Fable 3...

[Casual Shinji]

The only good thing that Fable 3 managed to do was, be so bad that it forced me to trade it for Fallout: New Vegas which I otherwise would probably not have bought.

Thanks, Fable 3

 

[Ridgemo]

*SPOILERS*

On my first play through i didn't realise that you'd have to have all that money come the ruling stage, so what really annoyed me was how I felt it was punishing me for being good. I know being good sometimes comes with its drawbacks, but when you keep all your promises, but your still a massive dick because you let the darkness cause geneocide on your kingdom, makes you wonder why you bothered.

On my second playthrough though i easily had enough money, and now currently own every building you can. Of course, i can't get the make 20 friends achievement because rescuing everyone seems to have instantly put me in their goodbooks.

Overall though i throughly enjoyed Fable III, I hated number 2, so I'm pleasently surprised by how this one came out.

 

[GLo Jones]

You see, Unlike most here, I took notice of the crazy irrational passing of time, and did some research into when the cut-off point actually was.

When I knew I was on the last playable day, I raised the appropriate money (about 7.5 million to be safe), and casually strolled through. I now have angel wings, and a full kingdom of people who adore me.

feelsgoodman[/jpg]

 

[Thespian]

After my review I posted here where I ranted, I have found the best way to think about it.

When you play it, don't think you're playing Fable, but just another game, then let it prove to you that it is fable.

I have to agree with this. The game doesn't initially feel like Fable, but it shines through further on.

Notice: Here be some mild Spoilers and major Ranting.

I got just about 9 hours of gameplay from the main storyline, without doing any additional stuff. I died twice due to a lack of paying attention or leveling up beforehand. But now, being Ruler of Albion, I simply can't get enough of farting around the land, doing nothing of consequence. I love visiting all the areas I had to unfortunately screw over whilst gathering resources and try to improve my moral standing there. I love buying more and more property and renting it out to raise revenue, allow the land to re-populate and keeping a huge supply of money. I love having an outrageous amount of gold for no reason, which is now justified by the rooms that you can fill with huge piles of currency, just to jump around in, apparently. I love watching my weapons change and grow, I love sprouting wings, kicking a hobbe into the air and then sluggin' it out of the park with my hammer. I love being chased around Mourningwood by about a hundred or so Hollowmen, just to toss them into a vortex and bullseye 'em with my rifle from afar. I love the smooth feeling of the albeit very simplistic combat system. I love mixing different spells, even just to see predictable outcomes.

So yeah, I really like Fable 3. A lot more than Fable 2. I think Lionhead really got the whole character thing right. I mean, I was evil in Fable II because I didn't know anything about most of the characters (except for Reaver, who rocks), not even my own. It didn't mean anything when everyone hated me. I had no sense of who I was, save for a guy as fat as the pie I last ate, or wearing the latest outfit I just found.
When I think of character customization, I think it's important that the character is changeable to the player's every whim, but retains a definite character. Look at Mass Effect - We all know who Shepard is, yet we all have our own unique idea of him or her. Our King or Queen in Fable has personality. We know what they are like, how they sound, and at least roughly how they look.
As for the other characters, I actually cared for them. I couldn't bear to betray Ben or Sabine. Though I didn't know much about Khalin, who had a very short role, but I was interested enough to want to know more. Page got on my nerves sometimes, but I understood her motives and the desperation of her struggle. I wanted to uphold my promises to these characters - And I was particularly attached to Walter.

Here is where I think that Fable's greatest success came - In breaking out of the bland greyness of moral choice systems.

I know it doesn't seem like this, with the glorious light of righteous goodliness on one path, and the evil blood-dripping horror of rapeful baby-eating on the other. But to be honest, the actions as a Ruler ended up very good. For example, I half-broke my promise to Page, and left Aurora in the dark. But I also gave Dwellers free reign of the mountains, and restored the Brightwall Academy, and set up the safe sewage plant and the school in bowerstone. I also suffered great losses in the invasion. Okay, sure, so the game labelled me as "Hero", but it still felt like I was in that grey area of what was right and wrong that I wanted. I was loved in places like MourningWood, Bowerstone, Brightwall and Mystpeaks, but hated in Millfields and Aurora. Which is how it would be. Different factions have different views. I like that, and if Fable had represented it more with the characters, so that they didn't just love you when you did something good and hate when you let them down, it could have really flourished.

The game required some commitment, but it paid off. I loved it, anywho.

 

[Joe Deadman]

I kinda saw it coming I mean it went from 300 and something to 200 and something then 122 so I figured I better not go any further till I had the funds.
Still took a hell of a long time to get the funds though.

 

[The Hero Killer]

At least most of you were able to beat the game. I got right to the end and was on my way to the castle to put my money into the treasury and got the falling glitch. 20 hours of hard work down the drain.

 

[RatRace123]

I liked it, though I don't think I liked it as much as 2.
The main thing that pisses me off is how short your time as King/Queen is and how little you actually get to do. I know you have important things to do during the story, but after the story I just wanted to fart about in the throne room, sitting on the throne and convicting random citizens to death or imprisonment in the dungeons.

 

[Veldt Falsetto]

When i became the king,the choices i got are so arbitrarily annoying,why can't i build a factory but ban child labor? come on!

I was hoping the game would actually let me,you know,manage my kingdom,instead of being a figure head.

This, I mean, why the hell am I king when I actually have no control, infact, where the hell was the middle ground, why where the choices absurdly bad or stupidly good, made no sense.

In addition, why does it have to be, I WILL DO THIS NOW AND THEN FORGET IT HAPPENED.

Why can't you say, look, the entire population now knows what's gonna happen...so stop demanding stupid trivial things, if any of you are still alive after this nonsense then you can propose it to me, right now I need money and YOU aren't helping.

The "good" route, everyone dies but has their stupid last moments free of pollution or slavery or whatever

The "bad" route, no one dies but everyone hates you because you didn't free them from slavery.

Afterwards, you can't say, oh I'm sorry, now we have some money and no immediate doom, I can do everything you little idiots wanted.

 

[T_ConX]

The game does ease you into the 'We're going to arbitrarily jump from day n to day n+25' thing by going from 365 days remaining to 339 days remaining to I forget the rest. So of course it's going to catch you with your pants down if you're not paying attention. It's an INVASION, not a diplomatic visit.

I kept all promises, ruled benevolently, and saved everyone.

Why can't you say, look, the entire population now knows what's gonna happen...so stop demanding stupid trivial things, if any of you are still alive after this nonsense then you can propose it to me, right now I need money and YOU aren't helping.

Except they don't know. It was just you and Walter in the cave. You're only aware of the threat because Teresa told about it. I'm not entirely sure your inner circle (Sebine, Ben Finn, Page, etc) completely believes you, let alone a populace of 6,500,000 who are desperately hoping this doesn't turn out to be a case 'Meet the new boss, same as the old boss'. What are you going to do?

Look, I know I promised you an Orphanage, but the thing is... there's this blind seer who appears in my dreams and talks only to me, and she told me that there's some Lovecraftian horror that's planning to invade Albion, and the loading screen says I have less then a year to save up about six and a half million gold pieces to build an army to combat a threat that no one besides me even knows exists. Read my lips! I'm not a crook! I did not have sexual relations with that woman! I'm not a Witch!

 

[azza987]

Final thought. Short and simple, Fable 3 IS a huge letdown. needs a more passionate crew maybe? not that they didnt try. But there is a LOT missed out.
i played fallout 3 which was sharp as fuck, no glitches, piss offs there...
i'm beginning to think i shud have brought fallout vegas!
I honestly do feel let down by Lionhead...

 

[azza987]

Out of the three, Fable 1 was the best for me. it had the magic which has been lost slowly through 2 and 3, like terminator 1 and 2 say, that got shit on with terminator 3...

 

[azza987]

im just tryin to have some gambling fun with the chicken race, but wait... another glitch... i cant bet on the race... what fucked up software do Lionhead need to use? Obviously a PC hardcore advanced one. as i dont recall the shit load of problems with any other single game. STOP MAKING THE GAME MORE POWERFUL THAN THE SYSTEM! or WHATEVERS MESSING IT UP! I DONT LIKE IT! i'l buy the new XBox720 and Fable IV, and if i'm not impressed with with it I WILL SACK ALL OF LIONHEAD! and make the game myself! (yea, in my dreams maybe)
Meanwhile i think i'l maybe just flush this fable 3 disk down the toilet..

 

[Veldt Falsetto]

The game does ease you into the 'We're going to arbitrarily jump from day n to day n+25' thing by going from 365 days remaining to 339 days remaining to I forget the rest. So of course it's going to catch you with your pants down if you're not paying attention. It's an INVASION, not a diplomatic visit.

I kept all promises, ruled benevolently, and saved everyone.

Why can't you say, look, the entire population now knows what's gonna happen...so stop demanding stupid trivial things, if any of you are still alive after this nonsense then you can propose it to me, right now I need money and YOU aren't helping.

Except they don't know. It was just you and Walter in the cave. You're only aware of the threat because Teresa told about it. I'm not entirely sure your inner circle (Sebine, Ben Finn, Page, etc) completely believes you, let alone a populace of 6,500,000 who are desperately hoping this doesn't turn out to be a case 'Meet the new boss, same as the old boss'. What are you going to do?

Look, I know I promised you an Orphanage, but the thing is... there's this blind seer who appears in my dreams and talks only to me, and she told me that there's some Lovecraftian horror that's planning to invade Albion, and the loading screen says I have less then a year to save up about six and a half million gold pieces to build an army to combat a threat that no one besides me even knows exists. Read my lips! I'm not a crook! I did not have sexual relations with that woman! I'm not a Witch!

I'm pretty sure that when Logan announced why he was such a dick there was a huge amount of people around plus, the fact that you can't change stuff around afterwards and continue your rule over albion is a bit sucky, if I were king, I'd keep all my promises but then after that I wouldn't have to choose between the impossibly vile or the impossibly saintly thing to do, I wanted middle ground, this is not what being a ruler is like, yes you have to make difficult decisions but you don't have to make the decision to either make the orphanage into a brothel or to make it a hundred times better, what about the decision to keep the orphanage the way it is until after the impending attack, or improve it a little bit so to spare a bit of money. This wasn't the only decision that was stupid, the fact that little people came to you personally with the most miniscule of things and the result is that you have to choose between complete evil and gain a stupid amount of money or completely good and lose everything you have, it's annoying, thats all.

 

[ohgodalex]

Fable III was brilliant, but I can't get myself into it. Investing myself 100% into Black Ops as of now.

 

[AcacianLeaves]

When i became the king,the choices i got are so arbitrarily annoying,why can't i build a factory but ban child labor? come on!

I was hoping the game would actually let me,you know,manage my kingdom,instead of being a figure head.

This is exactly what I thought throughout most of it. The game presents these false dichotomies to your choices. Either you have to institute slavery or build schools for orphans. Either you have to tax everyone in the kingdom to death or not tax them at all. Why do designers promise 'choice' when they know they can't deliver? As you said, why not build a safe factory? Why not just tax certain things? Why not offer people incentives for joining your military that aren't financial? Why not try to develop alternate weaponry to fight the big evil darkness?

It may have been better than Fable 2, but Peter Molyneaux needs to learn to shut up. Also, I get the feeling that he really wants a piece of The Sims pie. Half of the series is focused on doing inane daily tasks and making an easy, simple game that any fool can play.

 

[mensowvm]

Well first of all I must admit that i am currently on my second playthrough and I've had a great time playing fable. However I agree. It could have been sooooooooooo much better because of several reasons allready mentioned earlier so i'm not going to repeat them, here's some things that totally annoyed me:

Both the revolution as the fight against the darkness were too short,too easy and should have had way more options. For one I would have liked to actually see my army. I payed 6.5 million for it. The least they can give me, is to show it to me just once! or give them an encouraging speech or something before going to batle and like said earlier fighting in different places with at least an hour of gameplay with several revolution or darkness fighting sub quests.

The second thing that totally pissed me off was the lack of bosses. I mean the mercenary and hollow man bosses were just slightly upgraded versions of enemies you could face later on in the game. Don't even get me started on the final boss! If I fight the darkness I actually wanne fight the darkness not Walter....

thirdly: this only started annoying me on my second play through as an evil king. Why can't I make any evil promises? all of the promises should have had an evil alternative or you should have had evil promises that you could have broken as a good king/queen. For me breaking the promises just didn't do it. I would have loved it if i could have made all kind of promises to reaver for example.....

anyway i'm going to stop complaining now. looking forward to any reactions

 

[WolfThomas]

The annoying thing is that many of the so called evil choices aren't really bad, flood 20 hippies with sewage to save 300,000 lives. Building a whorehouse saves 1.5million people. Also the game treats high taxation as being evil, which coming from Australia I found extremely libertarian.

Another thing that annoyed me a whole lot is that it's not a fucking revolution it's a coup. Revolution indicates change of government. They lost one king for another, no big change. If you had options to make Albion a democracy or even a republic, it might be.

Also I wished they bring back scarring like they had in the first game, okay it was pretty ridiculous but I wish there was a middle ground between the different games. I liked having a scarred hero, it made me feel badass. Maybe if you could still get scarred from combat (say random critical hits), but a doctor could erase certain scars but you could keep the ones that are aesthetically pleasuing like a balverine scratch over one side of the face.

First off, I was able to save everybody because I found out about the stupid day thing. So, I bought up all the properties, and then let my game sit for the night with me in a corner of the castle. I had a book sat on my movement analog so that the 360 didn't hibernated. When I woke up the next day, I had 16 million to transfer over into the treasury. So, so take that Molyneux, I got a good ending where all the citizens survived.

An easier trick is just to leave the character in a blacksmith job over night, it never hibernates for some reason.