Fable
| Fable | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 | |||
| Studio | Lionhead Studios | ||
| Publisher | Xbox Game Studios | ||
| composer | Danny Elfman | ||
| Erstveröffent- lichung |
September 14, 2004 | ||
| platform | Xbox 360 , Xbox , Microsoft Windows , macOS | ||
| genre | Action RPG | ||
| Game mode | Single player | ||
| control | Gamepad | ||
| medium | DVD , download | ||
| language | u. a. German | ||
| Age rating |
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Fable is a computer role-playing game developed by the British development studio Lionhead Studios and released for Xbox in 2004. An extended Windows and Mac OS version was published in autumn 2005 under the title Fable: The Lost Chapters ( TLC ). In October 2008 the successor Fable II was released exclusively for the Xbox 360 . Fable III was released on October 29, 2010 for Xbox 360 and on May 19, 2011 for Windows.
action
A boy sees his village being attacked by bandits. His father is killed fighting for his family, and his mother and sister are kidnapped. The boy then meets a man named Maze, who accepts him into the heroes' guild. There he spends the next few years with combat and magic training until he is ready to face the dangers and problems of the world of Albion. In one of his first missions (called "Quests" here) he saves his sister. Later, the hero competes in the arena and meets Messer-Jack. Then he learns from his sister that his mother is still alive and is being held in a prison. This prison is ruled by Messer-Jack, who is out to subdue all of Albion.
The hero tries to free his mother from Bargate Prison in northern Albion. When he succeeds in this, he falls into a trap from Messer-Jack, who does not want to let them go. Now the hero is also in a cell and has to wait a whole year until he manages to free himself and his mother. In gratitude, his mother gives him the ability to communicate with her through a seal. It later emerges that Messer-Jack Maze once saved his life and secretly works for him. The player ultimately kills Maze.
At the end of the original version, the hero has to fight the boss, Messer-Jack. If Messer-Jack is dead, the player has to decide whether to kill his sister and thus keep the sword of eternity, or whether to destroy the weapon and let his sister live.
Gameplay
Character development
Character development is one of the most important game elements in Fable . The player controls a hero who changes more and more over time. For example, this is how he begins to age. If he is given a lot of cake to eat, he will begin to become overweight. However, if the hero carries heavy weapons and eats normally, he becomes a muscleman. Different hairstyles and beards also affect the behavior of those around them (i.e. the residents). Furthermore, the hero can have himself tattooed at the various dealers.
Apart from that, the more famous he becomes and the more tasks he solves, the hero receives various means of expression. Among other things, from a certain level of familiarity he is able to perform a tap dance. In addition, the hero can enter into relationships and have sex in the game, whereby the sexual orientation is not limited to heterosexuality.
Good / bad system
As in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic or Black & White , the player can determine whether he wants to behave well or badly. Killing many villagers and stealing goods from the vendors increases the score for evil deeds. On the other hand, if the character helps people, it collects points for good deeds. Clothing is a very important point: Wearing light-colored clothing makes a personable impression on the villagers, whereas dark clothing makes the villagers flee from the character. Likewise, different types of food can affect good and bad. Do you eat B. a crispy chicken, one gets angry, if one eats tofu, it changes the attitude of the character for the better.
Development history
Fable was a development of the independent development studio Big Blue Box, founded in 1999 from neighboring Godalming . The studio entered into a collaboration with Peter Molyneux ' Lionhead Studios to better market its project in exchange for company shares. The founders Dene and Simon Carter had previously worked at Bullfrog and designed the concept of the game, which they initially worked on with 15 people. Big Blue Box was referred to as the Lionhead satellite studio at the time. The first time was Fable on the E3 2001 under the working title Project Ego presented. This working title was later changed to Fable .
The team initially worked largely independently and undisturbed on the title until Microsoft , which was planning to enter the market for game consoles, became aware of Fable . In search of an exclusive role-playing game for the Xbox , console creator Ed Fries in particular developed a great interest in the title. Microsoft signed a publishing deal with Lionhead that made the game an Xbox-exclusive title. The development team has meanwhile grown to 30 people. In preparation for a planned, but never implemented, IPO, Lionhead bought Big Blue Box. Due to the failed IPO, Lionhead lacked the capital to continue operations as before. In order to end Fable , however, the development team had to be increased. So management moved the Big Blue Box team to the main studio in Guildford , discontinued the Black & White team's new development work , Project Dimitri, and distributed the freed employees to Fable . The team grew to 90 employees. Difficulties arose from the different corporate cultures, the unstructured way of working and the fact that Lionhead's core strengths lay in the development of sandbox games and god simulations , but not in strongly action-based genres such as role-playing games. Art director John McCormack complained in retrospect that the artistic part of the game at Xbox launch in November 2001 was largely complete, but the development of the game mechanics and the plot then delayed the release by three years. The game was originally developed for high-performance PCs, but the weaker Xbox architecture led to major performance problems. Microsoft intervened to provide support by sending technicians and producers. Above all, producer Louise Copley managed to contain Peter Molyneux and guide the work in an orderly manner.
The development work was completed at the end of August 2004. After several postponements, Fable was released for Xbox in October 2004 . In March 2005, the PC version was announced again after it was initially deleted and was released as The Lost Chapters in the fall .
The music in both games was written by Russel Shaw and film composer Danny Elfman .
Versions
Fable: The Lost Chapters
Fable: The Lost Chapters is an expanded remake of Fable . The Lost Chapters was released in the fourth quarter of 2005 for Windows and Mac OS and in 2006 for Xbox. The new content from the original Xbox version includes 16 new quests, including eleven optional quests and five that expand the plot.
Accordingly, Messer-Jack tries to get back to Albion after his apparent death. The hero ultimately has to sacrifice three souls to stop Messer-Jack. To this end, he can kill people associated with the main story or take the souls of the dead. In the final battle he meets Messer-Jack in the form of a dragon and kills him for good. He has the choice of keeping Messer-Jack's mask or throwing it away. After the complete credits have been completed without accelerating, for example by pressing the ESC key, the hero returns to Albion and can move freely in the world and solve remaining quests.
New gestures (including dancing and playing air guitar) are also part of The Lost Chapters . New armor and helmets and new opponents (ice troll and snow balverine) are also part of the features that have been given to the The Lost Chapters version compared to the original version. There are also new options for control configuration, a new city and even a brothel.
Fable Anniversary
On June 4, 2013, an HD remake of Fable: The Lost Chapters was announced for the Xbox 360 . The release date has been postponed to February 7, 2014. On September 12, 2014, the revised Windows version was released on Steam .
reception
The reviews of the game were mostly positive. The game sold 375,000 copies in the first week, and after a month the numbers were 600,000 copies. In July 2006, the American magazine Next Generation gave the sales figures for the US market with 1.5 million, the turnover was put at 58 million dollars. Fable was ranked 29th among the most successful games for PlayStation 2, Xbox and Gamecube since 2000. In 2010, sales were three million.
Microsoft was pleased with the success and named Fable the second most important franchise on Xbox after Halo . The development of a sequel for the successor console Xbox 360 was quickly contractually agreed.
There was criticism in particular of the promises made by Peter Molyneux, which he made to the press in the course of the development. In particular, the reactive, evolving game world never achieved the promised quality. In retrospect, the promises that the player would father children or plant a tree and watch them grow were always given as examples. A multiplayer mode via Xbox Live was never implemented until the successor and, according to the team, was not planned either. Molyneux apologized for these broken promises after publication in a forum post. However, since he exhibited this behavior before and also in subsequent games, it contributed to an increasingly negative public assessment of the designer in the long term.
successor
Fable II is the second installment in the Fable series and was released on October 24, 2008 exclusively for Xbox 360.
The game was released on October 29, 2010 for Xbox 360. For Windows, Fable III was released on May 19, 2011.
Novels about the games
- Peter David : Fable: The Order of the Balverine , February 2011, Panini Verlag , ISBN 978-3-8332-2238-2 .
- Peter David: Fable: Blood Ties. October 2011, Ace-Verlag, ISBN 978-1-937007-40-9 (English)
- Christie Golden: Fable: Edge of the World. August 2012, Del Rey-Verlag, ISBN 978-0-345-53937-3 (English)
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Wesley Yin-Poole: Rise and Fall - The Lionhead Story. In: Eurogamer.de. May 20, 2016, accessed September 5, 2019 .
- ^ E3: Molyneux 'Project EGO: Pictures + Info. In: PC Games. May 19, 2001, Retrieved September 5, 2019 .
- ↑ Rob Fahey: Big Blue Box 'Fable goes golden. In: Gamesindustry.biz. Retrieved September 5, 2019 .
- ↑ soundtrack.net
- ↑ David Adams: Fable Sells Big. In: IGN. September 23, 2004, accessed March 31, 2013 .
- ↑ Fable Continues to Break Records as Best-Selling Game Across All Platforms. GameSpot , October 21, 2004, archived from the original on January 23, 2013 ; accessed on May 13, 2020 .
- ^ Campbell, Colin & Keizer, Joe: The Top 100 Games of the 21st Century. (No longer available online.) In: Next Generation . July 29, 2006, archived from the original on October 28, 2007 ; accessed on May 13, 2020 .
- ↑ Ben Parfitt: 5m sales goal for Fable III. In: MCV . Intent Media, August 11, 2010, archived from the original on January 8, 2016 ; Retrieved June 3, 2014 .
- ↑ Michael Förtsch, Benedikt Plass-Flessenk finisher: Icons of the game industry - Peter Molyneux. June 1, 2019, accessed September 5, 2019 .
- ^ Levi Buchanan: Are the Broken Promises of Fable for Real? In: IGN. Retrieved September 5, 2019 .
- ↑ Jason Schreier: The Man Who Promised Too Much. In: Kotaku. Retrieved September 5, 2019 (American English).