What a difference a few weeks make. It wasn’t that long ago that question marks were still hanging over Obsidian’s coral-coloured role-playing game Avowed. Promotional trailers had left people unconvinced, showing an adventure that looked old-fashioned and lacking in originality. Yet weeks later, Avowed has wide acclaim. “It’s one of this year’s most pleasant surprises,” I wrote in our Avowed review. It’s a game that went from being under suspicion to an unlikely Xbox star. Obsidian has proven three times in a row now, with Grounded, Pentiment and Avowed, that it can produce the goods consistently for Microsoft, and do it in a way that’s less risky than betting everything on each project it makes. In stormy seas, Obsidian’s boat seems, blessedly, buoyant.