It all seems just a bit familiar…
The storyline of Fable is somewhat cliché. You initially play as a young boy, blissfully unaware that his Albion village and everyone in it is about to be destroyed. From there, a friendly chap by the name of Maze takes you into the Heroes’ Guild, where future tyrants and protectors of humanity are created. You quickly progress through your training, before finally you become a man ready to take on the world – specifically, those who went all Viking style on your village.
This tale is by no means dull. There are enough twists and turns to keep things interesting throughout, but it is hardly unique. Whilst an average story would normally lead to castration in a modern RPG, Fable manages to escape this fate due to the fact that the storyline is mostly secondary to the development of your character.
A fantasy wonderland
The land of Albion is vast. It is split up into separate areas, which lead into other areas, and so on. You have your standard towns, transitional corridors and other locales, each with their own décor, unique treasures, bad guys and story to tell. However, you do not have to travel everywhere by foot. Scattered throughout Albion are Cullis Gates, which, once activated, allow you to teleport back there at anytime. This does seem to make Albion feel just a bit small, unfortunately – but it beats having to jog everywhere.
You pass the time in Fable by performing quests, each of which you are assigned at the Heroes’ Guild. With many quests available at a time once you get started, you will never become stuck in Fable – a big gold (for the currently storyline objective) or silver (for secondary quests) are stamped on the map in the direction you must travel.
Good, evil, pimp – who will you be?
The biggest attraction to Fable is the character development involved in the game. Your character is initially a pasty little boy, who, while competent with a sword, is hardly going to be a threat to any serious villain. However, as you progress – upgrading your abilities through experience points, and becoming more ‘renown’ with every beastie that you slaughter – your character develops into something more fitting of a warrior.
This is where the real beauty of Fable lies. Each character uniquely develops based on how you play the game. Fancy getting up close and personal to your foes? You had best be upgrading your strength, and getting used to having a rather scared face. Want to be the ultimate evil sorcerer? Get used to those wrinkles, and those devilish looking horns. As well as basic physical appearance, you can also customize virtually everything about your player, from haircut and tattoos, right through to moustache and gloves. Your character truly reflects your playing style, and finishing the game with the exact same character twice is nigh on impossible.
Whether you are good or evil is also a decision to make whilst playing Fable. Obviously, murdering nearby villagers will send you quickly down an evil path – and the people of the game will see this. They will flee should you get too close to them, and be less than receptive to interaction. The town guards will also quickly become upset with you murdering the townsfolk, asking you less than politely to pay a fine. Should you refuse, prepare for the guard onslaught.
However, become a good guy, and people will flock to you. They will cheer, applaud, and generally be quite irritating. Being good is mostly easy – just avoid chopping up anything that isn’t a villager, and the people will adore you in no time.
It’s a safe bet he isn’t loved
I’d Hit It
Whether you are good or bad though, you are still able to find that special someone (although this could be a special hundred once you start becoming famous) and marry. Your wife will make goo goo eyes and noises at you and occasionally give you a gift (both material and physical, wink wink). Don’t make her happy though, and she will divorce you.
However, in order to successfully court a missus you will need to own a house, because, funnily enough, she won’t like being left out in the cold. Land ownership plays a small part in Fable. Each of the four towns initially has one house that you can buy to live in or rent out. However, ‘remove’ a local resident from their house/shop and, comically, the game will advise you that there is a new house for sale in the town. Cute.
Don’t you look at me like that!
Your character isn’t the most talkative chap. He much prefers interacting with the people of Albion through various facial and body gestures. These range from farting at your enemies (they are never amused by this), right through to laughing like a homicidal murderer. It’s certainly a unique method, and for the most part, it comes off. Of course, there are times when swearing at, or flirting with, someone just isn’t enough and you just want to scream at them, but, alas, no dice.
Also worth noting is the brilliant character recognition system. Each person/thing that you can interact with Albion is highlighted in a colour. If it’s an object that can be picked up or read, it will be highlighted blue. If it is a random villager with nothing useful to say to you, they will be surrounded by a purple haze (ahem). Baddies are simply red. If they have something to sell you, or anything else vaguely interesting to say, they will be green. This is a brilliant system that gets around the problem of having to talk to the entire village to find out something interesting.
You call that a sword? This is a sword!
The fighting mechanics in Fable is somewhat of a mixed bag. You can lock onto the nearest being with a quick pull of the L trigger. From there, press the white button to draw your sword, then you can start hacking away with the X button. Should you get in a few good hits, the sword will being to glow. Simply hit A to lunge at enemies with a stronger attack. And, well, as far as swordsmanship goes, that is it. It is entirely too hack ‘n’ slash, and you will often feel yourself hammering away at the buttons rather than skillfully launching an attack.
The arching system is much better, though. You can let arrows rip by drawing the bow with the black button, locking onto your target with the L trigger and hitting the X button. The length of time you hold down the button determines the power on the shot. If you want to do any damage, you’ll have to hold on for a good few seconds though. Clicking the left analog stick will launch you into first person mode to manually target, too.
The final aspect of the combat system is ‘will’ – or magic, if you prefer. Spells can be assigned to the four face buttons – but, to access these, you will need to hold onto the R trigger. The spells are many – and undeniably look brilliant. It is also fantastic fun. Is that villager annoying you? Fry them with a quick lightning bolt. Fantastic.
These three aspects – strength, skill and will – can all be upgraded by using experience points. Each of the three areas has several sub areas which must be individually upgraded if you want to get anywhere in Fable.
It’s like a fairytale
Without a doubt, Fable is absolutely gorgeous to look at. Absolutely everything is meticulously detailed, right down to the most insignificant tree. The characters are the best examples of this – zoom into your characters face and notice the tiny scars and other facial details. It’s fantastic. However, the most impressive aspect of the graphics is undoubtedly the will spells. Fire or lightning emerging from your player’s hands is simply fantastic.
You’re about to be thunderstruck
Turn on your British accent, chaps
The first thing you’ll notice about the audio in Fable is that everyone is British. Hmm. Regardless, most of the voice acting is reasonable, never really becoming too irritating. Random villagers on the other hand are another matter. Their constant cheering/screaming when your character becomes famous gets really annoying, really fast. Grrr. Aside from this minor gripe, the audio is solid, providing a good score for the game.
…I’ve won? Already?
Unfortunately, the biggest downfall of Fable lies in its incredibly short story. On the first time through, if you were to concentrate solely on the story aspect of the game, it could be completed in seven or eight hours, at the absolute most. This is a huge disappointment – it seems that the story is only to beginning to warm up when it ends. This isn’t aided by the markers on your map always pointing you in the exact direction to go. In fact, this makes the game flat out linear, which is a huge shame.
However, there is so much to do in Fable if you simply take your time. Things could easily be stretched out to well over twenty hours if you absorb the sights, sounds and side quests in the game. As well as this there are multiple endings – as well as countless different ways to build your character – which will have you coming back for another round at least once.
Still, this is such a shame.
Hero
Despite the length – or lack thereof – the game’s linear feel and the button bashing combat system, Fable is still a fantastic game. The ability to shape your own character – as well as become loved/feared throughout the world – is too good an opportunity to pass up. Whilst not quite the game it was built up to be, Fable is still more than worthy of your time. Action RPG fans dig in.
Loading...
