Fable 3 Review: Sometimes It’s Not Good To Be the King

Fable 3 is finally here. The much-awaited sequel to Peter Molyneux’s fantasy epic features a whole new story line, picking up a generation after the previous title. As the child of the King/Queen (the hero from Fable 2), you are tasked to bring down your villainous brother, who is the current King and ruling the land with a tyrannical fist. Should you take up arms, or avoid the game like the plague?

Fable 3 features the same basic gameplay you’ve come to expect from the series. You slowly unlock new abilities as you play, and new weapons as you continue your quest. The clunky menu system from Fable 2 has been replaced with an all new hub room, where you can check your map, equip new weapons or abilities, or join a friend’s game. Unfortunately, the menu system seems actually worse then it was in Fable 2. It takes a lot of time to get acclimated to how to use it, and by that time if you haven’t thrown down the game in anger, you’ve most likely already beaten it.

The game also does a terrible job of letting you know when you’re getting close to a no-return point. Which is incredibly frustrating when you think you have more time to finish certain quests, and then realize it’s too late. For completionist gamers out there, this can cause absolute frustration, because it’s gonna force you to have to replay the game again, which is only advisable if the story of the game itself actually warranted you wanting to do that.

With Fable 2, I played through it twice, because I wanted to experience the game the opposite of how I originally played. Although it didn’t do too terrible a job with it’s “moral choices,” it was at the very least still satisfying. Fable 3, once again, doesn’t execute this as well as it probably should have. The story just isn’t interesting enough to make you want to replay through it.

The one thing they did fix, thankfully, is online co-op. Gone is the broken Fable 2 shared screen multiplayer. Players can split up within the same loaded area, which makes it quite a bit easier to complete quests and find collectables, which will carry over to your own game. This part of the game is actually where Fable 3 shines, because once again, playing with a friend will always enhance a tepid experience.

Fable 3 isn’t terrible, but once again it doesn’t hit the bar that Molyneux and crew hype the game up to be. Between a stilted menu system, an uninspired storyline, and a completely unexpected abrupt ending, it definitely isn’t worthy of a $60 pricepoint. If you’ve got the time to rent or Gamefly it, or if you have a friend to play through it with, then it’s definitely an average adventure game worthy of a few days of play.