Fable 2, while it fails in many ways, it succeeds
The game's artistic design is vibrant and majestic. You really feel like you are playing in this fairy-tale world with bright colors, oddly designed lanterns and caravans, victorian clothing and lush forests. Bowerstone under snow during the first hour of the game is magnificient. Oddly enough, you'll never encounter it again, killing one of the most beautiful scenary of the game within it's prologue.
The combat, while simple, is very attractive to look at. There's a fair ammount of side-quests, and they're better than the main storytelling. Most of them are hilarious, and very cleverly designed.
But of course, there's also the not-so-good aspects of the game. Let's start on the graphics. While gorgeous in style, the engine strutters in menus and frequent ( and inexcusable ) loading time cripples the game's pacing. The character suffers from button and joystick lag. Don't believe me ? Move your dude around in Fable 2, and then switch to any other third person action game, even Fable 1, and you'll notice how clunky the game feels.
Is it game breaking ? No. Like any pain, you'll get used to it. It'll become a second nature, until you play something else and come back. Your main character feels like he's gliding on the ground, and sometimes doing precise manoeuvers is one kind of a task.
The gunplay is rather weak, since you must '' hold '' the Y button to aim AND shoot, resulting in some unwanted actions from time to time during the heat of the fight, like losing your aim, or just not being able to body-target like you want. The same concept applies to magic, wich works fine. As for melee combat, while I said it looked great, it's still oddly implemented.
The game's storyline is plain bad. You are a '' hero '' and you must save the world. You can be evil or good, but your choices don't affect the main storyline or its main quest. Being evil unlocks some different settings, but really, its not worth the trouble of playing through the game again for some zones that changes. Also, you cannot kill important characters like the one who you know i'm talking about. Fable 2 failed to make you feel like you carved your own Fable world, like PM promised, but rather being a pawn for some dull events.
Your dog is a neat addition, but never did I feel an attachement to it, even when ( SPOILERS ) he got shot at the end, I said '' lulz oh noooes ''.
Fable 2 offers about... 10 different types of enemies, wich is ridiculously small. You'll always fight the same monsters, and they're exactly the same as in Fable 1. That's just bad.
The whole system about making money with real estate, is just a mean to rack money while you're not playing ( wich means if you fast forward your console clock 5 years ahead, you're rich. ) and the familly thing is just a gimmick that doesnt work. You can't do crap with your familly other than doing some stupid expressions and give them gifts through clunky menus.
Speaking of stupid expression, you can't talk, but you can express yourself with comical and ridiculous ( in a bad way ) expressions. The whole thing about adjusting a slider to make someone likes you creates a huge plastic feel to everything, thus making the people in Fable very bland.
Fable 2 lasts for about 20 hours of content, side quests and gargoyles and statues included. It's not worth doing it again on the evil side, since you don't affect the main storyline at all. Only side-quests and some towns can be changed.
I give it a 8 out of 10, because i've played better lots of RPG's that felt a lot better and more complete in the end, like The Witcher and Oblivion. Fable 2 was a decent try, but looked better on paper than in execution.