Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2 failed to meet expectations for Obsidian, but Grounded 2 was a hit, and the future is looking positive for the Pillars of Eternity universe

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Obsidian's choice-driven first-person RPGs aren't hitting their lofty sales targets.

A Grounded 2 player character wearing armor that looks mix-and-match from various bugs. There's a Praying Mantis in the background chasing her.
(Image credit: Obsidian Entertainment, Eidos-Montréal)

Obsidian released three major games in 2025, at a time when most major studios—especially those owned by Microsoft—struggle to ship one. Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2 were big tentpole first-person RPGs of a kind the industry used to dine out on, while Grounded 2—an early access survival crafting game set in a miniature world, co-developed in two years with Eidos Montreal—was ostensibly the more niche affair.

Nevertheless, it was Grounded 2 that proved a big hit, whereas Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2 both failed to meet the sales forecasts set by Microsoft, according to a new Bloomberg report.

"They’re [Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2] not disasters," Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart told Bloomberg. "I’m not going to say this was a kick in the teeth. It was more like: ‘That sucks. What are we learning?’"

The disappointing results—and the success of Grounded 2—have led Obsidian to "think a lot about how much we put into the games, how much we spend on them, how long they take." Urquhart wants Obsidian to make games in three to four year cycles.

"We don’t need to change everything every time," he said. "We’ve had this debate internally: Do people really care that we spent an extra hundred person-months on the inventory screen?"

Avowed was clearly a pain point for Obisidan. In development for seven years, it started as an online-focused hybrid of Destiny and The Elder Scrolls before the project was scaled back. "My thought when I first saw it was, ‘I don’t think there’s a team on the planet that could execute on this,’" Obsidian director Josh Sawyer said of the initial scope.

Shaun Prescott
Shaun Prescott
Australian Editor

Shaun Prescott is the Australian editor of PC Gamer. With over ten years experience covering the games industry, his work has appeared on GamesRadar+, TechRadar, The Guardian, PLAY Magazine, the Sydney Morning Herald, and more. Specific interests include indie games, obscure Metroidvanias, speedrunning, experimental games and FPSs. He thinks Lulu by Metallica and Lou Reed is an all-time classic that will receive its due critical reappraisal one day.

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