thirdworldgamer

Saw this story on Kotaku today, and then I watched this video (note: This contains SPOILERS! If you're planning to buy the latest DLC, stop reading right now). It seems to hint at a future game...or DLC? Whichever the case, it impresses me that Fable II's DLCs have added voice acting. Usually these things are just tacked on to existing games. Good for Molyneux and Co. to actually put in more effort than usual.

If you've been reading a lot of game review sites and forums online, Fable 2 has been getting an immense amount of buzz this week. After having played the game since yesterday up to this afternoon...I say that the game really does deserve it. I haven't completed the game yet, to be honest, but I am getting that feeling that this is one of those games that will set a new bar for Western RPGs (or, perhaps RPGs in general). A quick list of things I liked: 1. Interactions with villagers, while limited and lacking dialogue, really come into their own after you spend a good deal of time with it. 2. Interesting design decision in Fable II - it seems monster encounters/bandit encounters do not drop any gold; just fighting experience (which can improve your physique and magic capabilities). Over time this makes you actually spend time in the towns, do the jobs, and change the way you understand the definition of a 'role playing game'. 3. It's really cool that you can buy sta...

That's just a sampling of the incredible, INCREDIBLE levels of hype Fable II is getting all over the Web. Can a game be THAT good? ***** The definition of RPG between Western developers and Eastern developers clearly differs in some way. Western devs mostly think that when a game is a 'role-playing game', they take it quite literally---you, the player, play a role in a fantasy setting, and as such, you should be given full ownership of that role. There's a lot of emphasis on freedom and the ability to do what you want to do in that world; the more expansive the choices you can make, the 'better' the game is. By this logic, even a game like Grand Theft Auto IV is technically a 'role-playing game', even if its setting is not a fantasy world (though at times, what happens is totally fantastic). With Eastern developers, it's different: a role-playing game for Japanese developers is putting the player in the middle of a story. The story is already written...