After years of games with a multiplayer focus, 2017 saw some very high-profile releases that put a strong emphasis on story-driven, single payer games that garnered a lot of critical acclaim and, crucially, also sold very well. Big, high-risk games like Horizon: Zero Dawn, Breath of the Wild, Super Mario Odyssey, and Assassin’s Creed: Origins didn’t have a multiplayer component at all. Even a huge first-person shooter like Wolfenstein: The New Colossus was single-player o
In service of drawing in a younger, and family-conscious fan base Lionhead has made a ton of concessions, and essentially created a completely different game than anything that exists in the Fable universe. The goal of each level in Fable Heroes , each a part of a larger board game , is to bash, zap, or shoot every enemy and collect the coins they leave behind. Those coins are then used on a whole variety of power-ups and improvements, from more damage to new puppet charact
But earning those power-ups isn’t as simple as spending one’s earned coins, it’s actually facilitated via the game’s coolest feature. After each level players accumulate a certain number of dice rolls, which determine the improvements they have access to. Rather than being able to increase your damage percentage outright, players have to hope they roll the appropriate number and land on that space. It’s quite an ingenious little addition, and helps keep that carrot-on-a-stick always out of re
As with the dog from Fable II , The Journey’s designers clearly want players to emotionally invest in Seren. Gabriel can brush her, feed her apples, and occasionally has to tend to her injuries – players mime the motion for pulling arrows from her flesh, then use the magic of the gauntlets to heal the gaping wound left behind. For that matter, Seren is rendered beautifully: shiny coat with distinct hair, attentive, believably alive eyes – but it’s all for nothing. She has no agency, no obvious personality or bearing on events. Seren’s defining characteristic is that she’s a pain in the ass to control, and dramatic story points that hinge on her fall flat as a result. Gabriel may care deeply about Seren, but the player never d
There is also the matter of Seren herself. There are some great horses in video games: Epona in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and (especially, so far as I’m concerned) Argo from Shadow of the Colossus . Seren won’t be joining that list, despite Lionhead’s intentions to the contr
When it comes to Fable 4 though, there are a lot of qualities from previous Adventure games Cheats in the series that we hope to see return. Combat has always been one of the most exciting elements, as well as the game’s ability to tell a story that feels as if it is the definition of epic. Where the games tend to go wrong is more in the subtle details, like last year’s ‘Road to Rule’ mechanics — namely the handholding and the third act decision-focused parts of the g
That leads us to one big candidate: Playground Games, makers of the recently released and well-received Xbox-exclusive Forza Horizon , who have been known to be working on an open-world RPG for Microsoft for some time. Job postings by Playground indicate they are looking for artists and programmers with experience in these fields and Horizons was itself an open world game, just with cars instead of swords and hor
With more than a year of development time to work on Splinter Cell 6 , it’s not a far stretch that Ubisoft might be saving it for a surprise reveal during this year’s E3. After all the attention they’ve been giving Assassin’s Creed Revelations over the last month, this would be a big surprise. Gamers no doubt want to know if the game will be returning to its original style of gameplay or if it will retain the darker, grittier, and more fast paced action of Splinter Cell Convicti
There’s no need to justify the announcement of Grand Theft Auto V as one of our most expected, but the sheer mystery surrounding the nature of the game can’t be overlooked. While Rockstar took a break from the Grand Theft Auto franchise, they managed to release both Red Dead Redemption and L.A. Noire : two titles that are helping to redefine maturity in modern gaming. So with GTA 5 , can we expect the developers to return to the immature and crude roots of the series, or try something
One big omission from the Fable games of yore was the implementation of player-ridden mounts like horses. While there is a certain appeal to being forced to travel through the game world on foot, personally I find that I miss a lot of detail and off-the-beaten-path stuff when I’m racing past everything at 100 km/h, the thought that Fable 4 won’t have some kind of mounted beasts is n
For that matter, The Journey’s voice acting and score are both top notch, as is the on-screen performance of Gabriel during cutscenes, his subtly exaggerated features easily communicating a wide range of emotions and clearly reflecting his state of mind. He’s a likable, distinct hero who frankly deserves a better game. Perhaps he’ll get it when Xbox 720 and Kinect 2.0 – with its rumored ability to read lips and recognize emotions – roll around, but for now, there’s just no need to take The Journ