Fable III

Spoilers, obviously.

Fable III is an interesting game. Just looking at the fan reaction when the game came out in 2010, I believe, (Yeah, I don't really fact check much, have fun correcting me) was quite... well, interesting. The game was rated very well among a lot of video games websites, but got mixed reactions from fans. Some loved it, some felt like it was "meh" and others hated it. I guess I can kind of see it from the more negative perspective, but I really liked Fable III. Like a lot.

One of the biggest gripes I hear is "the game was too easy!", that's fair, but I like easier games (especially when it comes to adventure games and RPGs) so the difficulty didn't really bother me much. I also heard plenty of folks saying it was too easy to have a "good" alignment, and that there weren't enough "evil" choices in the game. I don't know, I found it pretty darn easy to be evil. In retrospect, I guess I really don't get the negative perspective. Anyway on to more Fable stuff.

So the whole point of Fable III is to start a revolution and save your kingdom from the coming darkness/apocalypse stuff. Your brother, King Logan makes you choose some people to be executed, because he's just a jerk like that, and your mentor, Sir Walter and butler, Jasper lead you on a journey to take down your bro, the king. So long story short, you recruit the help of various towns and villages by making promises to their leaders/respected citizens and eventually you overthrow your bro and claim the Kingdom for yourself, but not before a brief encounter with "the darkness" that promises it's going to come back in exactly one year (?) and destroy your world.

At this point, you get to the best part of the game in my opinion, making decisions where you can keep your promises to those you made promises to, or you can break the promise and be a butt. Anyway, you make your choices, you face the darkness, which turns out to be Walter and that's that. The story is decent, no more, no less.

The gameplay is very simple, as it should be. Nobody wants to go to school for many years to get a degree in how to play the game you've just bought. the x button is melee attack, the y button is ranged attack and the b button is magic attack. Simple. No complaints, moving on.

Graphics are up for debate (well, everything is up for debate) Some were/are upset the game doesn't look more realistic, but I like the fantasy cartoony-ish look to the characters. Though they can sometimes make the most bizarre faces. The sound is spot on, great music, the sound effects never seem off putting. Overall, good job. The game isn't very long, it's not like Elder Scrolls or Final Fantasy where you start playing the game when you're 14 and you finish the game when you're 38. 15-25 hours, depending on how much you like to meander. Personally, I find that preferable to games that require hundreds of hours, which is funny because I've put in hundreds of hours into each of the original three Fable games.

Wrapping up, Fable III has great humor, a great fantasy look, simple gameplay, a decent story, reasonable complete time and great music and sound effects. Why were fans so mixed on this when it came out? I'm not sure. I guess it just wasn't what some people wanted, can't please everyone.

Final Score: 4 chickens out of 5.