In January, the rumor mill began swirling with reports that Forza Horizon 3 studio Playground Games had begun work on a fourth Fable game. At the time, a few developers from the now-shuttered Fable studio Lionhead voiced their thoughts on the project, and now, series creator Peter Molyneux has weighed in with what he wants to see in a new Fable game.
Speaking to IGN, Molyneux revealed that he’s interested in seeing a potential Fable 4 head back in time instead of trying to push the story forward.
“The Fable story hinted at a dramatic time before [the first Fable] when the Guild was founded. This would be a perfect setting for Fable 4,” Molyneux said in the interview.
Molyneux also stressed that changes needed to be made to the combat system, possibly with the ability to craft your own spells and “brutal, visceral, and fluid [combat] that left permanent scars.”
The melee combat in the last main game, Fable 3, was criticized for being boring and monotonous. As role-playing games have adopted more action game elements and action games have used some role-playing mechanics, it would be refreshing to see this area of of the series overhauled.
One of Molyneux’s other wishes for Fable 4 is the inclusion of rideable dragons, as well as “god-sized giants.” This sounds similar to what we saw in The Ender Scrolls V: Skyrim, but we wouldn’t be opposed to the series going in that direction — it has certainly influenced the majority of role-playing games released this generation in one way or another.
The last full-fledged Fable game we saw was the Kinect-exclusive Xbox 360 game Fable: The Journey. It received mixed reviews when it launched in 2012, with much of the criticism directed at the poor motion controls.
The fourth Fable game is reportedly in development at Playgrounds newly-opened second studio. The decision to revive the series was apparently made, at least in part, because of the success of Sony’s new IP Horizon Zero Dawn. With Microsoft’s major first-party franchises currently limited to just Halo, Forza, and Gears of War, we’re hoping the new game can give the company the confidence to move forward on more single-player and story-heavy projects.
