Fable'd Series

I often become nostalgic about older games that I have once played, but lately while playing Fable III, I have been feeling nostalgic in the game itself, which is quite a strange feeling.  As much as I originally despised Fable III when I first started, the game has really gotten a hold on me, even though I'm still not particularly enthralled with it.  I mean, every time Lionhead Studios and Peter Molyneux (now left the development studio to form his own, 22 Cans) would announce a new Fable game, they would go on about new revolutionary features, such as raising a child to eventually become the playable character, or the ability to burn down entire villages (this one is rumored to have originally been in Fable II, but removed due to controversy), only to release a game with a fraction of the freedom.  This was especially brought to light around the release of Fable III, which came out within a close time period of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Kingdoms of Amulur: Reckoning, which both put the game to shame in terms of freedom.

To be honest, nostalgic may not even be the correct word that I'm looking for, but the deeper I get into the gameplay and story of the game, the more I think back upon similar elements from Fable and Fable II.  It's almost as if I myself am this character on a journey, thinking back upon the history of the world, and the inhabitants before me.  The further I explore the world, the more I fully appreciate what the developers were able to accomplish not only in the third game of the Fable series, but how they've successfully tied together all three games.  What I've learned over the course of my time with Fable III is that the game is less of a sequel, and more of an expanded universe of the series.

In Fable I, the title character plays as a "Hero", one of few who have magic powers and superior strength above others.  The story revolves around the loss of one's family and village, revenge, the discovery of family members still alive, the hunt for the bad guy, and good and evil choices throughout, including a final decision to kill one's own sister for power, or save her for nothing.  In Fable II, 500 years after the original, the player and their sister/brother are separated by the evil king (being a Hero himself, shooting both in fear of other Heroes challenging him, killing the player's sibling), who is then slain by the player (once again a Hero, a "descendant" of the previous Hero I believe) after building up strength.  The end-game also requires a difficult choice to be made: to be rich, to save thousands of people who perished under the king, or to revive the player's sister, dog, and loved ones who also perished through ways of the king.

Having briefly explained the plots of both Fable and Fable II, which are both much more in depth than that (not even going into DLC for both games, which provide hints for the sequels), we arrive at Fable III.  Finally, near the end of the third game, I feel like Lionhead Studios finally hit the sweet spot in plot exploration.  Usually, when a game makes changes for a sequel, they do so to be fresh and new, but for once, the changes feel like they were made because the game itself has changed from what has come before it.  Fable III is a perfect example of how an entire game evolves - or better yet, game world evolves - for better or worse.

While walking through the world of Albion, the setting for all three Fable games, I would naturally come across cities, towns, or villages, and would sometimes recognize the name of said place.  I knew the name from both Fable II and even Fable before that, however could not remember how it looked, having been actual years since I've played the others (I believe 3 years since Fable II, and 5 years since Fable).  Slowly, however, I would stop at a random spot, and finally understand exactly where I was, having recognized something of unimportance, such as a small bridge or hill.  I have been here before, would be my first thought.  And I found this thought to be strange, because rarely does one stand in the same spot in a video game, that has been in not one, but two games before it.  At that point, I would look around, and realize what changes have been made to this area.  I'm not speaking of purely cosmetic changes (though I did notice that extra details such as textures and plants have been added), but of the placement of buildings, and how things have evolved.  Except it doesn't feel like a forced evolution by the developers, but rather a natural evolution that has occurred within the actual game, due to political and natural causes.  Fable I consisted mainly of magic and swords, and I believe had crossbows.  Fable II felt the push of societal changes, with the inclusion of the newly discovered gun, larger and less fantastical buildings, and the downplay of magic due to the extermination of heroes during the 500 years between the games.  Fable III moves into the industrial age, with steam powered engines, factories, the evolution of the simple gun to the rifle and pistol, and even governance.

What makes this feel even more of a natural evolution is that Albion is returned to during each game, with most areas making a reappearance, albeit in its new form.  The stories from the previous games are continued, and are referenced to when needed.  The last Hero, from Fable II, gave birth to two children (which is actually in the Fable II DLC, which I recently found out about), myself and my brother, who has become an evil king and partial dictator.  My goal is to get as many Albion residents on my side before overthrowing my brother.  These people live in the towns and cities that are all too familiar with what heroes can do, and some have been directly affected during the time between the two games.  Just yesterday while playing, I found a man looking for money to rebuild a bridge to another area, to memorialize the people that had lived in the village on the other side.  It took a moment for me to recognize the hill I was standing upon, the ravine and path below me, and the high waterfall to my right, which I could dive off of in Fable II.  It then occurred to me that the man meant that the ones living on the other side had been killed off by my brother, the king.  I came back a while later after the bridge had been built, and found the area to be desolate, which once served and my childhood home after I had been shot and rescued, during Fable II.  Except it wasn't me, it was my character's mother; the people who had raised her, who were now gone.

I found a path through the village, which lead me to a beach, which luckily still had a few remaining survivors of the old hippie village.  Seeing an island in the distance, I decided to swim to it, as I immediately recognized it as a small island in the middle of a large lake from Fable II, which held some decent treasure in its cave.  However, as I kept swimming, I noticed a very large tower, and wondered what had happened to the island during the course of history.  The lake also seemed bigger than I had remembered, until it finally occurred to me that it wasn't a lake, but a sea.  That island - that tower - presented memories rushing back to me.  Stranded in the tower, in prison, for years, forced into manual labor to build the tower.  During which time many were murdered back in Albion, including my family.  But once again, this wasn't me, it was my mother's past.  I was looking at the same tower in the distance (which I believe is inaccessible in Fable III) in which my mother had to make the final choice, which now stood silent, just as a reminder to what happened.

This is how sequels should be presented.  There have been multiple times throughout the game in which things like this have happened, bringing back images of what has come before, and how the world has changed.  What was once a happy forest in Fable I (besides the killer bees and bandits) has now become a desolate swamp riddled with cannons.  A graveyard from Fable II is back, though now with even more gravestones lining the path.  Even a semi-immortal character from Fable II has returned, bringing with him a device deemed "The Wheel of Death".  Unfortunately, while I used it to hilariously kill others during my time (as my mother, I suppose...), it was reversed and used unsuccessfully on myself.  There are still many other areas I am hoping to see return, a feeling that I rarely feel while playing a game.  What Lionhead Studios and Molyneux have done is quite amazing, having created a world that has a long continuing story, an evolving world and society, difficult moral decisions, all wrapped up with decently compelling gameplay.

Before I finish, I would like to touch upon the choice of good or evil in the game.  Each game has them at the end.  In Fable I saved my sister (who, by the way, becomes the blind seer, a large character in both Fable II and III); in Fable II I saved my sister, dog, and family (though honestly, while bringing my sister back was really cool, I had already killed off my wives, so I really just wanted my dog back).  Now I'm at the end of Fable III, or at least running down the home stretch.  After playing a bunch of games with moral decisions (KOTOR, Mass Effect, Skyrim, Fable I and II, etc.), I really didn't think that the game could present that much of a challenge.  I try to be the good guy, but in video games I don't care about others and do what's good for me, as long as it's a good cause - money and power don't matter to me at the end of games.  But, hearing online about what difficult decisions are to be made, I had to see it for myself.  I'm not going to lie, these really are tough decisions.  Without spoiling anything (I do urge others to play each of the games, both II and III have excellent combat), on one hand, I can lie to everyone I've befriended in the game and break every promise I've made, to actually be the good guy in the end, or I can uphold those promises and be the good guy in the short run, to be the bad guy in the end.  I'm having a hard time breaking those promises, so I'm going to see if it's possible to be the good guy no matter what.  No matter what I do though, someone is going to have to take the fall for others.