Fable II

[Saph]

Hello fellow gamers and wonderful review readers!!!

My former guide was alittle premature, as I really don't know enough about the game yet. As such, until I know more, I'll write a review on a different game that I used to love!



Fable 2 is a 3rd person RPG which takes place in the world of Albion. The character you play is a little boy or girl(you can choose)who grows up as an Orphan on the streets of Bowerstone, with no other relatives other than his/her older sister, Rose.

The ending of the childhood section shows Lord Lucien, the main evil of the game, and the Lord of Bowerstone, shoot your sister dead, only to shoot you as well, throwing you through the window from his tower of Bowerstone castle. You are hereafter saved by Theresa, a seeress, who takes your broken body to her hut outside Bowerstone, where she nurtures your body back to health. You're then released into the free world as an adolescent man or woman, and you're from here on out free to do as you please, to be who you want to be, good or evil, pure or corrupt!

The game has many awesome features in it to keep the game interesting. For example legit jobs, such as a bartender or a smith. Or you can be alittle less honest and be an assassin. It also gives you a large selection of clothing to wear, and the option to dye it, with dyes such as black and gold being rare, while blue and purple are very common!



Gameplay: The game is very straight forward, and easy to play with the controls. Your controls are the standard for almost any 3rd person RPG, so unless this is your first ever RPG on a console, don't worry about learning the controls, as hints on what to push when for certain situations in the game will be shown.

The entire world is also not completely free roaming, although its quite a free world, there're still zones, for example: You have to travel from 1 city to the next? You'll get a loading screen as you do so.



Combat is extremely fun in Fable! Wether you're using a rifle, hand gun, sword, polearm, whatever. The fighting in Fable II is the dot over the i!

You can fight multiple enemies at one, and even slay several at once if you cleave with your polearm, or rapidly shoot with your rifle, handgun, or crossbow!




There're many weapons to choose from, and each kind goes from Rusty, to Master, and from there on you can get legendary weapons, which all have unique names. Skins are still the same though, even if you've never seen a certain skin before, I'm sure it'll eventually turn up on other weapons! Each also have their own strengths and weaknesses, and you have to decide what kind of weapon you favor the most, as you cannot be an expert in all of them.

Other than weapons, there're of course also spells, but they're difficult to master, but reward you with more brutal force than more common weapons!

Skills: As a 4th hero, you can choose yourself which kind of hero you wish to be. You can choose to specialize in 3 different categories.

Strength
Skill
Will

Strength: Strength increases your efficiency, and physical strength required to swing and thrust melee weapons forcefully. It also increases your overall health pool and other resistances.

Skill: Skill increases your efficiency, and steady hand required to line up the perfect shot with any ranged weapon! It also increases your movement speed.

Will: Will increases your efficiency, and mental stability required to master the incredible powers of will! As magic in Albion is very taxing on a person, it takes tremendous mental stability to remain focused while casting a great spell. A hero not destined to master will, will pass out in a fight from exhaustion.

Each kind of speciality aids you, and curses you in different ways. Where strength is slower, skill is faster, while skill dies easier, and strength lasts longer. Will is really the Joker of the two kings. Where the two kings excel, Will may lack, or be twice as powerful, it depends on the person who plays!


Marriage?
Yes, Fable II is a very realistic game, as a player can build a relationship, become a friend, a lover, a boy/girlfriend, a fiance, a husband/wife, and even a mother/father to several children! You can also buy houses for your family, with varying size and value. You can even buy furniture for your home to make it look nice, and a special arrange button where you can walk around in your home, rearrange your furniture, and save when you leave! And yes, you can have same sex marriage, which makes me extremely happy to see. A man and woman can be married, and as can two men or two women.

However, you need to return home during your travels as well! If you stay away for too long, your wife will begin to miss you, get angry, and may even leave you, taking your children with her. And yes, if you're an extremely evil character that is, you can have an affair, or several wives, and if 1 wife gets out of line, you could murder that entire family of yours.

You can also knock on other peoples doors, burst in, and kill everyone in the home, finding treasure and gold(murderous stealing)

But the game is not lawless. If you break the law you'll be hunted down by guards. At later game levels, though, you'll be so powerful that people have trouble killing you!

Effects Of Your Decissions!

Everything you say and do in Fable II affects your character, and how people think of you. For example, being charitable, giving gold away, helping people in need, will increase your purity level, while being greedy, stealing gold, and murdering people, will increase your corruption level.

Each side of your concience level will change your physical appearance accordingly, as will your abilities with Strength, Skill, or Will.

For example:

A higher purity level will cause your character to become beautiful, plain and simple. Tan skin, light and waving hair, smooth skin, as well as a halo over their head. An angel, really.

A higher corruption level will cause your character to become monstrous, plain and simple. Grayish blue skin, black hair, reddish cracks in your skin, as well as horns on your head. A devil, really.

Your abilities will also cause your physical appearance to change.

For example:

A higher strength level will cause your character to grow bulkier muscles. Look more fit all around, get a thicker jaw, and just really buff and strong looking.

A higher skill level will cause your character to grow taller, more slender and agile looking.

A higher will level will cause your character to get darker skin, with glowing blue patterns on your skin. You will just generally get an otherworldly feel to yourself.

Most people in the game are also killable, although key NPCs are immortal, most are not, and you're always able to go on a killing rampage if you feel like raging hardcore mode. Of course this leaves you with a super low Purity level, people will be terrified of you, refuse to talk to you, and guards will attempt to kill you MUCH faster(A high purity might get guards to let a smaller crime slip, while the SMALLEST crime for a high corruption will cause the guards to want to jab their sword into your gut.

Scores:(Based on Xbox 360 gameplay)

Graphics: 8/10. Good graphics for its era, and very little choppyness in the game. The game looks beautiful, and really allows you to breathe in the unique atmosphere of the game.

Sound: 6/10. Sound is good, but could do better. Some looped noises in the forests, and lame repeated comments from people you may have to pass on your paths back and forth in the city!

Details: 10/10. These people left nothing to chance. The game is practically flawless in its details, from jobs, to physical changes as you grow older in the game, to getting married, to having kids and friends, to having a house, to owning shops and real estate, to dressing nicely in your favorite color, to sporting your favorite flintlock pistol on your belt, to cutting your hair and beard, to getting tatoos. The details are top notch, and by themselves, adds a HUGE chunk to the to do list in this game.

Gameplay: 7/10. Fantastic, but still quite abit of work to do for it to get a better score. The running is alittle clumsy and it takes a while to get used to the unique way the camera follows your fast traveling character, and turning to face an enemy behind you NEVER gets any faster, even with tons of skill ability, you run and attack faster, but you don't turn on your heels faster. Will is overpowered, strength is underpowered.

Overall score: 8.3/10

Great game, and despite it having a few goofy features(burping farting etc. for crowd rep), the game stays mostly serious, and succesfully manages to keep the campy and humorous aspects alittle in the background, in a less important slot, allowing the more serious aspects to get a front row seat.

I highly recommend this game to ANYONE who enjoys progressive RPGs with a timeline, lore, character background etc. Very highly indeed.