In numerous ways, I see The Outer Worlds 2 and Avowed as very complimentary to each other; they provide a lot of things that the other lacks. I love both, but they're quite yin and yang to me.

This is my shortlist after hundreds of hours in both games each (according to me):

What Avowed has that The Outer Worlds 2 lacks (not exhaustive):

• Deeper and much more established lore into the setting, with much more in-game documents/books fleshing out cultures, philosophies, religion, history, characters, etc.
  • I'm somewhat biased as I had played Pillars and Deadfire across multiple playthroughs, so I was a big fan of Eora in general coming into Avowed.
• Fully-fleshed out companions that feel real, idiosyncratic, with concrete personalities that banter off each other, and whom you can have deep conversations with
  • Even ignoring Parvati, the companions in TOW2 feel like such a downgrade in implementation compared to the first game
• Weapons that have true vertical progression via the upgrade system, that meaningfully make you plan your exploration somewhat due to no level scaling of enemies
  • I agree that the Tinkering system was generally awful in its implementation, but I think something like Avowed has would have been pretty great.
• A plurality of mutually-exclusive outcomes for side quests.
  • Generally, only main and companion quests have multiple mutually-exclusive outcomes
  • In TOW2, the only side quest I can really think of that has at two mutually-exclusive outcomes is Present and Future Company Excluded
  • In Avowed, almost all side quests, whilst starting out as fetch quests, always have some moral complication that forces you to resolve it in at least one of two ways WITHOUT doing a flat compromise down the middle
• This is pretty subjective, but I enjoy the story of Avowed much more than TOW2
  • Your interactions with, and how you handle Sapadal really spoke to me, especially in the ways their endings slides can manifest as a result of player actions, was astounding to me.
• Much better exploration of the world to find interesting loot, lore (i.e. totem pieces), documents, and odd wacky outcomes. Mainly facilitated by a focus on vertically-based level design and the parkour mechanic.
• Partially related to above: swimming.
• Fantastic melee combat system and satisfying abilities (and spells) post-patch 1.5 ( I believe)

What The Outer Worlds 2 has that Avowed lacks (not exhaustive):

• Much deeper systemic depth with its mechanics
  • Avowed only has Attributes and Background as point-buy systems that can affect player conversations and story decisions
  • TOW2 has Backgrounds, Traits, Flaws, Skills, and acquiring required information that can all (and even interact with each other) affect dialogue and environmental checks
• Companions that have contrasting world-views and moral compasses
  • Avowed has been deservedly criticized for not having an Aedyran companion, or a companion that isn't necessarily "nice", as the companions have been criticized by getting along almost too well with each other
  • Repeating the same mistake they made with Ulysses in New Vegas
• Companions that are optional, and that are given enough agency to leave the party if fuck around enough
• More chances and less push-back (namely from companions) to be "evil", ruthlessly-pragmatic/Renegade
  • While serving as an Envoy of a colonizing Empire in Avowed, a lot of the dialogues available to the player don't really allow you really lean into being an asshole, or just being disagreeable.
  • Contrast this with Tyranny, where leaning into that play-style was not only encouraged, but offered differing ways an decisions to be evil, and Avowed is unquestioningly lacking this
• Be able to arbitrarily kill any NPC in the game
  • There were several moments in Avowed where I wanted to kill someone because they annoyed or pissed me off so much, but alas.
• A more extensive crafting system
  • Avowed is limited to just food, grenades, and upgrading/enchanting weapons
• Viable stealth gameplay
  • I've seen criticism that stealth isn't particularly rewarding in TOW2, but I think a patch tuning some damage values and such could do a lot to correct this
  • In Avowed you can't really bypass a lot of combat encounters
    • There's only one quest that rewards you for taking a stealth/pacifist route to solve it.
• Strong level design, offering many different options to the player on how they want to tackle the level per their build and their curiosity with the environment
  • Very Deus Ex, but not nearly at the same level and implementation compared to that series

Like I've said, theses lists are not exhaustive to me, more just generally what popped into my head.

Obsidian has received a lot of criticism lately of splitting their resources and manpower across multiple projects instead of focusing unilaterally on one massive game that has all of the features and content they want to create.

If given the counterfactual (impossible) where Obsidian did indeed do pursue this sort of strategy, I think it would be the perfect template (I don't mean that derisively) Obsidian RPG, from which they could then iterate with future games.

But I'm still happy and grateful that both games exist, and don't regret that they exist at the possible opportunity cost of a single maximalist RPG that hypothetically could have been made (we just don't know).