Fable
Part 3: The Ugly
Tags: Fable Categories: Reviews, Xbox Reviews
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Oct 6th, 2004
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Fable (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action RPG | No | ||
Please read part one which focused on being good and part two which focused on being evil before progressing with the main review.
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There isn’t a large variety of monsters in Fable, something that is abundantly clear after only a few hours. It seems that the game was cut in half, with it being possible to accomplish the game in less than 12 hours.The quests seem rather… well, the game is short. Of course this doesn’t include going through the game a second time (once as good, once as evil) or tackling the many side quests. It would have been nice to at lease see a somewhat larger variety of enemies even in this small world.
It also would have been nice to have a larger world.
The choices presented to the player don’t have the same feel as other games where one has the option of being good or evil. The dialogues don’t really provide a sense of conversation where the player feels like they are participating in making a choice. There is no intimidation of townsfolk through talking to them. The option to lie isn’t present.
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It is possible to marry more than one person in the game. The game’s sense of evil and good doesn’t always match with what is morally right and wrong. It felt very odd having a halo appear while shuttling between two wives. Though to be fair, the game doesn’t discriminate against whether or not marriage is between two people of the same sex. A rather open minded approach to a society that doesn’t have indoor plumbing.
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Graphically Fable is good. The character visibly ages over time and that’s a cool feature that should be a benchmark in future games of this sort. Unfortunately there are many graphical problems that don’t show off how powerful the Xbox really is. There are far too many instances of clipping, for example, but that’s not the worst of it.
All too often there will be some “stuttering” in the framerates. This is particularly irritating when battling one of the bosses or accomplishing some of the timed side-quests.
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Another glitch shows up graphically with some clipping – a lot of clipping, particularly is some of the cutscenes. This is particularly odd, as one would expect those to be of better quality. To the developer’s credit, the cutscenes are rendered using the in-game engine.
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There is plenty of detail and activity in the land giving the impression of a “living” land, through the feeling is that something more could have been done. Part of this has to do with the fact that the game’s path is so narrow. Fable isn’t the open-ended do anything game that it should be. Yes, it is possible to take as much time as possible to complete the game, but certain areas of the world don’t open up until certain storyline specific tasks are accomplished. This gets into just how linear the game really is.
It would have been nice if the whole of the country were actually open at once, allowing the player to explore the land from the get-go, with certain “life events” tied to the game’s clock. Since the character ages, why not have events tied to occur during certain years?
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Perhaps though the biggest crime that Fable is guilty of is the load times. The maps are very small and getting from one end of the world to the other can take forever with the loading that goes on between each small map. Sure, it’s possible to teleport to the major areas of the map once they open up, but when a player wants to go trough the land slaughtering enemies to build up experience, it shouldn’t take nearly as long to load a map as it does to walk from one end of it to another. The Xbox’s hard drive should have been used better.
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There are other pieces to Fable which deserve looking at in-depth, such as how the character is altered in appearance by tattoos and hairstyles, as well as the various skills and spells that players can choose from. These, however, are window dressing to the primary game. getting the fishing rod and learning how to fish is just another way in which the game has a high immersive factor, showing off the living world. Same thing with hairstyles and tattoos.
Fable isn’t really an RPG. It is an action game with RPG elements. Players should ultimately look at that when deciding upon picking up Fable. There isn’t anything wrong with it being a primarliy action game, but those expecting a deep gameplay ruleset will be disappointed. This however, adds to the accessability of the game to a wider audience.
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Is Fable worth the price? Ultimately, yes, though not without reservations. Players looking for a more visceral thrill-ride may want to look elsewhere, or simply rent the game for the weekend. Players that like to play a game several times through and actively search out the hidden treasures will defenitely get more than their money’s worth.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
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+ Great story, particularly if the player wants to walk a morally ambiguous line, but primarily good. + The level of interactivity on the part of non-player characters is really nice. + A living breathing world. + High replayability. + The audio - including the music - is very well done. |
8.1 |
| What Doesn't | |
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- Being evil is a chore. - No conversational choices - it's all monologues on the part of NPCs, then (if anything) a "yes" or "no" option at the end. - A small world. - Graphical shortcomings, such as stuttering, and the all too annoying load times. |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| This game deserves to be played if for nothing else than to see an exercise in walking around in a land that has a daily life that is wrapped around a good story. Fable is better suited toward players that want to play as a good character, but those that have the perseverence can really go evil if they want. | |
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Tags: Fable
Posted by Daniel "monk" Pelfrey on Oct 6th, 2004 and is filed under Reviews, Xbox Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
