Albion, the world of the Fable series, is a rich and detailed world. It’s quirky, colorful and filled with all manner of strange and wonderful characters. At the Eurogamer Expo this weekend, Peter Molyneux gave a revealing talk about how the series has grown and changed over the years, and the many influences that inspired various aspects of the game and its world.
“In the beginning was the idea,” began the presentation, showing a selection of footage from the series set to stirring orchestral music. “Good? Evil? It’s your choice.”
That, in essence, has always been the crux of the series: choice. The player’s actions influence the world around them and in each subsequent entry, these consequences have become more and more ambitious in their scope.
Molyneux recalls first discussing the idea of Fable in 1996 as development on Dungeon Keeper was coming to a close. Speaking with his colleagues Simon Carter and Dene Carter, they came up with the concept for what Molyneux described as “the greatest RPG of all time.” This, incidentally, was a statement he subsequently came to regret. His self-confessed tendency to over-promise and under-deliver provoked the wrath of the press and public.
Criticisms aside, the concept was sound enough to produce an RPG that featured a story with humor, and a world that “wasn’t too weird,” and mechanics that were not overly obsessed with numbers.
In 1998, development on Fable started in earnest, and as work on the game progressed, the team began to draw on a number of different influences.
The look of the original Fable was inspired by 1999′s movie, Sleepy Hollow. Molyneux described the movie as being “fantastic but realistic.” He wanted Fable’s world of Albion to be obviously in the realm of fantasy, but realistic enough to keep players immersed. From the original concept art for the game, it’s clear that it was originally intended to be much more stylized than it ended up being. The series, as it stands, straddles a line between wild fantasy and realism.
The legend of King Arthur also struck a chord with Molyneux and the team. Here was a true heroic legend that was familiar to everyone. It featured a group of heroes, strong characters and just enough of the fantastic to keep people intrigued. Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table became the inspiration for Fable’s Heroes’ Guild.
Molyneux and the team were fans of RPGs because of the opportunities for character development. They wanted to do this without numbers, though. This is how they came up with the “morphing” system, where the player character changes in appearance according to how they play the game. This was also inspired in part by the story of The Picture of Dorian Grey. Fable III carries the morphing system to the next level: not only does the player sculpt their own appearance through their actions, but their weapons change and grow, as well.
Molyneux is under no illusions that Fable did everything they set out to do. ”We went out with the intention of making the greatest RPG of all time,” he said. “And we’re still trying to do that.” Fable II was the next step in that process.
The first thing to do was to correct the over-ambitious promises which had been made first time around. ”Everyone was obsessed with something to do with an acorn,” Molyneux joked. “I don’t understand why people were so excited about that. Given the choice between a tree and swords, I’d rather have the swords, I think.” But that didn’t mean Molyneux and the team were going to rest on their laurels. They decided that Fable should be a series where they innovated and surprised with each new entry.
Fable II’s new innovation was the inclusion of the dog. The dog was included for very simple reasons that ended up having a profound effect on how people felt about the game, and particularly the ending.
Spoiler alert: at the ending of Fable II, the player is offered a choice. They can save thousands of nameless innocents, save their dog and their family, or be showered with personal riches. A considerable proportion of people in the audience picked the second option, and Molyneux believes it was because of the dog’s constant presence. The dog was something for the player to care about, a focus for their activities. This concept was, once again, taken from a movie — in this case, Mad Max. The player’s relationship with their dog is intended to mirror that depicted in the movie. And it affected the design of the game; the dog originally looked much more like a cartoony mutt. But this took away from its “dogness” and made players care less, according to Molyneux, and so the decision was made to make it appear more realistic.
Molyneux commented that many players felt like the decision at the end of Fable II was unfair; of course everyone was going to choose to save the dog. But he was pleased that this had had such a profound impact on the game’s audience. As such, there is apparently a decision of similar weight roughly ten minutes into Fable III. It is there, he claims, to help establish the bad guy character.
“Because,” he says, “you can make people hate someone as well as care about them.”
Fable II’s casual-friendly “one-button combat” system was inspired by Kill Bill‘s dramatic combat sequences. The simple yet flexible system was designed to “make the player feel heroic,” and it helped to highlight the differences between slicing through hundreds of “cannon fodder” enemies and engaging in tight, one-on-one combat with individual adversaries.
Fable III, like its predecessors, also draws inspiration from a variety of sources. Chief amongst these is cult classic ICO. Molyneux believes that ICO features the “greatest game design ever” because it played with expectations and conventions. And it invented the “touch” mechanic which features so prominently in Fable III. The ability to touch other characters in various ways, be it holding their hand, dragging them around, pushing them or leading them somewhere, helps to build emotional attachments between the player and others in the world.
The look and feel of the new game again takes its inspiration from a couple of sources. This time around, the visual style is drawn from the movie Perfume, while the story and “feel” of the world were based on Dickensian London.
Fable III is looking great, and it was fascinating to hear Molyneux talk so candidly about his influences. He promised not to spoil anything about the new game, but he did let slip that there is a “huge plot twist” once the player character becomes the ruler of Albion. He caught himself before saying any more, though, so we’ll all just have to wait until October 29 to find out exactly what this twist is.
If you can’t wait for a dose of Fable III action, be sure to check out the new Kingmaker app, due soon for Android, Symbian and iPhone devices.
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