40fps mode

@Dm9982 that's awesome to hear!

@FarmDog08 Yup!! That's one I cannot wait for.

@carlos82

He and I said exactly the same. The only thing I added was "connected to regular displays" because I assume that he won't recommend two different things for the same scenario and he previously recommended performance mode for VRR displays connected to Series X. I find your comment confusing and I don't have the game to check what you mean, but because the 60fps is not flawless, he recommends performance mode (60fps) with VRR and, as conclusion, he recommends balanced mode for Series X and quality mode for Series S. That's what I posted above.

@Banjo- you wrote "balanced mode on Series X connected to regular displays" but balanced mode isn't available on regular displays as its a 40fps mode for 120hz displays

@carlos82 If what you say is true, he's apparently recommending two different modes for the same scenario (Series X connected to VRR display). In any case, it doesn't affect you since you don't have a Series X.

@Banjo- whether I have one or not is irrelevant, I'm still allowed to discuss things

@carlos82 You should argue with Digital Foundry then, I only transcribed what the video says about the video modes on Series X|S, specifically in the Xbox Performance Testing section.

@Banjo- Sorry if this is a stupid question but I'm not very tech minded. I have an LG OLED TV so assume it's VRR, but how do I find out? And then is this a thing I actively need to turn on or does it just...work?

@LaurenceJ1987 Your Xbox should tell you if you go into general TV and display options and there'll be an allow variable refresh rate toggle if the TV has it

@LaurenceJ1987 It's not a stupid question.

Go to these Xbox settings:

Settings, TV & display options.

In this menu, select "4K TV details", and the console will tell you what your TV supports, e.g., "Your TV setup supports up to native 4K at 120 FPS"

Also in this TV & display options menu, select Refresh rate and choose 120 Hz.

When you play a game, you need to choose the video mode that supports variable refresh rate, sometimes named "120 FPS", "120 Hz" or "VRR", so you need to check the settings of each game. I don't have Avowed yet, but you can do a test with Ninja Gaiden II Black if you have Game Pass. Start the game, go to Options, Screen Settings, and set the FPS Limit to 120 FPS.

In most modern LG OLED models menus (mine is G4), when you press Settings on the LG remote, you can access the game optimiser mode settings bar that shows the FPS in real time. I'm checking the final boss battle and it's between 104 and 120 FPS. The good thing about variable refresh rate is that it doesn't matter if the frame rate is not consistent, especially on Series X|S because of its wide range support for very low frame rates. In short, variable refresh rate allows higher frame rates, lowers the input lag and also smoothens visuals and gameplay when the frame rate is low and unstable.

@carlos82 Thanks!

@Banjo- Ah thanks so much for that. I am sure I've selected 120Hz for other games, but I didn't realise that was VRR. And I'm sure I've seen high numbers when looking at Game Optimiser settings. I will investigate this weekend ready to try Avowed when it hits Game Pass. Thanks again!

@LaurenceJ1987 You're welcome! Just a few days left!

@LaurenceJ1987 no problem, Banjo has way more experience than me when it comes to LG specifically but just to add that VRR is not only active on 120hz modes in games but also 60fps games benefit from it as well without having to turn anything on in game, as once it's set in the Xbox menu it'll always apply and help smooth over any drops from 60

@carlos82 That's really useful to know. Definitely going to check my settings. I really appreciate the input from both of you.

@VeganHerpes I’m quite happy with it!

I do have a bit more of a tolerance to stuff in a way than others. I’m ok with lower fps/res having grown up on old IBM PCs back in the 80s. As long as the frame pacing isn’t off in a way that induces motion sickness (like GoW 2016 did for me on a PS4 Pro…) and I can adjust features like Motion Blur. Which I did disable/lower that and the camera shake stuff - this does improve performance too, but was mainly disabled for motion sickness reasons.

Being a parent twice over now, having games portable and playable in any room truly makes a heck of difference. And while I love remote playing my Series X on my Steam Deck, some games like Avowed I want truly portable and not reliant on my internet connection - which my daughters could be hogging.

Also, if you’re an SD owner and Xbox owner, get the XbPlay app on the Steam store. It works SO much better than the official app. You can set bitrate for 1080p which improves the image quality greatly - official app only does 720p. And moreover, XbPlay allows you to remote 360 games, official app does not. Was $6.99 or 7.99 last I checked. Incredibly worth it. Stream quality is infinitely superior to anything I tried with the official app.

I will give the balanced mode on Series X a spin but will almost certainly prefer performance mode with VRR - give me extra frames over a bit more detail any day of the week. Good to have options though and each to their own personal preference.

Oh boy the 18th can't come soon enough!!!

Watched a few YT reviews and it looks pretty Marmite so far; some love the combat, the story, the visuals etc, while others dislike them. Getting Veilguard vibes, not as in it’s the same type of game, more regarding how it’s being received.

Will probably pre-install it and give it a go on GP. Not sure I’m going to like it, but I felt the same about Veilguard and kind of enjoyed that more than expected.

Whilst gameplay and vibe can be subjective, performance of the game cannot, and it's a great performing game. I also really like the aesthetic they went with (except for the facial growth stuff), they clearly have talented artists in the team.
Im really looking forward to playing this when we get it, if PJ had a good time, then I'm likely to as well!

I can believe it'll become a cult classic. Much in the same way New Vegas is a lot of ppl's favorite Fallout game, I can see people really swearing by this one.

@Kaloudz Been playing it on early access. It's good, like a more scaled down Skyrim with a strong art direction and dialogue.

@DesertRanger Ah man I can't wait, and that description just puts the cherry on the cake for me. I love me a condensed world rather than vasts of nothingness.

Looks like they were wowed with avowed