Fable: The Lost Chapters

"Light, fun, and very appealing."

Fable is an action RPG. You run around in third person beating up baddies and doing specified quests. To give some idea of how the game is looked at, I'll first go through its presentation.

Graphics -- 9/10. Fantastic. The graphics are slightly cartoonish (not at all in a bad way), and that greatly appeals to the overall theme of the presentation -- light, comical, and story-like. The cartoonishness exaggerates the fact that this IS a fable you are playing. Everything is very detailed. People, buildings, natural environment, it's all there. Simple walking through cities or a path through a forest is a delight. (Granted, I was lucky enough to play this game with a 7800GT, so I cranked all the settings to max.) The combat graphics are superb as well. The smooth animation of spells and sword-swinging is plain fun to watch. The way trees blow in the breeze, the way your hair waves when you run, the way people walk around, everything comes together to make a greatly detailed world graphically. Note that because of this style, graphics are fairly exaggerated -- not realistic. Facial and body expressions, architecture, and the entire environment are all exaggerated to give you the feeling of being inside a story.

Sound -- 9/10. The absolute first thing I noticed about this game that nobody had previously told me was that just about everybody has an Irish accent. Now, this certainly adds to the hilarity of the game, and I do think that's what the developers were going for. All dialogue is voice-acted, and the voices are very well done. There are a huge range of tones of voices among a huge cast of characters -- again, this game the game a lot like a... fable. Much of the dialogue you hear is actually funny. And yes, you will laugh. Again, speech and intonation is exagerrated so that the presentation mimics that of a storybook. The music is not bad either. Adventurous, exciting, and light.

Story and Presentation -- 7/10. Typical story. A generic hero goes and does this, blah blah blah. A key here is that you can be a good hero or a bad hero. This affects your physical appearance and how people react to you. You also age over time (not over gameplay time, but depending on how much experience you get), and can get married. But of course the story is a very minor part of the game. The presentation -- the fun, light, comical nature of the game's mood -- is very good. It is indeed very fable-like.

Gameplay -- 8/10. It's an action RPG. You kill monsters, and do quests. Quests are very specific and linear. Say, "escort these merchants across the swamp". And you MUST do them in order to advance the game. This was a bit disappointing -- the linearity of the quests. Not to mention that the entire game is a bit short -- 40 or so hours to get through the main quests and the few side quests.
The combat is fun though. You can choose from a plethora of magic spells (which are all beautifully animated), melee weapons (swords, axes, and such), or the bow and arrow. Each type of combat nets you experience in that field. The experience system is quite well done indeed. It makes it fun to just go beating up monsters to gain experience. You spend your experience on becoming stronger (as in doing more damage with weapons), becoming more "skilled" (as in archery), or more "willed" (use more magic spells). The combat system and game mechanics are quite smooth, making it even more fun to beat up monsters.

Overall -- 8/10
+Slightly comical, Fun experience, Well balanced and smooth game mechanics
-Bland story, Too short

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 04/14/06