Fable : Web Wombat : Games

The idea of an absolutely non-linear game is something that has been yearned after by many gamers, ever since role playing games were first taken from pen and paper and transmogrified into binary.

Though real life is the closest concept to a totally non-linear universe (with some pesky legal limitations), one of the biggest and arguably best RPGs to arrive on the Xbox, Fable, has a good crack at it nevertheless.

In the years leading up to the game's launch, when it was once known as Project Ego, the hype suggested gamers could do what they wanted, leave their mark across the gameworld and travel uninhibited wherever they wanted.

Sadly, not quite all of these features made it into the game, but despite a few shortcomings, Lionhead Studios' latest Xbox game is a very toight package, as a once famous Swedish disco owner would say.

There's an interesting story to Fable, and it begins in a peaceful village where you are but a little boy enjoying life - pulling the wings off moths and urinating on the washing. But then the shit really hits the fan as a marauding gang of bandits raze the village, kidnap your sister, murder your parents and eat your porridge.

You are saved from these reprehensible bandits by a mysterious fellow who takes you to the Hero's Guild, and it's here that he trains you up to be hero - an integrated tutorial if you like - and from here the game really begins.

The Hero's Guild is where you'll be given your major quests and from the get-go it's obvious that Fable is no basic RPG.

You can choose a quest and go kick the crap out of a queen wasp, or if your curiosity gets the better of you, you can simply explore the gameworld, do a little shopping, get married, have kids, buy a house, trade commodities, join a fight club, gamble, go fishing, drink and even kill innocent people.

Bam! Spells are good are pushing enemies away

The gameworld is vibrant, full of character and is a great place to spend hours upon hours.

I often said to myself "Okay Will, a few more kills then you gotta go make lunch, head outside, fight the machine and stick it to the man," but another three hours later and I'm lying gormless on the loungeroom floor, staring fixatedly at my slowly evolving character. "Wow. He's got horns!"

And for any RPG, the evolution of ones character is tantamount to the game's success. As it happens, Fable takes character development more seriously than almost any other RPG to date, and if you like your stats on the busy side, you'll be more than pleased with what Lionhead Studios offers up.

You may start off the game with a rambunctious little dork, wielding nothing only a lichen-covered twig of unfairness +1, but as things progress not only will your skills increase, but you're appearance will change too.

That's right, if you have high strength levels thanks to engaging in lots of melee combat, you'll be a massive beefcake jock with rippling muscles and no personality. If you use magic, you'll age quickly, turn grey and develop a British accent, just like Harry Potter.

And if you decide that the world owes you big time (welcome to my life), and beat the crud out of all and sundry, if not outright slaughter them, your face will begin to distort, your skin will go pale and if you're lucky you'll even grow horns with which to hang tassles from.

There are many stats that affect how you look and how you evolve, but the three main ones are strength, skill and magic, and these increase whenever you perform an action involving close combat, archery or spell casting respectively.

It sounds simple, and the three major stats are quite rudimentary when taken on their own, but there are many other variables in there that affect character progression.

Graphically, Fable is very impressive

Reputation plays a part too - tell the constabulary where to stick their so-called 'laws' and just like in real life you'll get fined, beaten and maybe even set up with a albino lady-boy.

Every forty minutes of gametime you play through, one day will pass, and day and night have an impact on many things.

You may encounter different baddies at night, and in towns and citadels you'll find that most people are in bed sleeping, giving you perfect opportunity to steal their belongings.

Gameplay mechanics are very good, perhaps some of the best ever used on an Xbox RPG. While the controls are quite complex and take a little getting used to, everything works well, and when I say everything, I mean exploration and interaction, melee combat, long range combat (archery) and spell casting.

When you're completely comfortable with the controls it's possible to walk into a fight with plenty of bravado. Slice you're way through minions with your platinum cleaver of finality, then as the bad-assed boss approaches hit him with explosive fury in the form of spells, all the while hacking at his bloated and sore-encrusted body.

Combat in general is very good, and it's what holds the game together, I believe. More than anything else, you'll want to kill stuff and the motivation to try out your new sword, to see if that new suit of armour really is impenetrable and to launch a volley of fireballs at evildoers is very strong.

The game wants to be remembered as an epic, but after playing the game to death it does however, fall somewhat short. For a console RPG it is a tremendous effort incorporating more features than most gamers will ever get to exploit. You can trade goods to make a buck, get married, join a fight club and fart in people's general direction.

But there are issues in some areas, and without further ado I feel obliged to communicate these in the name of all that is… Oh hell, here's what I didn't like:

Look at the facial detail - not bad eh?

Loading times. Way too much loading. It kills the pacing of the game and gives it a nasty Banjo Kazooie vibe.

Where you'd ideally be able to traipse from one end of the gameworld to the other, with minimal loading (like Halo 2), you are instead forced to sit through a loading screen every 500 metres or so, sometimes less depending on the size and complexity of the location.

I suppose this overabundance of loading should be a good excuse to practise the virtue that is patience, but the loading screen is boring, and screw virtuousness anyway. The game is also somewhat short if you forget about all the supplementary things you can do (which includes gambling) and concentrate on beating the games 50 or so quests, but the good news is that once you've finished the game you can keep on playing.

The in-game graphics, however, are not like the boring loading screens, and contribute to Fable's vibrant personality and charm. Despite the fairly major issue of the loading screens and what appears to be a very easy level of difficulty, the game is nevertheless very impressive to look at, as there's always something going on.

From the towns chock full of people, to the tranquil agricultural surrounds, it's cool just strolling around in the afternoon sun, chatting to strangers who may be willing to style your hair or sell you a blade.

There are also many dark woods that are home to evils so very very evil. But luckily for them retribution is at hand, and it takes the form of a swift gash to the neck, or a lighting bolt to the eyeball, or an arrow in the nutsack.

And what would an RPG be without dungeons? A pile of steaming crap, that's what.

Dude: "Hey kid - wanna be in my movie?"

Kid: "Sure I do. What's it called, good Sir?"

Dude: "It's called Chicks who dig the Mo."

There's lots of caves rather than dungeons per se, but they're dark, dank and slimy, and the atmosphere created by combining the high resolution visuals and some cool ambient sounds makes for some rather involving (and at times tense) exploration.

As well as some above average level design, the special effects are very nice to look at, with the spells in particular making good use of volumetric lighting and particles.

There is some slowdown at times, but it's nothing to get upset about, and the facial detail on most humanoids is quite extraordinary. Some of the boss monsters also surprised me with their size and complexity and generally speaking, there are few games that so masterfully portray a fantasy realm.

The sound, like the visuals, is top notch - and you'd hope so after how long the game's been in development. It really adds the final touch on the Fable gameworld, giving the game its spirit and enabling the player to be even more engrossed in the protagonists struggle to find the meaning of existence.

If you believed everything game guru Peter Molyneux said about Fable a few years ago, you'd think the end result was a burning pile of faecal matter sitting on the top of a rubbish heap, surrounded by a moat full of tripe.

All the hyperbole, all the anticipation of advanced gaming features, next-gen this and hyper-real that -- and in the end what are we left with? A very worthy game in its own right, but nothing compared to what Molyneux envisaged, and far from the super-real, totally non linear game that we were promised.

While it is a good game by and large, I must say I was sucked in by the hype, and now that some of this hype has failed to eventuate, I feel somewhat cheated. I guess that's what you get for believing the media eh? Wait a sec, aren't I part of the… ack….. Can't breathe…

Big Blue Box and Lionhead Studios have put together a massive game with so much replayability, it kind of boggles the mind. It's like trying to figure out quantum mechanics while riding a scooter and texting obscenities via your phone to your old boss at the same time.

But really, I'm just a spoilt games reviewer who wants the world and then some, and in hindsight the game can't really be considered any other than a success. If this is the closest we're going to get to non-linearity in role playing games for the time being, then sign me up.

Game: Fable
System: Xbox
Players: 1
Online: No
Developer: Big Blue Box
Distributor: Microsoft

Rating: 85%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)

Fable is on the shelves now.

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