Fable 2 (hitherto forth referred to as Fable 1.2 so as to keep readers from being confused into thinking that anything changed from its predecessor) is a game that can be summed up in a single word: shallow. From afar, the game seems to offer a lot of depth for players to splash around in and have a ball, but once you get up close and personal with the game, you quickly find out that the water only reaches your ankles. I tried to give the game a chance, I really did. I got a lot of encouragement from friends to try out the game despite the overall mediocrity of the first one. “Lionhead fixed everything bad about the game,” they said in response to my proclaiming the game was likely trash; “It’s so much better than the first one.” However, if you were one of the many people like myself who believed all these lies, you probably know that I have a lot of dishonest friends to smack upside the head in the next week.
I don’t know what game these naysayers were playing, but it sure as hell wasn’t the Fable 1.2 that came with my purchase. Nothing has changed since the first game. In fact, if anything, the game has gotten significantly worse because of the dumbed down combat system. You would think that Peter Molyneux would get things right after four years of criticism for his flop of a game, but I”m still sitting here with the same exact complaints about the game that I did with the first Fable. It’s as if all they did to improve the game was slap box art on the game that was even more deceptively awesome than the first one and just repeated the same crap in the same setting, only a few centuries in the future. It’d be different if they had done something to make the game fit today’s standards, but all that I can see from Fable 1.2 is a newer version of my disappointment from four years ago.
Because the story, plot, characters, and immersion are all the most important parts of an RPG (you know, considering that ROLEPLAY bit that’s thrown in there), lets focus on how Fable 1.2 does dreadfully horrible at all of them. The main story is as awful as it is short, which is very. The plot progresses in very much the same way as the first game, in which you start of as a little prepubescent twerp, learn about all the same game mechanics from the first game, and then are stricken by a tragedy that forces you to become the stalwart hero who liberates the world from dark forces because all the other people are sensible enough not to bother with this trite bullshit. The clichés definitely don’t help the fact that the plot is just awful. Granted, I haven’t gotten very far in the game, but there’s something to be said about the fact that I’m 2 hours into a 10 hour game and I’m already drooling with boredom with no hope of redemption in the near future.
While it might sound like my standards are high for RPG plotlines, they’re really not. There are only so many Flash Gordons and Star Wars and Lord of the Rings that people can make. You can bet your ass that if you’re playing an RPG, you’re likely going to be one of a handful of people (teenagers if it’s out of Japan) who are the world’s only hope of salvation from a big evil (and flamboyant if it’s out of Japan) baddie. But at least other games try to be original. While interesting characters and intriguing plot twists keep everything fresh for other games, Fable 1.2′s like the bastard child in the corner that has just stopped caring about the lack of praise from its peers. It does nothing to be a successful sequel, hardly makes any attempt at preforming properly as an RPG, and falls short of every low expectation you could’ve possibly had. Assassin’s Creed 2 is an example of a great sequel. It’s predecessor was a good game with a lot of flaws and blemishes that kept it from being much more than interesting, but Ubisoft listened to their fans’ complaints and made improvements to AC2 that turned it into a great game with a few minor issues. Fable 1.2 sort of just shits all over everyone’s problems with the first game and stubbornly insists on doing everything all over again.
I’ve been told that Fable 1.2 has “spine chilling” moral decisions (lolwothyperbole) and consequences for each action, but Ii just don’t see it. For example, one of the aforementioned decisions supposedly happens during a quest in which a dead bride’s spirits asks you to break the heart of the man that left her on her wedding day. “Cool,” I said, actually somewhat hopeful that I might enjoy some aspect of this game. I was sorely disappointed when I came back five minutes later and finished the quest. This is literally how it went: I picked up the quest and was told to make him fall in love with me, then give him a note that said it was all a lie. I was given a book about being sultry, which then gave me the emote (i.e. the only way the protagonist talks in Fable 1.2) ‘seduction’, which happened to be the emote that the bride’s fiance really liked. So, I go to see this coldhearted asshat, find out that he’s a sweet guy that just felt they were too young, and proceed to spam the seduction emote for 30 seconds. That’s all it took for this man to fall in love with my character; 30 seconds of spamming one action over and over again. He then tells me he’s in love with me and I’m given the choice to either marry him and leave the spiteful witch behind or crush his heart and destroy his relationship with his fiance. Spine chilling? Why the hell wouldn’t I break the imbecile’s heart? All I had to do was bat my character eyelashes a few times and the guy wanted a ring from me. Like hell if he’ll get one.
This brings me to the other issue with the game: the gameplay itself. Combat is boring and unintuitive; the X button swings your melee weapon, the Y button shoots your ranged weapon, and B uses your selected magic. The B button is really the only one you’ll ever need to use in combat, though, even despite the fact that you can only have one magic spell equipped at any given time. During combat, the game essentially gives you no way to change your magic without being punished. There are no “quickslots” and the only way to change out your magic is to hold RT and choose a different spell with your d-pad, but since all of this is happening in real time and the point of combat is Fable 1.2 is just to mash buttons as fast as you can to kill everything around you, it’s kind of silly to even bother. Plus, all you really have to do is buy an area of effect spell when you first start off and invest all of your experience points in that in order to push your way through the game. Don’t worry; there’s no MP score, so you can spam that spell all you want. Some may argue that you have to use all methods of fighting to get the most out of combat, but that argument essentially suggests that you try harder for lesser gain in order to have just a sliver of extra fun, which should tell you something about the level of fun and excitement this game offers. Besides, using ranged or melee attacks would make you have to spend significantly more points in order to be just as effective as that single spell, all the while forcing you to take part in tedious mini-game “jobs” which end up being your only source of income in the beginning.
Gameplay outside of combat is even worse because it’s all pointless. Again, that “shallow” description of Fable 1.2 comes to mind. While the game promises depth and hours upon hours of gameplay, the reality is that Fable 1.2 meshes the lame aspects of a life-simulator with the bad pieces of an RPG and playing the game becomes both trite and pointless. The truth of the matter is that unless you’ve been comatose for the past 15 years and have touched neither a simulator game nor a half-decent RPG, Fable 1.2 is going to fall dangerously short of your expectations. In fact, the only thing that the game does succeed at is being Knights of the Old Republic’s retarded bastard child who can’t find the means to crawl out of its father’s gargantuan shadow of awesome.
Perhaps I’m being a bit of a cynical douche bag about this game; there are some slightly redeeming aspects to it. Unfortunately, any self-respecting RPG’er has to use a magnifying glass to find any sign of something that isn’t sheer mediocrity. To be honest, the first thirty minutes of the game were actually relatively enjoyable. Despite only just falling short of copying Fable 1′s introduction verbatim (I mean, fuck–they even had you destroying some poor schmuck’s barrels and crates as an evil act while you were a child), the very beginning of Fable 1.2 happened to be intriguing. There was the slightest sense of immersion once you got past the fact that everyone was shaped like a dwarf (and will be throughout the entirety of the game) and I actually became interested in the characters. Your sister is fun to hang around with, the townspeople are marginally entertaining, and the villain seems to have enough depth to him to be a satisfying opponent to thwart. Lionhead screws it all up shortly after your childhood is over, though. The cynical hag (blatantly Fable 1′s hero’s sister) becomes KotOR’s Kreia, the villain turns into LoZ’s Ganondorf (no reason to be stupidly evil save for the fact that he’s stupidly evil), and the rest of the game continues to stumble down into it reaches a level of complete mediocrity.
There are a lot of good concepts thrown into the game, but Lionhead dug it’s own grave my over exaggerating the depth of it all. At the end of the day, Fable 1.2 plays well enough to be charming for any unsuspecting console fanboys, but too poor to satisfy the needs of anyone who has played five minutes of a good RPG. I might even have the willpower to trudge through the entirety of the game at least once, but the reality is that I likely won’t offer myself a chance. There are a lot more pleasing Western RPG’s to pick up from Bioware and Fable 1.2 is going to fall at the absolute bottom of my To Do list.
