Molyneux on the Vanity of Gamers

Fable 2 is turning out to be a fantasy game unlike any other, with a new feature announced almost every time Molyneux opens his mouth. At a games industry event in Brighton, he sat down for a chat with Gamasutra to discuss using vanity as an incentive. "Fable 2 will take a similar dramatic approach to the concept. Drained of health points and laid out on the ground, players will have the choice of losing experience points - the game's key method of building up a selection of fearsome fighting moves - and immediately jumping up to regain the action, or letting the enemy close in and work them over with stabs, kicks and punches ... Worse than that, when you eventually get up again to fight another day, the marks of your beating will remain for all to see." These scars will be important, somehow, in Fable 2 online mode, a topic they still aren't discussing in detail.

Comments

Molyneaux's Fables

[Puff of Logic]

Molyneux is a guy I have very mixed feelings about. He headed up Bullfrog when they made Dungeon Keeper, one of the first games I've ever played from the evil perspective, and a game that earns him huge cool points in my mind. The trouble is, the guy keeps talking about making games that I really want to play but then isn't able to deliver. Black and White is an excellent example: huge potential, but the delivery lacked...something. I can't decide whether I like the guy for being such a visionary, or dislike him for constantly taunting me with game experiences I can't have!

Unlike any other?

[Aladrin]

Unlike any other? I dunno, sounding a LOT like Fable 1 so far. Free-roaming so vast that one of the devs got lost, for example... Yeah, sure it was.

You'd think PM would have learned his lesson on Fable 1 about opening his mouth, and I think I remember him SAYING he learned his lesson (Why did I believe him?) but here he goes again.

Know who this is going to bother?

[RandoX]

The guys that pick the "hot chick" character in every game.

Re:Know who this is going to bother?

[hansamurai]

If I'm going to stare at the rear end of a character for 40+ hours, it might as well be a woman.

Re:Know who this is going to bother?

[Drachemorder]

That's all well and good, but I prefer for my avatar in a game to be a representation of what I would like to project myself as rather than what I'd like to sleep with. It's just a personal preference about play styles, though. Some people like to create a character that's completely different from who they really are. Others like to project themselves into the game and act according to their real-life principles. Still others just want to look at a hot female butt. I have no problem with any of these. It's your game, play it however you want to.

Re:will it let you complete the game?

[Broken scope]

Because the scaring in the last game did affect gameplay.

You could be the glorious hero, full of light and wisdom, but you were so damned fugley by the end game that the towns people would run away from you.

Not to mention the fact that some people DO care what their character looks like, even more once you go online, a name isn't always enough to make you unique.

Go look at wow, how many lvl 70s look almost the same and are the same right down to the enchants, the talents, and the equipment? Its not pretty and it gets really annoying really fast.

People want unique characters, this is part of that to an extent.