Fable II, developed by Peter Molyneux's team at Lionhead Studios, is the second game in the ambitious Fable franchise, which aims to place players in the shoes of a legendary hero in the world of Albion while providing free reign for them to chose a lifestyle and moral code to follow. Having not played the original, I can't speak the improvements from the first game to the second, but I can say that Fable II strives to do great things, implements some good ideas, and has shining spots of brilliant narration, but ultimately suffers due to the mechanical feel of the characters that populate Albion and the similarly mechanical social gameplay systems that allow your hero to affect them.
Fable II's story begins 500 years after the original. The heroes that formerly populated Albion have vanished, leaving them truly as the stuff of myth. The player begins their journey as a child living as an orphan in the city of Bowerstone, along with their sister Rose. Being convinced by an old blind woman to buy a magic music box sets off a chain of events that will ultimately lead to the player being raised by in a gypsy camp. A decade later, the hero makes their return to Bowerstone, ready to right the wrongs that were done and claim the mantle of heroes past.
Where exactly the hero goes from there is up to the player. There is always a quest meant to push forward the game's main plot waiting in the background, but the player is free to take on other tasks until he or she is ready to continue with the story. The hero can get married, have children, get a job, or spend hard earned cash at the many stalls and stores that are to be found.
It sounds as if there is a lot to do in Albion, and players will certainly never find themselves without something to do, but it all ends up being a bit repetitive. The various jobs are all more or less the same: a mini-game consisting of hitting the A button at just the right time. This becomes tedious rather quickly, but buying and renting a house or business or two can easily keep the cash rolling in so players can leave the manual labor behind quickly.
Marriage is supposed to be a milestone in a person's life, but its hardly treated as such in Albion. In fact, players can get married almost right out of the gate. All a player really has to do is spend three to five minutes dancing or posing in front of a member of the opposite sex (or the same sex if that's more to the hero's liking), find a suitable ring, and suddenly wedding bells are chiming. Making marriage this simple drains the reward from it. It doesn't help that all the potential spouses feel like they were cloned from two or three originals and programmed with identical responses. Should a hero marry Beryl, Alex, or Amelia? They all look the same, sound the same, and more or less act the same, so who really cares?
Fable II could have benefited greatly by taking a cue from BioWare and adding some sort of dialog tree to social interactions. Instead, heroes learn expressions by reading books. These expressions include things like dancing and breaking wind, so instead of having conversations, players are forced to communicate through jigs and farts. Somehow this just doesn't convey a lot of depth of character. Instead of rich conversations and endearing courtships, players end up spamming whatever expression is his or her chosen mate's favorite and then moves them right into their marital home.
The games' combat feels much smoother than most of the rest of the game, although its magical aspects get a little cumbersome. The set up is simple: one button swings your sword, another shoots your ranged weapon, a third casts spells. You can level up these three aspects with experience points, gaining new abilities such as roll, flourish, and counter to spice up your battles. You can also learn new spells, or level up old ones. Once you've done so, higher level versions of spells can be cast by holding down the spell casting button for a longer period of time, and different spells can be placed at different points on the spell casting meter. This works well enough, but it can be troublesome to try to switch spells in the middle of battle, as it requires use of the otherwise sidelined D-pad, and sometimes the player will get stuck in the spell selection menu while bad guys are beating his or her hero to a pulp. Usually its not a huge issue, but smoother spell transition would have been nice. Otherwise, combat is simple enough for the uninitiated to button mash through, while having a certain more complex aspect that gives hardcore gamers a chance to really dig in.
The games narrative is mostly pretty standard fantasy fair: there's a bad guy planning to do bad things and you have to stop him. There are moments when the game achieves something greater and closer to its goal of placing the weight of morality firmly on the player, most notably when the hero first visits the Tattered Spire. Without spoiling anything, the game leaves its fairly stark black and white are you good or are you evil approach, and instead asks the player just how much of a hero he or she really is. The consequences aren't dire enough to make anyone lose sleep over their decision, but they are presented so well that it will still leave a lasting impression on the player. Unfortunately, despite being warned that the world has changed when you finally get to leave the Spire, most things seem largely the same. The stores are all still selling the same goods, and even many of the quests you left behind are still waiting for you. Its a little anti-climactic, but not enough so to ruin the experience of the event itself.
Bottom line: Fable II is not a bad game, its just a game that doesn't live up to its own lofty goals. It seems to consistently choose quantity over quality in its social aspects, preferring breadth to depth.
Recommendation: The solid combat and occasionally interesting narrative make it a fun venture for anyone simply looking for a enjoyable action-RPG. Just don't be surprised if the social aspects feel a bit dry.
Fable II's story begins 500 years after the original. The heroes that formerly populated Albion have vanished, leaving them truly as the stuff of myth. The player begins their journey as a child living as an orphan in the city of Bowerstone, along with their sister Rose. Being convinced by an old blind woman to buy a magic music box sets off a chain of events that will ultimately lead to the player being raised by in a gypsy camp. A decade later, the hero makes their return to Bowerstone, ready to right the wrongs that were done and claim the mantle of heroes past.
Where exactly the hero goes from there is up to the player. There is always a quest meant to push forward the game's main plot waiting in the background, but the player is free to take on other tasks until he or she is ready to continue with the story. The hero can get married, have children, get a job, or spend hard earned cash at the many stalls and stores that are to be found.
It sounds as if there is a lot to do in Albion, and players will certainly never find themselves without something to do, but it all ends up being a bit repetitive. The various jobs are all more or less the same: a mini-game consisting of hitting the A button at just the right time. This becomes tedious rather quickly, but buying and renting a house or business or two can easily keep the cash rolling in so players can leave the manual labor behind quickly.
Marriage is supposed to be a milestone in a person's life, but its hardly treated as such in Albion. In fact, players can get married almost right out of the gate. All a player really has to do is spend three to five minutes dancing or posing in front of a member of the opposite sex (or the same sex if that's more to the hero's liking), find a suitable ring, and suddenly wedding bells are chiming. Making marriage this simple drains the reward from it. It doesn't help that all the potential spouses feel like they were cloned from two or three originals and programmed with identical responses. Should a hero marry Beryl, Alex, or Amelia? They all look the same, sound the same, and more or less act the same, so who really cares?
Fable II could have benefited greatly by taking a cue from BioWare and adding some sort of dialog tree to social interactions. Instead, heroes learn expressions by reading books. These expressions include things like dancing and breaking wind, so instead of having conversations, players are forced to communicate through jigs and farts. Somehow this just doesn't convey a lot of depth of character. Instead of rich conversations and endearing courtships, players end up spamming whatever expression is his or her chosen mate's favorite and then moves them right into their marital home.
The games' combat feels much smoother than most of the rest of the game, although its magical aspects get a little cumbersome. The set up is simple: one button swings your sword, another shoots your ranged weapon, a third casts spells. You can level up these three aspects with experience points, gaining new abilities such as roll, flourish, and counter to spice up your battles. You can also learn new spells, or level up old ones. Once you've done so, higher level versions of spells can be cast by holding down the spell casting button for a longer period of time, and different spells can be placed at different points on the spell casting meter. This works well enough, but it can be troublesome to try to switch spells in the middle of battle, as it requires use of the otherwise sidelined D-pad, and sometimes the player will get stuck in the spell selection menu while bad guys are beating his or her hero to a pulp. Usually its not a huge issue, but smoother spell transition would have been nice. Otherwise, combat is simple enough for the uninitiated to button mash through, while having a certain more complex aspect that gives hardcore gamers a chance to really dig in.
The games narrative is mostly pretty standard fantasy fair: there's a bad guy planning to do bad things and you have to stop him. There are moments when the game achieves something greater and closer to its goal of placing the weight of morality firmly on the player, most notably when the hero first visits the Tattered Spire. Without spoiling anything, the game leaves its fairly stark black and white are you good or are you evil approach, and instead asks the player just how much of a hero he or she really is. The consequences aren't dire enough to make anyone lose sleep over their decision, but they are presented so well that it will still leave a lasting impression on the player. Unfortunately, despite being warned that the world has changed when you finally get to leave the Spire, most things seem largely the same. The stores are all still selling the same goods, and even many of the quests you left behind are still waiting for you. Its a little anti-climactic, but not enough so to ruin the experience of the event itself.
Bottom line: Fable II is not a bad game, its just a game that doesn't live up to its own lofty goals. It seems to consistently choose quantity over quality in its social aspects, preferring breadth to depth.
Recommendation: The solid combat and occasionally interesting narrative make it a fun venture for anyone simply looking for a enjoyable action-RPG. Just don't be surprised if the social aspects feel a bit dry.
