Estimated Play Time without DLC: 19 to 22 hours
A third person Action-Role Playing Game that mixes magic, swords, and guns. The backdrop, the kingdom of Albion. Your parent, the last great Hero died a few years back and ever since your elder brother Logan has been ruling with a fairly iron fist. Your first choice determines what gender you are, and then an opening cinimatic of the loyal elder servant Jasper rousing you from bed......Please note, this review deals strictly with Fable 3 itself, not any of the DLC.
THE GOOD
1) Those who played Fable 2 will find about half the controls the same as before. 2) Those who didn't play Fable 2 won't have much difficulty in slipping right into the control scheme, infact might have an easier time of it because of lack of preconceptions.
3) There is no seperate XP like there was in previous offerings of the Fable series, now all XP is called Guild Seals and can be used for everything.
4) Magic...It's been tweeked. Mana is gone, and spells still can be charged for larger more destructive capabilities be it single target or Area of Effect. The Summon Creature and Slow Time spells are now potions instead making usage much simpler. The higher your magical rating the more powerful your Creatures are, and the longer Slow Time lasts. On top of that, instead of putting spells into slots you wear guantlets. Relatively early on you will get the ability to wear two gauntlets at a time making for some interesting combinations. Spells are: Fireball, Lightning, Ice Storm, Vortex, Force Push, Blades.
5) Graphics....Character modeling, character movement has improved, but what has really improved is the texturing of the enviornment. It has a much smoother look and feel to it.
6) After you save the world, you still have the ability to do whatever you want. If there are any quests you didn't do, you can do them at this time.
THE BAD
1) Houses....At first glance fixing up a home and renting it out would be a good way to get the money to save the kingdom. It isn't. Houses quickly deteriorate, and need to be repaired. If you don't keep them in good repair this lowers how much rent you get. Even worse, the cost of keeping them in repair equal to, and in some cases more, than what you would have collected in rent by that time.
2) The Dog...Once again your Hero has a loyal four legged companion. The AI for the dog has seemingly gotten worse. It gets stuck behind obstacles frequently, won't follow you or fight sometimes if it spots something. Most frustrating of all, is there are times at maxed level of Treasure Hunting, you can be very close to an unopened chest and it won't bark.
3) Jasper....You will be entering your Sanctuary quite a bit through the course of the game and everytime you do Jasper welcomes you. Everytime you enter one of the side rooms, look at your weapons, change clothes, dye them, etc he makes a comment. This gets tiresome very quickly.
4) In the Beginning....You go through short sword training sequence with Walter, and then after that you leave the castle. The odd thing is, you don't get a sword at that time.
5) Upgrading Named Weapons...Unlike previous Fable offerings, you don't get to put upgrades, aka Augments, into your weapons. Instead you have to perform some actions, listed when you view a weapon, to activate it's upgrade. Some of these include: Perform 30 quests, make friends of 30 villagers, dig up 30 items, kill 250 enemies at night, kill 400 mercenaries, have 5 children. There are many others, but it might take you over 3/4 of the game to upgrade your weapon of choice depending on it's requirements.
6) Obtaining Specific Named Weapons...Unlike previous Fable games with the exception of a single chest in Morningwood which gives you the Bonesmasher, all weapons are determined at random. Yes, it is even possible to get duplicate named weapons.
7) Health....There is no healthbar anymore. As you take damage your quick use items starts to flash a little red, then darker red, then the screen does a bit. Then you get knocked out and gain a scar [note, upgrades on certain weapons prevent scars]. There are no Phylactrils anymore and no scar removal potions.
8) Multiplayer...Is bugged beyond belief. Going between zones in any way except Fast Travel is difficult. The game often freezes. There is difficulty for the game to recognize that the hosting player has completed a quest. Sometimes the game locks up to where a quest cannot be abandoned, the most notorious of these is Reaver's Mansion.
9) Merchants.....Buying from merchants is easy. The fact that in most cases their merchandise never changes is a pain. Worse still, you can only buy from them. To sell you must go to Pawnbroker, where items will be displayed on a pedistal. Then you have to cycle through the category, and page. If you goof, sell something you don't want to, you can't buy it back.
10) Voices....The third game (Fourth if you count Lost Chapters seperately) and the people of Albion say the nearly the same thing as they did in the first game with only a couple additions. One of which being what was likely meant as a joke, but sums it up perfectly. "Don't you hate when somebody says the same thing over and over. Don't you hate when somebody says the same thing over and over"
TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT
1) Alignment....It's easy to be good or bad, all it takes is money. When you get the ability to deal with your treasury, at about midpoint in the game (strictly in terms of required storyline quests) you can alter it to maximum good or bad all it takes is adding or subracting cash from the treasury.
2) Expressions....To earn them you must buy them via the Road to Rule. Once you have them, you can only use them when interacting with somebody. This means no more random farting, belching, posing, or whatever struck your fancy.
3) Many of the various weapons have been removed leaving just Warhammers, Longswords, Rifles, and Pistols.
4) Choice...Choice options are very clearcut. Good is always green, Evil is always red. Yellow is the neutral or silly option depending on the situation. However, to save the world you must be either fully good or fully evil. Also with one exception, there is no longterm consequence of your choices. You see the results immediatly.
MY THOUGHTS
Fable 3 feels much like the origional did giving you the feeling of "That's it"? Even with that, and the myriad of problems, Fable 3 still retains that which has made the series fun. That unique blend of the tragic, humor, and seriousness that works itself into so many quests that has defined the Fable series.