“So it begins…” Theoden quietly murmured as his feeble army prepared to face Urukai at Helm’s Deep. I thought the same as I approached EB Games, perpared to face the horde of geeks in order to purchase Fable 2 as Oct 21st officially marked the beginning of video game onsalught for the Fall season. In the queue I currently have Fable 2, Fallout 3, Gears of War 2 and Mirrors Edge all for the Xbox 360 and nothing for the Playstation 3 as once again 2008 has proved to be a dismal year for Sony.
The story of Fable began 4 years ago on the original Xbox. I can’t really remember what made me buy the game as I rarely read video game blogs or zines at the time. It may have just been word of mouth. I do remember I throughly enjoying it as I’ve always been a fan of these medieval hack and slash magic type games but never had the patience to play RPG’s like World of Warcraft. Fable was a perfect fit as it allowed you to do all the cool stuff they have in RPG’s but leveling up, fighting and casting spells was dead easy. Plus I could make your ‘Hero’ belch and fart on demand.
Fast forward to August 2008. Fable 2 has long since been announced, I managed to catch a glimpse of the game play at PAX and I’m itching to get the game in my hot little hands. Lionhead releases Fable 2 Pub Games on Xbox Live on August 13th, a stroke of marketing genius that allowed the player to accumulate gold and in-game unlockables which you could transfer over to your hero when the game was officially released in October.
Fable 2 starts off with a brief intro cut scene, the visuals of which are stunning, but the actual gameplay graphics are comparable to the original Xbox version. A bit of a disappointment but I’m going to cut Lionhead a little slack as I know that they’ve had to stuff a shit-load of content into one tiny disc. I’ve also noticed a lot of technical bugs like clunky controls, slow frame rate and visual inaccuracies. But despite all that I’m still having a great time playing. I was quite curious about how the Pub Games feature actually worked in-game so I made it a priority when I started playing. I amassed a bankroll of around 7000 gold but also a debt of 3000, meant to be payed at the time I collected my gold in the full version of the game. When I went to collect, the ‘game master’ asked me to pay up, I refused, guards we called and gave me the option of fighting, community service or pay a 25 gold fine. I chose the fine as use that much gold to prop up my table. So far I’ve used the wealth I acquired playing pub games purchasing new clothes, a haircut and invested in some property.
The most unique feature of Fable 2 is decision making as it bears a lot of weight as the story progresses. For example, a seedy character in the dodgy part of town asks me to destroy all the crates a rivals warehouse. I accept his offer and as a result, his business grows exponentially as he becomes the only warehouse owner in Old Bowerstone. 10 years later when I come back to visit he ‘owns’ the old town. If I didn’t decide to help him 10 years earlier things may have turned out quite differently. Now imagine that scenario with every decision you make in the game.
(click on the photo’s to see them in all their hi-res glory)
I’m about 6 hours into Fable 2 and despite a few glitches and bugs I’m throughly enjoying my time spent playing it…and I haven’t even started the main story. I highly recommend this one. Now here’s a completely random song.
