if you've got a sense of humour and a lot of spare time, you'll love Fable II.
You can choose to be a male or female main character, and whilst the game narrowly skirts the clichéd plot devices so common to games of its ilk, let's face it, saving the world is about the biggest challenge you can get, and if it still works for James Bond, it's good enough for this.
You start off as a child, following your older sister around learning the basics: discovery, combat, using the in-game expression wheel and so on. A stray dog befriends you, and accompanies you throughout the game, proving to be a very emotional attachment. Later events set you on the path to vengeance against Lord Lucien, the game's antagonist. To defeat him, you need to gather three heroes, each representing Strength, Skill, and Will. You are to become the fourth hero, and bind the three's powers together.
You are guided on your quest by Theresa, a mysterious seeress. She directs you to the three heroes in question, yet you often must complete certain requirements to get to them. To progress, you often need a certain level of fame (or infamy), and the way to get this is to complete one of the many side-quests available in the game. These can be as simple as rescuing some kidnapped civilians to long adventures that take a lot of time and effort to complete.
Each quest carries a loaded element however: your choices, like in many games, are moral, and can be good or bad. This often isn't clear at the outset, so a degree of reservation is often desirable when seeking out characters during a quest. One such example sees you avenging a ghost whose lover abandoned him. You are required to make her fall in love with you, then hand her a note from the ghost which will break her heart. Whilst this is all optional, it does make things a lot more personal than slaying a gang of criminals.
Ultimately, your choices will dictate not only people's reaction to you, but even your appearance, which will be handsome and heroic if good, and horribly demonic if bad. Eating and drinking bad food will make you fat, further altering your appearance.
The morality system has ramifications because there's so much to do in Albion. If admired, hoards of females will swoon at your feet, adorning you with praise and all eager to marry you. You can have a family, but the moral high ground can end there if you wish: you can have affairs, commit bigamy, indulge in homosexual relationships and even have an orgy or two if you're so inclined.
Communicating with people is done via the expression wheel, and whilst it's amusing to make crude gestures and fart - yes really - in front of people, the lack of speech doesn't give your character much depth. This is a shame, as whilst Albion offers lots to do and is a vibrant, colourful and almost cartoony place, it suffers because there isn't much in the way of compelling characterisation.
The three tenets of Strength, Skill and Will make up the game's combat system of melee attacks, using ranged weapons, and finally magic. You can charge into combat with a sword or axe, take aim with a crossbow or antiquated shotgun, or deal out huge damage with elemental magic. You gain experience points specific to each one if you use it in combat, and general experience to help you level up, and unlock new skills and powers.
Combat is fun, but lacks the fluidity that a comparable game, Batman: Arkham Asylum possesses. Fable II would've been more exciting and visually better if you could chain huge combos together with sword, gun and magic alike, but instead it's rather defined, hacking away, or shooting from distance, never both in smooth succession. That said, when it's going well, it's satisfying.
You need to earn money to buy better weapons, and the game as numerous ways to do this by providing jobs such as bartender, blacksmith, bounty hunter and so on. The former requires you to hit a target as it sways left and right across a scale, but often this is juddering and can be incredibly frustrating when you miss because it doesn't move smoothly.
After acquiring enough funds, you can buy property and charge rent, which increases your wealth. The game pays you every five minutes of real time, so buying a few houses and then not playing for a few days will see you become very wealthy the next time you play, making it easy to acquire the best weapons. This isn't the best monetary system as a result, but it's a cost-effective way to advance, and if you really want a challenge, you can simply not buy anything in the first place.
Your trusty dog is an endearing companion, as he hunts treasure for you to dig up, and aids you in combat. You can feed him and teach him tricks, and this ends up forming a strong emotional attachment, something that isn't easily achieved in gaming.
If you're from the UK, the cast of stereotypical mock-Cockney characters who chirpily greet you as "Little Sparra!" (Sparrow) can grate at times, but this is a minor annoyance. The humour is consistent and voice acting is equally good.
The wide variety of locations to explore are well-animated, but unfortunately the map is utterly useless and you rely heavily on a glowing trail that leads you to your current destination. This is a shame because unlocked quests cannot be fast-travelled to unless you've found their region, and because the map is so bad, you're unlikely to have done this before hand. As a result you need to making your way through entire regions to your intended location, fighting all the enemies in each place all over again. Whilst this gives healthy experience bonuses, it's frustrating to have to do on a regular basis.
Ultimately Fable II is the sum of its parts. Crude, lewd, rude and tattooed if you want to be, it's got enough variety to make it worth several playthroughs and the morality choices and sheer fun to be had makes it well worth checking out. Not perfect by any means, but that's arguably its greatest strength: it's just like you!