14 DAY TRIAL // Fable 2 is going to be big. Peter Molyneux points that out to anyone who's got the ears and the interest to listen. And there are quite a few of those, apparently, judging by the sales that the original Fable brought in (about 3,5 million copies) and by the reception of any new piece of news about the new game. While Molyneux has a history of talking about features that don't make it into his games, all the Fable 2 talk is pretty interesting.
If the first game in the series took you from your boyish days and allowed you to become the greatest hero of the land or the biggest villain in town, Fable 2 is going to begin at the hero stage. Everything the player does, however insignificant, will reflect clearly upon the world of Albion, in which the adventures take place. In any of the game's zones, all the things you destroy remain destroyed for the rest of the game. There's an option for the character to get married. And marriage leads to sex, the fade-to-black-and-no-graphics kind of videogame sex, and sex leads to children. If the hero goes evil, his kid will become the bully of the town and if the player stays on the good side, his child can grow up to be a hero that takes after his father. It is all about the choices you make and the consequences they have.
The innovations are not restricted to the game world. Molyneux reveals that Fable 2 lacks a functioning HUD and does away with the minimap. In short, you'll have a pet dog that functions as a pointer. He runs away towards enemies and some locations, forcing you to follow him and do whatever is needed. Also, the patch towards your next questing target is shown as a magical dust floating near the ground. All of this is done in the name of immersion and might be a bit confusing at first, especially considering that the game world itself is more than 10 times the size of the original game world, with 80 spells, 30 dungeons and over 100 weapons, and that there are more than 160,000 dialog lines to be found in Fable 2.
The only thing that is now up in the air is represented by the plot details for the game. Molyneux has mentioned sacrifice and loss as major themes, while also stating that the game might be experienced very differently by different players. As the game is scheduled for release this year, stay tuned for further details.