Pentiment is a narrative adventure game set in the 16th century, all about a young artist named Andreas Maler as he deals with the consequences of a murder in a small Bavarian town. A game premise like this is certainly quite a departure for Obsidian Entertainment, known for its isometric and 3D RPGs; however, it’s a breath of fresh air for fans that love a narrative experience. Pentiment keeps a lot of its story under wraps, but even before players decide to get their hands on it, they may be fascinated by its real-life journey to release.

Behind Pentiment is an intriguing story spanning thirty years, all about a passionate game developer and his vision for a great historical fiction game that suffered some setbacks and reworks. It starts with the now-ancient MS-DOS and a game called Darklands and continues up to today as his vision is refined with influences from contemporary games. Pentiment has been a long time coming for Josh Sawyer of Obsidian Entertainment. It is a passion project that has finally come to life.

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The Origins of Pentiment

Pentiment Andreas

Pentiment’s story starts all the way back in 1992, in the days of bulky consoles and even bulkier computers. Upon playing the MS-DOS RPG, Darklands, Pentiment’s future game director Josh Sawyer felt inspired by the game’s unique 15th-century setting and found it a compelling backdrop for a video game. The idea of a historical fiction RPG stuck with Sawyer throughout much of his youth. He even received a degree in history before working in the games industry and winding up at acclaimed studios like Black Isle Entertainment. While working at Black Isle during the development of Icewind Dale 2, Sawyer pitched his idea for Pentiment as a historical fiction RPG to former-president Feargus Urquhart but was unfortunately rejected.

At the time, Black Isle figured that a historical game set during the Holy Roman Empire wouldn’t appeal to mainstream audiences. High fantasy was where Black Isle was focused at the time, along with much of the industry, as classics like Morrowind and Baldur’s Gate were on the horizon. So Pentiment ended up shelved in Sawyer’s mind for many years as he continued to work at Black Isle and eventually found himself at Obsidian Entertainment. Sawyer’s shift to Obsidian would be the inciting incident that would bring Pentiment back to life after years of reworking the project.

Pentiment is a Passion Project Come to Life

Pentiment Fire

As luck would have it, Sawyer and Feargus would find each other again at Obsidian Entertainment, Feargus now as CEO and Sawyer working as a games designer for titles like Fallout: New Vegas. While working at the studio, Sawyer once again pitched Pentiment to Feargus, but this time reworked as a narrative adventure with a murder mystery premise and an RPG-lite approach to gameplay. Sawyer cited games like Night in the Woods, Mutazione, and Oxenfree as influences while keeping the vision of a historical fiction setting that Darklands inspired back in 1992. This time, Feargus gave the green light to Sawyer’s pitch, but a reworked pitch and a more ambitious Obsidian Entertainment weren't be the only reasons for Pentiment’s green light.

Microsoft’s acquisition of Bethesda and all companies was one of the key reasons that Pentiment was a go, also partly due to Xbox Game Pass. Sawyer’s vision of a historical fiction game with a heavy focus on narrative and dialogue is still somewhat niche, but that is why Sawyer says that Pentiment is the ideal Game Pass game. There is less hesitancy to try something like Pentiment when fans are already subscribed to Game Pass. What’s more, Microsoft and Xbox’s accessibility divisions have been instrumental in helping a game as niche and era-authentic as Pentiment break through to wider audiences. Pentiment’s journey from concept to release took thirty years and a few setbacks; however, its warm welcome proved worth the wait.

Pentiment is available now for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

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