Fable III

[Mark]

So, the release date is next month. Anyone else put their deposit down yet?

[colmquinn]

Nope - i'm going to focus on Fallout New Vegas and worry about Fable 3 after that. But then COD Black Ops will be coming out in Nov so decisions will have to be made.

[SolkaTruesilver]

I haven't played Fable I or II yet. Shamus Young's story description of Fable II kinda made me not want to at all... So unless I hear there is incredible increase of the storyline value, I will abstain.

[Mark]

Fable II wasn't BAD, just weak because it was done to death. You know, avenging yourself on the badguy that killed your sister. But, while the story was a bit weak, the journey to get there was pretty cool.

[Reliant121]

Above all, Fable was one of those rare games that was simply fun. it had a serious storyline, and serious pretentions, but a lot of the voice acting simply wasn't. It was a game happy to take the p*ss out of itself, and yet still managed to pull it together seriously when it was necessary. It was the epitome of lighthearted fun with a decent storyline, even if it was filled with every cliche in existence and it was entirely predictable.

[Mark]

Ditto

[SolkaTruesilver]

But, while the story was a bit weak, the journey to get there was pretty cool.

Shamus Young's review of the story was very amusing to read

http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=2090
http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=2102

(You can read him playing the game in the next Fable-related, easily accessible at the end of each article)

He also made a good point about the general feel of the Fable games in this post:

http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=8883

A protagonist is introduced and then tormented in various "humorous" ways before they meet their end with injustice, all while author-insertion Theresa narrates. This is 100% Fable. It fits perfectly with the mass murder, torture, slaughter of innocents, murder of children, and wrongful imprisonment themes the game has been exploring.

The series presents a whimsical fairytale world and then systematically murders the innocents while all you can do is boink random NPC's and perform fart emotes. Then at the end you get to sort of put a single bad guy down without any sense of justice or closure. It just ends. The world of Fable is ugly, stupid, and nihilistic. Imagine the original Shrek if Lord Farquad had raped Fiona, killed donkey, burned down Shrek's home, wiped out the fairytale creatures, and then at the end Shrek just strangled him and wandered off. Roll credits. That's the Fable series. I actually find it kind of sick. Imagine if the movie Se7en had been exactly the same, except Brad Pitt's character had done a bunch of screwy pratfalls and Wayans brothers style comedy.

In the above movie, the audience naturally sides with the chicken. We naturally root for the underdog. We see her plight and we want her to win. Or - if you want a darker tone - go through all that struggle to end up back where she started. But to go through all that and then end with a "BANG, the protagonist is dead, the end" punchline is not entertaining to me.

You CAN present a dark world of injustice, but you need to get the people designing the world and the people writing your script on the same page. Fable is too cartoonish (in both presentation and depth) to support that sort of complex narrative. I can't help but get the feeling Peter Molyneux thinks this is somehow funny.

There is something wrong with that guy.

I think the worst part of Fable II is that you can't kill the Agility hero, even if he behaved in so many ways that would make it 100% warranted to kill him multiple times. AND he can actually steal your final kill just because he gets bored. That's depressing, methink.

But YMMV