Fable

"Project Ego >>>>>>>>> Fable"

What I Liked About Fable:

-You can shoot lightning from your hands. Ever since I saw Return of the Jedi, I've wanted to be able to do this. Too bad it's almost worthless.

-The music is pretty well done. Got kind of old after awhile, but still pretty good.

-The graphics are stunning. I'm not one to choose graphics over fun factor, but they are incredible.

What I Didn't Like About Fable:

-You can't jump. That's right, you can shoot lightning from your hands, summon werewolf-like creatures, and even grow horns, but you can't jump.

-Your hero can grow older than his own mother.

-If you find a weapon, augment it, and find another weapon just like the augmented one, guess what? Augmented one's gone.

-Almost none of your actions have a large impact on the storyline. "For every choice a consequence" my ass.

-You can beat the last boss with a stick. That's right, a stick.

-Even if you do every side quest in the game, this disappointment still only lasts about 15 hours.

-Getting divorced in Albion is more evil than killing about twenty people.

-About five hours into the game, your Hero will be unstoppable.

-There's a series of "Legendary" weapons that cannot be sold at any time. This makes no sense, since the people of Albion are supposed to be extremely materialistic, and the Legendary weapons are quite valuable.

-Once you've acquired a set of "Bandit" armor, you can never get rid of it. This is minor of course, but still quite annoying, and is part of a much bigger complaint.

-Once certain things are in your inventory, they're there for good. You can sell your armor and weapons (minus the Bandit clothes and Legendary weapons) but as far as keys, books, and trophies are concerned (some of which are useless yet valuable), no selling.

-The instant you step into a town called Bowerstone, your ability to use magic disappears. What's supposed to be causing this anyway? I went looking for a wizard or some kind of enchanted artifact that was responsible for this, but to no avail. Makes no sense at all.

-You can get haircuts in the game, but your hair doesn't actually grow (Except at a certain point in the game, which makes no sense.). That's right, you can walk into a barber's shop, pick a hair style, and regardless of how long your hair is, you'll have it. Go from bald to a ponytail. If they used magic to do this, it would make sense, but magic can't be used in Bowerstone, which has a barbershop in it, so that doesn't make sense either.

-You can slaughter an entire village, kill twenty guards, leave the town for a few days, and your 400,000 gold piece fine will be gone. It's fun, but when you consider the "For every choice a consequence" thing, it makes no sense.

-Shovel Glitch. 'Nuff said.

-You encounter a homeless man who was once a Hero. If you help him, he's says you may run into each other later. I thought, cool, maybe he'll help me beat the last boss, who I, at the time, assumed would be very difficult. Guess what? Didn't happen. He disappears completely.

-The most powerful weapon in the game can only be obtained after beating the game. And is you skip the credits, you'll never get to have fun using it. Lame. Very lame.

-One of the Legendary weapons requires you to be so strong, by the time you've attained the requirement, you'll have found a much better weapon.

-Outside of "Thanks", "Hey", "Sorry", "Oy!", "C'mon", and "****", your Hero never speaks. Every time Maze asks you a question, he then answers it himself, as if he can read your mind. Hmm, this reminds me of a certain game, but I can't quite put my finger on it. *cough*GTA: III*cough*

-The combat system is quite awkward. Many time have I found myself fighting multiple opponents, yet unable to lock onto the one closest to me. Or behind me, slashing the crap out of my backlike a coward. Now, there are certain spells to use in the situation, but what if someone doesn't want to use magic while playing? Shouldn't they have the option to learn some techniques that apply to melee combat, other than a useless "Flourish"?

-The Guildmaster. Quite possibly the most annoying feature in this entire game. "There's an important Quest Card at the Guild for you." You will hear this, day after day, until the game is beaten. "Try to get your Combat Multiplier even higher." I got mine to over 2,000 one time to see if he would shut up. Didn't work. You don't even get the pleasure of killing him either. That would have at least made me somewhat happy. But no. "I could break you, so leave it." Pfft. I could kick him into the sun if I wanted. I've even dreamt of doing it. Seriously. I need help.

-Fishing. I was actually looking forward to being able to take a break from butchering Bandits and Balverines and enjoy some goold old fishing. Alas, PM's poor descision making strikes again! Fishing actually gets harder the more you do it. Why? Beats me. You'd think after catching at least a dozen fish, my Hero would be quite adept at reeling them in without snapping the line. WRONG! Phailed.

-The most bad-ass looking armor in the game is incomplete (missing the helm). Hang your head shame Molyneux.

-Not a single shield in the whole damn game! Aside from the Physical Shield spell, which is cheap and helped me beat the game in less than 4 hours. Actually, no I take that back, there is one shield, a really cool one too, but you can't use it.

-No dual-wielding. Yeah, I now, I'm picky , but damn it if my Hero is the buffest guy in all of Albion, I should at least be able to carry a pair of light-weight swords But no.

-Once you've graduated from the guild, you go to the map table and there will be several quests that you cannot take because your Renown isn't high enough. You figure, okay, I'll take them when I've got more Renown. Nope. Once you accept the one and only quest you can, the others disappear for the rest of the game. Why? Some bit of coding left behind when they starting cutting things? Pretty sloppy (and slightly suspicious) if you ask me.

-You can't play as a female. This would have been fun, and should have been a no-brainer for PM and crew. I think they're sexist personally. We should boycott them. ^_^

-You can't have children. Growing up, becoming a legendary warrior, then raising a son/daughter to be the same/something entirely different would have been awesome. But no. it was cut because of the whole "killing children" thing. If they were smart, this could have been easily remedied.

-Well this is it, the number one flaw, my single biggest complaint: It wasn't made by Capcom. Capcom would have turned this game into the greatest, most innovative, awe-inspiring game of all-time. But noooo, it had to be made by Lionhead Studios.

Well there's my review, if you like it, good. If not, that's okay. I won't hold it against you. Honestly. *laughs evily and disappears in a puff of smoke*

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 12/03/04