Fable 2 - Preview @ Hooked Gamers

Dhruin

Dhruin

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Hooked Gamers serves up an oddly written preview of Peter Molyneux's upcoming action/RPG/dog simulator, Fable 2:
The third angle of this love theme is: A Dog. This dog will follow you around wherever you go. He will fight with you and it will help you in any way possible. The dog also changes as you do; if you're evil the dog will get very muscular and show his teeth to people and perhaps bite them. If you're a good person the dog will love to mingle with the people you meet. He will become very shaggy and have his tongue sticking out of his mouth. The Dog also serves another purpose and that is to scout for you. He will explore the areas ahead of you, pointing out anything of interest whether it be enemies, treasure or a new item. He will not engage into a fight or retrieve the item unless you trigger him to. Even if he gets hurt in combat and cannot keep up, he will track you down eventually, bruised and battered, and keep on doing his tasks.
Click to expand...
More information.
 
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Oh man, A DOG! I can't actually get my mind to fold around the level of innovation, it's just mind-boggling

Wow

A dog

Even if he gets hurt in combat and cannot keep up, he will track you down eventually, bruised and battered, and keep on doing his tasks.
Click to expand...

This is seriously getting too stupid.
 
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Cool. With this and the one-button-does-everything control system I'm really looking forward to this one!

The big question, though, is can we teach the dog to do unspeakable acts with it's own poo, like we could our creature in B&W? Because that's what awesome gameplay is all about right there.

Disclaimer: This post was brought to you with high levels of sarcasm.
 
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This one got me totally unhooked up - a dog, please. The least they could have done was to have a cat as an option :)
 
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My expectations are mediocre. As to the dog? Might work out well, might not, let's just hope it's more a companion than an NPC in The Sims. The Dog in Arcanum was great - completely overpowered, but still fun.
 
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Another game built on gimmicks.
 
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You have to feel a little sorry for Peter Molyneux. Prior to the formation of Lionhead Studios he turned out some truly good games: Populous, Powermonger, Hi-Octane and Dungeon Keeper.

Since opening his own studio, however, things seem to have gone awry. I'd like to be able to point the finger at a move away from programming and design to producing, but it seems that he's been wearing multiple hats all along.

I suspect that it's simply a case of ambitions not being met by reality. Both Black and White and Fable were set up to be genre breaking games. Sadly, neither delivered. This probably has more to do with what is actually possible when budgets and publishing time frames are taken into account than any shift in Molyneux's focus.

I'd like to think that Fable 2 might be a more complete title than Fable was, but the information that has been released to date suggests that the thorny "moral choices" faced by players will once again consist of whether to indulge in chicken punting.

*sigh*
 
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Yeah, cause why just make a good game when you can spend half your time and budget on innovating something that has a wow factor of about 10 minutes? Really as a dev you only have 14 hours and 50 min of game left to develop, well if your m$ 9 hours and -300 minutes.
 
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I want to point out what I loved about the first Fable: Being able to boast about quests. "I can do this quest naked!" and then finding it nigh impossible, that cracked me up.

I'm now not excited about Fable 2, and I will probably try it for free before any money gets involved. I didn't feel Fable was an RPG but more like an action title but I still enjoyed it for what it was, a game I haven't played yet. Heh.
 
I was never a big fan of Fable 1. Put all of maybe 10 hours into it and called it a 'day.' It's sad though to see such a cynical reaction to this one 'dog' feature on this board. It's just one feature out of possible many.

I like to think of this place as my little sanctuary away from boards like the official bethesda oblivion forums.
 
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How can you not be cynical about such a feature from Molyneux? I thought Fable was OK...it wasn't terrible but nor was it very good - I can't get enthused about being able to fart and belch but not have any real dialogue, for example. For me, the priorities are all in the wrong place. Of course, it sold over 1M copies, so I'm sure Molyneux doesn't agree with me.

This looks the same - an emphasis on gimmicks - even assuming the gimmick is complete and works properly.
 
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I don't like animals unless they're served on a platter. That said, I'm looking forward to Fable 2 despite the dog - I seriously need a fun/ny game.
 
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The days when I was part of Molyneux's target audience are long gone...
 
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Molyneaux hasn't done crap since the 1990's. He has become a relic of the game industry like Warren Spector and John Romero (although perhaps not to that same extent). Better developers like Irrational, Epic, Crytek, Valve, Bioware, and Rockstar have legitimately earned far more praise this decade. I would argue that the days where one guy can make a big difference on a game with creative vision are over. Great games nowadays are made by large, talented and hard-working teams coordinated by talented leaders who also have a good sense for business. Anybody can come up with a good gimmick, but the devil is in the details, more than it ever has been. Fable was enjoyable, but it was enjoyable because of how well it implemented standard features (such as great graphics and good combat) than its gimmicks. Fable 2 looks like it's shaping up to be a mediocre gimmick game.
 
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Dhruin said:
How can you not be cynical about such a feature from Molyneux? .
Click to expand...

I just keep my cynical setting throttled down to low.


Low <===================================> High
^

Right about where the up arrow is. =)
 
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Yeah, the pets are one of the things I really like about Fate. Hopefully, youll be able to load your pet up here and send him to town to cash in loot and grab a few potions or something. I like pet companions in games in general, even in WoW I played pretty much exclusively Hunters and Warlocks.

I think the dog sounds like a cool idea, and as Mad Gamer said, it's only one aspect of the game anyway. Lots of games have various little gimmicks and minigames and such, it's part of the overall picture. I have no inherant dislike for Peter and his ideas anyway, thus I cant participate in this total resentment-fest akin to some scorned woman who didnt get all that she was promised.
 
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If you're evil the dog will get very muscular and show his teeth to people and perhaps bite them. If you're a good person the dog will love to mingle with the people you meet. He will become very shaggy and have his tongue sticking out of his mouth.
Click to expand...

Guess that explains why all the nice people I meet are grubby and drooling, while the athletic people are social misfits. Like master, like dog.

I must admit that I even liked the PC version of the first Fable, but why does it all have to be so extremely cliché and Disneylandish for Molyneux?

P.S.: So what? I like sports. You can tell me I am a nice person now or ask me for a cheap dentist later.
 
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