Related: One of the main designers of Fable recently released a free, highly imaginative Ultima-4-inspired game called Moonring. Check it out!
Moonring is a decent game, but not worth the price of admission, imo.
A decent game that isn't worth a price of admission that is $0? Am I missing something?
Huh, what this whole article actually led me to find is that the winner of Curiosity never actually got any price. The price they were supposed to get was never even developed. I guess that’s some way to get out of your contractual agreements. Wonder how that would have gone for them if the winner wasn’t a clueless 18 year old.
I vaguely recall playing Fable on the Xbox and being satisfied, though not blown away by it. It was certainly one of the most fleshed-out house-buying/marriage-allowing games I recall playing (not the first, though) and probably paved the way for more complete systems.
I love Peter Molyneux and he's built amazing things, but he is certainly a hype factory.
I absolutely loved that game on Xbox. It's the only reason I own an original Xbox.
It came out when I was just branching out into the world without my family around, and seeing a game where my choices changed my appearance was kind blowing to me.
I still love this game, though the replayability was definitely overhyped. It's pretty much the same every time.
Molyneux is obviously infamous for over promises and under delivering, but Fable (Fable, Fable The Lost Chapters, etc.) had such a special place in my heart.
An amazing game with raunchy wit, moving story, and great fantasy world building. The music still rattles through my brain and I still occasionally say, "Do you chase chickens, Chicken Chaser?".
I really enjoyed the games, but especially Fable and Fable TLC (which was an extended chapter at the end which changes the ending and takes you to a talked about continent that the base game did not).
... It always felt more French to me.
IIRC, II was considered superior, where a lot of the ideas were supposed to have matured and gelled to create a compelling experience. I didn't own a 360, so I never got to see for myself, but I did get to watch a few hours of gameplay while hanging out with my boyfriend at the time.
A notable moment: he'd unlocked a Demon Door and was enthusiastically laying out how the game's real estate system worked, and his plans for the idyllic winter lodge he'd just found, when he walked his character inside and... well, I won't spoil the surprise. Suffice it to say, someone on the design team had a very good handle on what they were doing. It's always stuck out to me as an excellent example of how deeply game designers understand their systems, how those systems influence gamer behavior and expectations, and how to play on those expectations for emotional impact.
In that era of gaming, just waiting a few years meant sequels were better just due to extra computing power, so yes, Fable II was better in most ways (although I'd argue the main story was worse). It was still trying to define many gameplay mechanics that are just standard fare for western made action RPGs. One can play Fable and Morrowind, then look at Skyrim, and see how it owes about as much to Fable as to Morrowind.
It's harder now, because so much of the genre seems to have frozen. The graphics are many times more realistic, and animation blending has come a long way. But ultimately making changes is now so much more expensive, that significant novelty is difficult to find in games that also push what could be done, the way it was back when the first two Fable games could try to push ahead in all direction at once
I'm disappointed in rpg's now. Once oblivion came out, they all seemed to stagnate and just be clones of that model.
The problem is the market for a deep, deep rpg with skills based on time spent using them is probably pretty small. Because it's people like me who don't actually have the time needed to play them due to life nonsense.
I desperately want the mechanics of Morrowind, but with modern graphics. The original is almost unplayable because of how crappy the graphics are.