I never got round to playing the original fable back in the day (over 20 years ago now wow) but absolutely loved fable 2 as a teen. So I was very excited to play this remaster for the upcoming episode of the gaming garnish podcast. I found myself having a bit of a love/hate relationship with this one by the end but I’ll start with what I loved…
The style or rather charm of the game is great, the voice acting is hilariously British (being born and raised here surely helps). It’s weird, mostly in a good way, still don’t know why you start off being called ‘chicken chaser’ but hell I’m along for the ride! Now the remaster is 10 years old as well at this point so I can’t critique it too much but some of the character models aren’t great, some specifically being nightmare-ish. However this is a product of its time and overall the game, mostly, gives off a lovely fairytale style in its visuals.
Now for something I didn’t like… the combat. Again you have to bear in mind the game is old but the combat really hasn’t aged well, it’s just very clunky. To be honest it’s not so bad at first when you’re fighting simple enemies and I like the easy way you can jump between melee, ranged and spell attacks on the fly. However, as the game progresses and you start getting mobbed and you’re attacked by harder enemies it just starts to fall apart. I think they were trying to do a lot of different things, very commendable for the time, but not everything worked out well. Stealth for example is horrendously bad and the mission they tie it to is so frustrating. It can really become quite a slog unfortunately. Especially the undead, they just constantly respawn immediately after killing them, the only way to get through them it seems is to just run past them. Unfortunately that’s just what I ended up doing towards the end of the game, running past a lot of enemies.
The story isn’t anything to write home about but it’s done rather well, it’s a testament to the game that despite my problems with the combat I still wanted to get through it to see it to its end. It was good to see where the story of fable all began and I really liked the main villain. Sprinkle in the choice system, which is a little black and white, and some funny side quests and you’ve got yourself a decent time.
Lastly, I’ll quickly mention, it can be a bit of a buggy game too unfortunately. Textures will randomly just all turn off sometimes and the frame rate is a bit choppy.
As mentioned at the start I had a love/hate relationship with fable at the end. Love being the world it was building, the choices, it was doing a lot for a game of its time. The hate being combat being hit and miss and sometimes the game just feeling like a big slog to get through. Overall I think this is a good game for its time but I think it’s heavily held up by its nostalgia. And having not played the game originally I just found it hard to overcome its shortcomings. Fable 2 is the better game to get into the series in my opinion but again that’s the power of nostalgia. It was nice to see where it all began though.
The style or rather charm of the game is great, the voice acting is hilariously British (being born and raised here surely helps). It’s weird, mostly in a good way, still don’t know why you start off being called ‘chicken chaser’ but hell I’m along for the ride! Now the remaster is 10 years old as well at this point so I can’t critique it too much but some of the character models aren’t great, some specifically being nightmare-ish. However this is a product of its time and overall the game, mostly, gives off a lovely fairytale style in its visuals.
Now for something I didn’t like… the combat. Again you have to bear in mind the game is old but the combat really hasn’t aged well, it’s just very clunky. To be honest it’s not so bad at first when you’re fighting simple enemies and I like the easy way you can jump between melee, ranged and spell attacks on the fly. However, as the game progresses and you start getting mobbed and you’re attacked by harder enemies it just starts to fall apart. I think they were trying to do a lot of different things, very commendable for the time, but not everything worked out well. Stealth for example is horrendously bad and the mission they tie it to is so frustrating. It can really become quite a slog unfortunately. Especially the undead, they just constantly respawn immediately after killing them, the only way to get through them it seems is to just run past them. Unfortunately that’s just what I ended up doing towards the end of the game, running past a lot of enemies.
The story isn’t anything to write home about but it’s done rather well, it’s a testament to the game that despite my problems with the combat I still wanted to get through it to see it to its end. It was good to see where the story of fable all began and I really liked the main villain. Sprinkle in the choice system, which is a little black and white, and some funny side quests and you’ve got yourself a decent time.
Lastly, I’ll quickly mention, it can be a bit of a buggy game too unfortunately. Textures will randomly just all turn off sometimes and the frame rate is a bit choppy.
As mentioned at the start I had a love/hate relationship with fable at the end. Love being the world it was building, the choices, it was doing a lot for a game of its time. The hate being combat being hit and miss and sometimes the game just feeling like a big slog to get through. Overall I think this is a good game for its time but I think it’s heavily held up by its nostalgia. And having not played the game originally I just found it hard to overcome its shortcomings. Fable 2 is the better game to get into the series in my opinion but again that’s the power of nostalgia. It was nice to see where it all began though.