First off, I promised things and then went silent, and to that, I apologize. I know my number of readers is still scant, but it doesn’t change the fact that I felt bad about it. However, I didn’t realize how much family-related stuff I had to do for the holidays until it was already upon me. However, I’m finally back to gaming and with that, thinking about games. Back to the regularly unscheduled programming, I guess. Once again, here I go with a topic past it’s point of discussion, this time, Fable 2.
I’m wrapping up Fable 2 tonight, after writing this post. I finished the main quest earlier this evening, and just have to mop up some achievements and then I’ll be done wit it. Overall, I’ve taken away a lot of enjoyment from the game. I don’t feel like writing up a full review, since I realize my reviews tend to focus on some things more than others, and have a very subjective taste. So, instead, I’m going to throw up a few posts about various parts of the game.
The story was interesting enough to keep me interested when I was doing the main quest missions, yet, I felt like the main quest was too far removed from the rest of the game. Many of the main quests operated in their own sections totally removed from the rest of the world, and their number was really quite scant when compared to the number of missions in the game. It was really just like three or four missions for the main quest. One could easily blow through the story missions in a long day of playing and be done with the game, if they felt so inclined. Several of the story missions really serve a basic purpose of advancing the game’s time so that your decisions can be reflected in the game world, since your character is removed from the world for a period of years.
While I knew going in to the game that choice would make a big deal, as it has with so many other games this year, I really didn’t realize that this time, the choices would affect how I felt about the world. In Fallout 3, your choices are really restricted to character development or mission based actions, and rarely do they have an overarching affect on the entire atmosphere of the world outside of Three Dog’s radio broadcasts. However, I felt like my actions changed the way the world felt in Fable. When I invested money to develop Westcliffe and came back a few years later, I felt like my actions meant something to the world, not just to the mission. The closest mission to this in Fallout 3 was the mission where you can either help the slaves kill their former owner, or lead the slavers to them. In that sense, it was like you were helping to establish a settlement and help the world develop. In Fable 2, every action feels like that. Whether you decide to build it up or tear it down, you feel like the world is really being shaped by your hands.
Since I took the route of a good character, I got a genuinely good feeling with each time a passerby said something positive about me. As much as I hated the hordes of people crowding around every time I walked into a building and caused problems with exiting, I knew it was because I was a real hero that they seemed to genuinely love. That created a real compelling atmosphere for the world and made me genuinely want to save it. To be honest, I can’t say I’ve felt that way about a game world since the first time I played Chrono Trigger. With that in mind, it is an awesome season to be gaming when I can be playing both Fable 2 and Chrono Trigger as new releases. More to come on Fable 2 later.
