I've been making the most of the 360 since I've been home. I've done everything in AC: Brotherhood, bar the multiplayer achievements, and my wireless at home isn't good enough to play any matches properly, so I won't be getting them any time soon.
Instead I've been putting some time into Fable 3. I spoke about it last year giving my general impressions. There's nothing particularly wrong with it, it's just not a great deal different to its predecessors.
There's some interesting ideas in there though. The story is dark at times. The Fable series has often walked that line between "childish humour" and "balverines eating people" but when the final boss fight (oh right, MASSIVE SPOILER) forces you to kill your mentor, it's pretty heavy stuff. The final scene where he dies isn't going to make anyone cry, but it's pretty sad nonetheless.
However, it sticks to the template lain down by the franchise. There's not an awful lot of innovation going on. Yes, being the king allows you to make choices that affect the entire kingdom, but it's just basically another form of the moral choices that have been a part of Fable since the beginning. There's nothing particularly bad about that, but it'd be nice to see some new ideas injected into the franchise.
So with that in mind, here are my ideas of things Fable 4 could do to make it even better;
- Bring back the magic
The main antagonist of Fable 2 was Lord Lucien, a guy who really couldn't get over his personal tragedy. Fable 3 was mostly you travelling around forming alliances and playing property developer. Let's see a return to the magic of Fable 1. Jack of Blades was a brilliant villain, with a great malevolent feel. I'd love to see a return of The Court, with the Queen or Knight of Blades being the primary antagonist. God, I'm such a Fable geek.
- Swap out/upgrade the engine
Fable 3 looks nice enough, and it's actually quite stylised, but I'd like to see the game running in a different engine. The fighting of Fable has always been a bit repetitive so perhaps an engine shift would allow for slightly more dynamic combat. Perhaps combining spells and swordplay. Basically, I'd like to be able to set fire to my sword.
- Keep the weapon morphing system...
... But make it MORE dynamic. Fable 3 had the Hero weapons which could change in a few ways, but the others had three upgrades which were essentially stat upgrades. I'd like to see a system where the weapons perhaps adapted to better suit your play style. So for example, if you use fast flurries of sword attacks, your sword becomes a katana, but if you use lots of blocks and flourishes, it becomes a slower, stronger broadsword.
- Bring back menus
As much as Peter Molyneux would disagree, menu screens aren't all that bad. No, I don't enjoy them but I recognise them as a necessary evil in inventory management. The wardrobe system was nice, but sometimes I like to just default to a simple pause screen. The map system was nice though. That can stay.
- Go global
The map has expanded each Fable game, so it'd make sense to expand it further in Fable 4. Instead of purchasing individual properties, why not be able to buy territories and be able to adjust taxes to increase your income? It'd be great to see a range of different countries, like Samarkand mentioned in Fable 2. I like medieval England but sometimes, I'd like to here some villagers who don't sound like they're all from the West Country
- Stop the black and white decisions
Admittedly, Fable 3 was better at this. Some options were evil, but pleased the populace, and some vice versa, but let's move on from the "Send the Orphan to school/Kick him into a volcano" style of choices. In fact, why not have several options, with it not being exactly clear what the result will be? You could make the entire decision by normal gameplay actions. Instead of having to press and hold a button, maybe you could just walk away from an downed enemy if you wanted to spare their life. Alternatively, you could shoot them in the crotch. Or perhaps offer them your hand, to form a new alliance.Your choice.
- More WP7 interactivity
I liked Fable Coin Golf. It was a clever little side game that rewarded you in Fable 3. I want more of this in the next game. Why not have a short Fable style action-adventure game about a legendary hero on the WP7, whose tomb you can then access in Fable 4? Also I want to be able to take my Fable dog out on my phone for walks. That's innovation right there.
- Stop my character from talking
There's no deep roleplaying insight for this one, his voice just pisses me off.
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