Fable Preview.

[Signe]

This game looks so fun!  I am very much looking forward to it.

http://xbox.gamespy.com/xbox/fable/537969p1.html

Sorry... it's gamespy.  :(

[Alluvian]

Yeah, there was a pretty long video demo of it on this month's xbox magazine.  Molyneux talking over video that showed a lot of the early tutorial part of the game where you are a little child and then a lot of snippets showing how the combat works, skill development, bragging, character interaction and emotes, reaction to clothing options, etc....

The bragging was a nice idea.  Since Molyneux wanted this to be an adventure game with action oriented combat finding the right difficulty level was obviously a sticking point.  So they made all the required quests really easy and let you increase difficulty by bragging.  There was a scene where you could add difficulty to it and increase your fame if you complete it with the extra conditions.  One I remember was "Without a scratch" where you could not take any damage.  I think one was with double the enemies, I forget what the others were.

The combat was certainly twitch based and oriented around melee, bow, and magic.  Switching between them seemed very very simple as they would show him attacking one guy with a sword, getting surrounded, then using a magical force push to knock everyone away and to the ground.  The character then immediately pulled out his bow and started impaling people while circle strafing.  You can increase in bow, melee, or magic as you increase in skills.  My problem will be that I won't be able to pick one.  I will surely be pretty evenly split.  Maybe abit more bow and magic for me though.

[Arcadian Del Sol]

Its not the messiah that a lot of gamers have hoped it would be, but it will be about as fun as an XBox can get. I haven't anticipated a game this earnestly since Under a Killing Moon.

[Merusk]

Like the last Molyneux game, I'll wait out the first month or two and see how everyone feels after that.  It saved me from buying a $50 Tamagochi the last time.

[daveNYC]

I'll probably buy it after the first week.  All I'm concerned about is the potential of game breaking bugs.  Even when Molyneux fucks up the result is at least interesting.

[SirBruce]

I saw at at GDC and decided then I would buy it.

Bruce

[HaemishM]

If it's buggy, they sure as hell better allowing X-Box Live patching, or I won't even bother to consider what otherwise sounds like a great game.

[WayAbvPar]

Goddamn it. I hate RPGs on consoles, but this looks too good to pass up. I will likely wait a few days until a few of the folks here have tried it out, but it sounds like a lot of fun.

[Alluvian]

Think of it more of an adventure than an RPG.  I don't think there will be any numbers or stats visible in the game other than money.  It is a role playing game in the purest sense that you are playing the role of hero (or anti-hero) but not a roleplaying game in any of the standard video game ways.

It is yet to be seen how much the NPC interaction really affects the game and whether it is a good thing or an annoying minigame.  I will probably get the game early.  It has me fascinated.  I have a hard time imagining my not getting at least my money out of it.

If it is fun, it should be highly replayable.  Thinking of jack of all trades for my first character doing whatever actions come most naturally to me.  Either good or neutral good if the good stuff is too hokey to act out.

Then I think a fully concentrated magic badguy would be fun as well for an alternate runthrough.

[SirBruce]

NPC interaction very much effects the game.  All the NPCs go about their own virtual lives and virtual world when you're not around; what you do effects how they view and react to you.

Bruce

[daveNYC]

An RPG that allows you to play shades of grey instead of just flat good or evil, pure luv.

I wonder if any of the NPC code could have applications in MMOG space.

[Alluvian]

NPC interaction very much effects the game.  All the NPCs go about their own virtual lives and virtual world when you're not around; what you do effects how they view and react to you.

Bruce

That is what the talking heads say, yes.  But I don't really care what Molyneux says or the PR department.  He suckered me into buying black and white for fucks sake.  The gameplay itself seems worthy of playing the game.  The NPC interactions may or may not be as impressive as we are being told by those paid to say so.  And the interaction could take AWAY from the game instead of adding to it.

For all we know something as simple as hitting a wrong button in a menu and momentarily going naked in town will make you a laughing stock there for the rest of the game.  That would suck ass.  Accidentally hitting the wrong emote and belching instead of bowing to the mayor and he kicks you out of town.  Interaction is not always a positive.  How it is implemented won't be known until the game is rather extensively played.

[Shockeye]

As long as I don't have to train my hero when and where to crap.

[Morfiend]

I have been watching this game for a long time. I REALLY hoped it would be the Xbox Live coop RPG my friend and i ahve been looking for, and I was saddened greatly when they removed the multiplayer. It still looks like a really fun game, and it has been a while since I have played a good console rpg.

Next month. Lets hope they make release date.

[stray]

Preordered it last month, without knowing shit about it other than it was an RPG (I can make this kind of decision because I sold off every shit PC game I own..I'm a rich man when it comes to EB store credit). I guess this is good news. Besides KotOR and Gladius, X-Box RPG's have been pretty lame (Morrowind is overrated trash...and umm, stay away from Sudeki).

[Arcadian Del Sol]

If it's buggy, they sure as hell better allowing X-Box Live patching, or I won't even bother to consider what otherwise sounds like a great game.

wont happen. Microsoft's mantra is "no downloadable fixes for bugs ever" and I can't argue with that logic. The last thing we need is for the XBL services to become a centralized console patch distributor.

worth noting: the rule I mentioned obviously doesn't apply to the XBox Dashboard.

[Sky]

I was going to buy this title, anyway, but then I saw the video over on this site. Decent writeup, but scroll down to the videos section, there is a 40 minute video with interviews of Petey and several of the leads. Now I'm cleaning up a little bit of drool, even if I'm still a bit more excited about Jade Empire, since Bioware has made some of the greatest rpgs evar.

At the very worst, it'll be a fun 'toy'. At best....well, that'd be really cool.

Go watch that video, though.

[Sky]

Accidentally hitting the wrong emote and belching instead of bowing to the mayor and he kicks you out of town.

Roleplay, it man, roleplay it! You step before the mayor to give him an honoring bow....and a belch from that ale you had over lunch sneaks out!

:)

[schild]

The gameplay videos at Kikizo look great. Kicking chickens looks a lot more fun than picking them up and carrying them above your head.

Edit:

Traditional RPG enthusiasts will be in heaven, trying to squash every last point into such esoteric categories as how often you puke, how much sex you have and your furthest chicken kick.

Yummeh.

[HaemishM]

That video definitely got me excited about the game. I'm hoping I can find the ducats to get this on release.

[MrHat]

Just watched that interview vid.

This cracked me up:

What a kid did a few weeks ago, what a kid did, he came up to me and said 'I've heard there's this amazing economy system, and I don't believe it.' And I said well do what you wanna do.

So, one day, he went into a town and killed all the people in the town because he rationalized that if everyone was dead, than all the prices of the houses should fall and all the prices of the goods should fall because no one would want them.  So he bought up the whole town, every house, every shop, waited for the people to come back in and start populating the town again.  The prices for the houses went back up again, and he rented all the houses out, and he became the landlord of the town.

And that is emergent gameplay.

Fucking awesome.

Oh and chicken punting.  And stats for how far you kicked a chicken.

[NiX]

I'm considering buying an XBOX just so I can play this when it comes out. The only gripe I have is your character changing looks when he goes one way or another. Then again, I'm not too sure on how exactly that works.

[Trippy]

I'm considering buying an XBOX just so I can play this when it comes out. The only gripe I have is your character changing looks when he goes one way or another. Then again, I'm not too sure on how exactly that works.

Your character's appearance will change based on both his "alignment" (good or evil) and which skills he favors. E.g. as you tend toward evil your character will grow horns out of his head and supposedly even get hooves though I haven't seen pictures of that. As you go toward good you get a halo (haven't seen any of screenshots of that either, guess it's not as cool as the horn effect) and stuff like that. Your appearance also changes depending on the skills you use most. So melee fighters change to look like Conan the Barbarian, spell casters will look like Gandalf since they'll age faster and their hair will turn white and "stealth" characters will look leaner and move faster.

[AOFanboi]

Microsoft's mantra is "no downloadable fixes for bugs ever"

Incorrect AFAIK: There have already been bug-fix downloads, but apparently Microsoft only let Live-using (not just highscore-storing) games do it.

(However, apart from Rallisport Challenge 2, I cannot think of any other games that have been patched this way. Also, it's possible it was considered a "nerf" instead of a bug-fix.)

[Arcadian Del Sol]

Thats not fixing a bug. I'm talking stuff like the now notorious game stopper bug in KotoR (forgot its name now). There was even a patch developed, but it was not permitted on XBL. Stuff like juggling around the game dynamics because players were powerstriking for the win isn't a bug patch - its a balance patch which XBL has always allowed, as long as it was tied to a content patch of some sort. But if the update is strictly to fix an outright programming mistake, they dont allow that. The fear is that once they open that Pandora's Box, we'll be downloading Ultima 9 1.1 type patches that take a fortnight and clog the service for week.

[Sky]

Ok, to counter the nice video I linked above, here's a different take on the game. Sounds like a much more realistic picture of the Pete Molyneux we have come to know, certainly knocked my fanboism back a couple notches.

[Arcadian Del Sol]

Great Link - that may be the best written game review I've ever read. It was engrossing.

[schild]

Great Link - that may be the best written game review I've ever read. It was engrossing.

While it was well written, it's a full 34 days before the release of the actual game - or about 3 weeks or so until the gold master is due. That's a lot of time to address the cosmetic concerns (a few mannerisms, clothing, and replies) that the reviewer had. It's a safe bet Molyneux and co. got a hold of that review before it was even published.

Either way, I'm still buying the game and preordered it as of yesterday (and got a halfway decent limited edition dvd with the preorder).

[Arcadian Del Sol]

Based on everything that review had to say, I'd buy it if that was the only thing I ever heard about Fable.  What they point to as drawbacks (narrow/small play areas) are old hat for XBox owners now. It certainly can't be any more confined than Deus Ex: Invisible War - which took place inside a warehouse.

PS: http://www.members.shaw.ca/goodwills/countdown.htm">this will only make you sadder - Fable countdown

[Sky]

Things like repetetive villagers, and the screens I've seen with villagers in them, has me in the mind of the B&W villagers, which were god-awful. Given the relatively underpowered xbox, it's a valid concern, I guess.

Not that I won't buy it anyway. I'm just hoping it's not another B&W debacle, like most people.

What they point to as drawbacks (narrow/small play areas) are old hat for XBox owners now.

Yep, consoles are doing so much to push gaming forward. If by pushing forward one means holding it back. Damn LCD. At least it's not on the Crapstation2. ^^

[Rasix]

I can live with Fable not being ROBOT JESUS. The review pointed out mostly stuff that wouldn't stop me from buying a game.

Still looking forward to this and will likely preorder soon.  I just hope there are no game breaking bugs.  I've yet to buy a XBox game with one, and not looking forward to the day when one pops up on me.