Fable 3 Review (Xbox 360)

Fable 3 is the latest title of series of games that made a first appearance on the original Xbox console. Despite that creative director of Lionhead studios makes radical and absurd promises about his games, the games turn out quite well-made despite those promises not being fulfilled. Whereas the the last games took place in the Medieval and Renaissance Era (Fable 1 and 2 respectively), this iteration takes place during the industrial revolution, a pleasant site to see for those having played the game before, as Albion has undergone some many changes. You play as a young prince who is descended from the great heroes of Fable 1 and 2. As your brother (who is currently King) starts to show signs of corruption and misguidedness, it's up to you to lead a revolution and overthrow the your brother and ascend to the throne.

This is the age of oppression, and the world "is crying out for a hero". As you try to ascend the throne, you need to make allies and this is made enjoyable by Fable 3's strong cast of characters. Famous actors such as Sean of the Dead's Simon Pegg and Monty Python's John Cleese are involved in the voice work of this game. Being inspired by Monty Python, Fable 3 is a very funny game. You're butler (Jasper) giving funny comments about you're chicken suit to playing a role playing game with a bunch of people robed people for a side quest. Or those blasted gnomes that harass you as you search to shoot them down. This game has great voice work and a great sense of humor (or homour as the English would spell it). Fable 3 has an interesting main storyline you want to see through the end, and some funny and interesting side quests as well. With many other great voice actors, Fable 3 has a world that is memorable for it's charming characters, my favorite which I don't want to spoil but all I will say is that Stefen Fry did a great job.

As Moleneux pointed out in one of the Lionhead development documenteries, the game is moving towards action adventure, but their are still RPG aspects hidden with the game. In addition to the "action adventure feel" the game has been simplified. There are two main parts of the game, one is when you play as a revolutionary overthrowing your brother and making friends and allies, and the other portion of the game is when you play as a king and you make some difficult decisions. All Fable games are about choice, but one of the things about Fable 3 is that their is a bit of a gray zone, and not one choice is clearly good or clearly evil, and this becomes apparent in you're kingly duties. As you'll find out, being the king of Albion is actually much harder than it sounds.

Fable 3 is a world with history behind it, as I have mentioned anyone who has played Fable 1 and 2 will be pleased to see how the land of Albion has underwent its transformation. The graphics in Fable 2 remain only slightly improved, however there was a noticeable improvement to shadow's and lighting, which looks beautiful as you're walking throw the ugly sewers and you see the light reveal you're shadow on the water. We can tell however, that the Xbox 360 is showing it's age and this is also obvious in games like Halo Reach and Gears of War. The graphics though unimproved, don't really detract from the game at all. Fable 3 still retains it's cartoonish like art style, but gone is the character's aging, halo, or devil horns. It used to be that in the older games that you're characters looks reflected his or her morality, but you only see that reflect in a hero's weapon as it drips with blood or glows with light. You do the math on determining what type of character has a glowing sword.

As far as action goes. The game still maintains its 3 button combat, where you use the "X" button for melee attacks and blocking, the "Y" button for shooting you're firearm and aiming, and the "B" button for using and charging up magical abilities. The combat is very simple, and it's fun melee, magic, and ranged attacks together. However the combat doesn't do much to stand out. It's extremely hard to die and you would have to be doing it on purpose or in one of the later segments. I actually got an achievement for not "getting knocked down" on my first playthrough. Fable 3, like Fable 2, should be tougher or at least have a difficulty selection.

Fable 3 underwent a make over in its menu and inventory system. Gone are the cumbersome menu's in exchange for the sanctuary. The sanctuary is basically your "pause button". Every time you hit start, you get transfered to the sanctuary (which is maintained by your butler). In the sanctuary is a map where you can navigate the world and fast travel to certain locations, a weapons room, a clothing room, and a room where you can join random Xbox live games. While many people will not like the ommission of the menu system, I actually prefer it, given the simplicity and the fact that I simply don't like sorting through useless junk. For others however, this new simplified "menu" that is the sanctuary may seem unnecessary.

Fable 3 does have numerous bugs, glitches, and other issues. Sometimes the d-pad won't let you use certain items from your inventory. There was one game breaking bug where I couldn't exit the sanctuary, and reloading my saves didn't solve that problem. In fact you can only have one save file and you're game automatically saves for you. This is extremely annoying especially at the end when you play as a King and the abrupt ending almost hits you in the face and you can't go back. However you only notice this in the city of Bowerstone, because for some reason all of the other territories that were featured in Fable 1 and 2 were oddly omitted. As a result, their are hardly many places to explore. Fable 3 hardly has many environments to explore, and also another issue with the game is that it's very short. Even with a good portion of side quests it should take you a very short time to blow through the main storyline. Sure you can get married or browse the stores, but personally I don't play video games to have virtual marriages. Just saying.

While Fable 3 has an interesting story, great actors, and a great universe, it simply felt unfinished. Numerous bugs and technical flaws hold the game back from greatness and the game suffers from being extremely short. The king portion of the game ended too abruptly and the game there wasn't much added to the overall experience of Fable. Playing Fable 2, I noticed that there were hardly improvements made to Fable 3 besides the flashy new menu system. There weren't any new enemies, so all that leaves is the improvement of co-op. However, Fable 3 still has an interesting world, and it still managed to pull me in, but I felt like the game needed an extra 6 months for fixing bugs and expanding the life of the game.

Fable 3 gets a 7/10, which means its a good game. I loved the universe, i loved the characters, but this game feels unfinished. The story also has a couple of major plot holes that nagged at me in the end, but I can't tell you anything without spoiling it. It's a good game, but the game is untapped in its potential. It is really unfortunate that this game didn't recieve a longer development time, it almost feels that Microsoft tried to rush this game out.