Good game but should have been called Fable 2.5
The Good:
One of the brilliant new features added to the game is the Sanctuary. With a simple press of the start button you are taken to a room where you can manage your income, change cloths or hair styles, receive or reject gifts from other players, and even check your achievements. There is also a map located right in the center where you can buy or repair buildings, and warp to any of the cities in the game. You will also find your Hero stats as well as a save game option here. Not only does this make everything much more accessible, but it really tidies up the previous games menu screens. Once more its streamlined very well allowing changing your characters look, or just to save your game a simple non laborious task. Throughout your time at the Sanctuary you are always greeted by your pleasant butler Jasper (voiced by the great John Cleese) Sometimes he will add witty dialog depending on what your currently doing. For instance if you remove all your clothing he will say something about the mannequin feeling uncomfortable.
All in all its a great feature and a novel way to check all your stats.
Another great new feature is weapon morphing.
Whenever you do anything in the game such as defeat certain enemies or acquire lots of gold, your weapon will change to represent this. Killing innocents committing crimes and being a general nuisance will cause your weapons to drip blood and flames sear from the handle. To improve your weapons further you can complete small tasks to upgrade them. These range from kill 200 hollow men to spend x amount of gold, however these upgrades only apply to the many Legendary weapons in the game. All of which will not appear in your game, meaning you will have to co op with a friend to find the best one's.
And on the subject of co op things have improved significantly. No longer when you join someone's game are you simply a generic henchman. No, now you enter the game with your own hero and dog from your world. Also there's no restriction on where either person goes, one player can go off and do one thing and your mate can do something else. You can even marry your co op friends, or have children with them. All in all it's a vast improvement over the last game and makes it more fun and enjoyable.
The Bad:
Remember the rather awkward combat system in the last game? Well it's back only this time it seems even more unbalanced. Your spells are incredibly overpowered, it's possible to go through the whole game never using your melee or ranged weapons. In fact melee combat is probably the hardest to use in the game, it feels so clumsy and sluggish. There are times where the opponent is able to hit you five or six times and your unable to do anything in retaliation, not even block. However when trying this yourself you'll find the AI is able to block you after the second strike. It's far easier and safer to keep your distance and use spells or guns. When (or if) you do defeat your foes you'll earn Guild Seals, Fable 3's version of experience points. When you earn enough you can transport to the "Road to Rule" where you use the seals to unlock chests. Each chest has something different inside, spells, extra melee damage, expression packs etc. I saw this as a menial part of the game and wished they had kept the old experience system. Running along the long road to rule was rather annoying when trying to spend my seals. Also once you unlock them there's no way to give them back, so you don't have the flexibility of the last game.
This is however the staple of the game, more simplicity and less substance. If you thought Fable 2 held your hand be prepared for Fable 3 to hold your hand, kiss you better, and give you a big cuddle. The game practically feeds you all it's secrets not allowing you to find them yourself, and your awful dog AI makes digging up items tedious and boring. You'll see what I mean when your dog barks to dig and just runs around trapped in the scenery. The baffling AI does not stop there however as enemy's will often just stand still and let you shoot at them. No matter what your actions during the fight they will never react, almost like they are glued to the spot. There are new enemy's called the sand fury, that is if you acknowledge re skinned highwaymen from the last game as new enemy's.
The Ugly?
Graphically the game looks beautiful in some area's but rather grey and dull in others. Most of the NPC's in the game look very similar with only color and gender really separating them. And the ways in which you interact with them as changed dramatically. The expression wheel from the last game has gone and replaced with a rather limited system using the X Y and A buttons on the controller. When interacting with a NPC, these buttons will appear for you to press each one with its own expression.
This means you are limited to just three expressions at a time, and have no choice in the matter. This can be incredibly frustrating as you can interact with a male NPC and the only good option is kiss.
Not much choice if you want to play as a straight hero.
Conclusion:
All in all a good game but not worthy of the title Fable 3, Fable 2.5 would be a better option. Again Lionhead prove that the best Fable game was The Lost Chapters on the original Xbox console.
So to answer the original question and to reply to the media hype, no it's not a revolution. Just a more simplified game that losses lots of it's appeal due to it's own rather limited mechanics