How Fable 2 Was Made and Why it's For Casuals 

Thanks for watching! If you missed Fable 1 video, find it here ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-5IzamQvbYhY.htmlsi=uY12d84bd8Sf_n_3

Fable 2 is one of my favorite rpgs, seeing the vision for the dog and learning about that implementation, remembering the story and hearing the music reminds me why. Idgaf if it’s for casuals! Solid vid!

It's interesting to learn about the development for this one, and specifically how Molyneux fought the team so often both for good ideas and infuriatingly bad ones. Imo the best examples for either side are: Good- Pushing so hard for the dog was a great idea, as it was a great companion and had a tangible positive effect on gameplay. It speaks volumes that the obvious good ending choice is hard to pick even as a good character because it meant not getting your pup back (until Knothole, at least). Bad: "We don't want it to be too scary for the children". Peter, this is an M-rated game where you can have unprotected sex with male prostitutes three at a time. The target audience is not and should not be children, and his attempts to tone down the themes just meant that the darker parts of the game had less bite. I feel this is a related issue to his attempts to tone down the combat complexity for a more "casual" audience, it seems to me Molyneux just did not understand what his target audience was.

Fable 2 is my favourite Fable game and one of my favourite games of all time. I love the world and the living world systems. THere are times I boot up the game and just stay in Bowerstone, never going to Oakfield. Just interacting with NPC's, exploiting the economy, starting a family. A true roleplaying game.

Fable 2 is certainly out there among my favourite games. I love the setting so much.

Awesome video, thanks! I hope Fable 3 is next because this one is gonna be rough XD

Absolutely fantastic work with making these documentary style videos, takes me back to the simpler days.

Nobody ever thought the Fable games were hardcore. They were made around the time where games got dumbed down/consolized for the erupting audiences on 360 and ps3.

I wish the Fable 2 intro cinematic was what the game actually looked like, and that scrapped final boss battle sounds great.

Coincidentally went back and rewatched your first Fable video today, perfect timing can’t wait to watch this! Keep it up

Fable is one of my all time favorite games, I'll have to give fable 2 another try. This video makes it look fun. Nothing but respect and appreciation to the creative team but why did they think the series needed to be more casual friendly? As a middle school kid I felt that fable 1 was already a good first rpg for a young or new person, while still being "hardcore" enough for "real" gamers. I was thrown off immediately by fable 2 and just rented instead of buying the followup to my most replayed game ever...

They were both right about the fairy trail. Yes, it made it so that you were never looking at a mini-map, but now you're looking at the trail and still not seeing everything else. The problem with F2's combat system was that once you got magic, it was just "stand in the middle and spam magic". EXP and timing and any form of skill didn't matter anymore, because a circular magic explosion was the fastest way to kill all the bad things every time. As for the death mechanic, I don't know that it mattered in a game that was so easy you would never risk dyeing. I couldn't even remember what happened when you died in this game. This is absolutely a game to give to non-gamers. The whole game felt too simple. I played it once because I enjoyed F1, then went back to Halo 3. I felt it was no where near as good as F1, but then F3 came out... and I wrote off Lionhead entirely

Great choice when you used Morrowind to compare for the bread crumb trail, it already solved exploration wonderfully with the directions in the journal and no markers.

Well thanks, now I have to put my current game down and immediately replay Fable II 😆 great video!

Fable 2 is the best of the series. But all 3 fable games have only aged great (even fable 3 with all its problems) and I wish so bad that lion head was still around to create fable 4. I am so nervous for the new fable

Banger video, keep the grind up

This is an amazing retrospective, no one touched on that. Keep it up!

Love fable, and love the video! Love the deeper dive - Great work! Thanks!

Great video, can't wait for the fable 3 retrospective :D

Loved this video and the first Fable game video too. Great work on these. Fable 1(TLC) has and always will be one of my favorite games of all time. And fron my perspective, the only good ideas Peter Molyneux added we're the dog and maybe the voice acting stuff. Other than that, all of the other things he wanted were just going against what made Fable 1 great IMO. And personally I feel Fable 1 was also a pretty casual game, but with more depth and stuff that made it feel just right. If only Blue Box could've stayed in charge of it all, I can only imagine the amazing sequels we would've gotten. Look forward to a video on Fable 3. Keep up the good work, you've earned a new sub homie. 🙏🔥🖤

Very informative!! Amazing video

This explains so much about why Fable 2 was so watered down compared to the first game. Molyneux’s disregard for the core fanbase in exchange for trying to pander to the widest audience possible led to the game feeling so much less magical, unique and flavorful than the first game did. I always wondered why the sequels felt so much less “Fable”. Hopefully the team working on Fable 4 brings back the charm and wonder of the first game rather than trying to revive all the weird decisions made in the sequels.

earned a sub with both of these reviews!

absolutely amazing editing and script!!!! expecting 100k subs by end of year

Great video man.

Fable two was for casuals! I thought the first was way better, but everyone I knew kept going on and on about how 2 was their favorite of the series, and I never understood it.

it's cray that i started the series with Fable 2 and loved its immersion and lore so to the concept art director yes your work and vision was seen i love that kind of art style but i did go back to 1 and had that moment where it clicked why so many people love the first one but not the sequel

This series was beautiful, I miss it very much

Cant wait for the next video on Fable 3

Great video! Hope there’s a Fable 3 video in the works!

GAMESTUDIOLORE with another BANGER. lets go

Small nitpick, but you showed chewablethunder's video for the morality/purity body morphing, but don't seem to have credited them in the description. I recognized it immediately because it's like the *only* video on RU-vid that shows the four wildly different appearances in one quick go for each gender and for that effort it feels like something worth crediting.

The perfect video to enjoy the weekend

You deserve way more subscribers.

Fable 2 is such an underrated game. I'm a huge fable fan and while I don't compare 2 and 3 to fable 1, I still think fable 2 is excellent on its own.

Listening to video while playing Fable 2

you put a lot of work into it, top.

Great video.

If this game will ever get the remake/remaster treatment, i really hope in the combat and magic redesign, and a better difficulty, adding death and checkpoint. Instead of the fairy trail, would be better the feature of consulting the map area, seeing all the point of interest, and having the option to use a marker that you can see in game, like Elden Ring

OHYUP the first was a banger this about to be insane

this analysis is so good, great work --- SUB TO THIS MAN !!!

While I totally agree that Fable 2 regressed a lot from the first in terms of the features that I would have rather seen fleshed out instead of dumbed down, when I booted this up again after a decade, I absolutely adored fully immersing myself again. Rose tinted glasses hard. Maybe just even though my older self knows I objectively don't like the changes from the first, I remember my younger self being so excited about this and absolutely loving every second of it. And it holds nostalgia even now.

I am playing fable 2 for the first time right now and I think that it's honestly a really good game even compared to fable 1. While I would say 1 is probably the overall better game 2 has both a lot of bad and good streamlining as well as new ideas that really makes me appreciate it as a sequel.

I couldn't remember why I like Fable II so much, when one was a better game. And then the end of the video happened and you mentioned co-op. My brother and I played this game so much. I had totally forgotten.

Don't care what anyone says. Fable 2 is in my top 5 favorite games of all time. I adore it.

I just started playing Fable 2 for the first time and was a little shocked at how different it looks from the first. The cartoon style seems more timeless compared to the more 'realistic' style. Fable 2 feels more aged and clunky compared to the previous. I do like how the game is more thought out in terms of mechanics and depth. It's rare to find a game like that nowadays, modern games seem stale from their lack of innovation.

It really sucks that this game is still not on PC

Imagine if fable 2 had never existed and came out today. It would be praised for doing something different

Fable 2 is the goat. I will gladly die on that hill

Awesome!!

Fable and fable 2 are the entire reason im an Xbox gamer.

I wish it was on pc 😢

hope you continue with 3!

Man... How long did Dene keep that look.... Geh.... You need to close out the series now. I'll be here. You've gotten my sub.

I bought an Xbox 360 just to play fable 2. I returned it within 2 days. I love the original fable. Fable 2 was a hollow shell of what the original was.

This video earned a sub, plz do fable 3

I actually think the Breadcrumb Trail does exactly what Molyneux claims. I was better able to look around Fable 2 without worrying I was going in the right direction (and forcing myself into the next part of a story quest or something; which is common in more narrative-heavy linear games, not really this genre, but still worth mentioning) and always knowing that even though I was exploring in the "wrong" direction, I could easily find my way out without having to pop open a map all the time. In many ways I am probably a "casual" gamer because while I do enjoy depth and can play games that are punishing towards the player (I love Kenshi, for example; as well as the souls genre), I don't fall in love with those features when playing the game, so much as I tolerate and learn to survive or outright subvert them (in Kenshi, it's save scumming; in souls games it's using player or AI summons to back me up most of the time). I do not think a game designed around using the map all the time is good design, it's a crutch that distracts from the world exactly the way Molyneux says it does, but I do believe you can find a better way by making the world feel memorable and easy to navigate. I didn't have that problem with Fable 1, but Fable 1's areas were shorter and it had teleportation as an option (and sometimes as a requirement). Fable 2 is noticeably larger with its areas, so having something to guide you can be argued as a good thing. People often complain about "casualization" of their favorite games, and I won't deny it goes too far sometimes (I hated how Mass Effect simplified your abilities; every point I earned and spent in ME1 felt like I was personally-tailoring my character to my liking and optimizing my favorite weapons and abilities based on how much I liked them over others), but overall it is a good thing to make it so more people can enjoy your game and I genuinely think it's only really elitists that bitch about it all the time. Hell, they use these features themselves while complaining about them. Like Elden Ring's summons system and how you can call for aid practically wherever you are. If the Mimic Tear is such a horribly overpowered summon and you think it ruins the boss experience, then _don't use it._ Don't bitch and moan and demand it be nerfed because casual players use it to get through extremely difficult and frankly unfair boss fights. But we live in a world where it's not enough for people to hate something. They have to tell *everyone* that they hate it and convince those people to hate it, too. Unsuccessfully, of course, because those people are sad, empty and extremely irritating to listen to. I will always love Fable 1 more than its sequel, but hell... even _Fable 3_ had some decent qualities. I see nothing wrong with Fable 2. Even if I no longer really play it, I got many years of enjoyment out of it. It was a pretty good game. Still wish they hadn't done the time jump, though, or at least didn't introduce technological advancements. Have a cataclysm of some sort set humanity back if you want to change the world without moving it along with reality. You don't need that, lots of fantasy settings work just fine going thousands of years into the future without adding things like guns to them, but I think they just wanted to do that to make the game feel different and while it's not what I would have done, I do think it worked well enough for what they intended. 37:17 Well at least Molyneux and I agree on a few things, with the time jump being included. That's exactly my fear with Fable. That even if the series continues, one day they may be jumping in time too far, because now they've convinced us that time and technology do indeed progress in a somewhat realistic and brisk fashion. So not moving along at all will seem strange in each sequel.

"To give people ways of playing quests that match their preferred character type rather than saying "Save these people!" only to pull the rug from under them with a "Ha! They were evil, you idiot!", that might be clever, but it usually doesn't make the player feel good." Sixteen years later, I'm still mad about the Tenpenny Tower quest. Peter had it on the nose for that. "Hey, smoothskin, can you help us get in some actual digs and not these damp dark tunnels? These guys are bigots!" only to come back a week later and Roy's killed everyone, including Herbert Daring Dashwood. Prick.

The first Fable that I played was Fable 3, when I was about 13, and I still remember the story of it fondly, but I ended up coming back and replaying Fable 2 the most. The exploration and quests feel more challenging in F2, and talking to NPCs is also more engaging in 2. I remember how in 3, you'll have NPCs literally follow you around, in love with you, after you get to a certain level of fame. I like that in 2, they have a good opinion of you and it makes it easy to romance them, but very few of them just throw themselves at you for no reason. I tried playing the original Fable when the anniversary edition came out, and I couldn't really get into it because it was so difficult and didn't have the same charm as 2 and 3. I think they did a great job of making Fable 2 more accessible and fun

“We were children…” so was I when I played these games… 😔 🤜

i love fable 2

Fable 2 got so much right it astounded me how much fable 3 'over corrected' to straight wrong.

Fable is the best gaming franchise of all time. Are you going to cover fable 3 I've always wanted to hear about its development because it felt so rushed.

I downloaded the demo for fable 2 way back then. I think it let you play up to Bowerstone before it prompted you to buy the full game. Although I played the hell out of the demo, I never bought the full game. A console generation later the xbox one introduces backwards compatibility and it somehow recognizes my fable 2 demo as a full game of fable 2. Blew my mind that I was able to get a 10 year old game for free at the time.

I remember how disappointed I was day one playing this game. I couldn’t wait after beating the original fable at least 20 times. No idea how they fucked up so bad and then made it even more worse again with the 3rd one it’s so sad.

As much as I thought Cliffy B and Peter Molyneux were over hyped in the past, They are what Xbox needs now. Xbox has all these IP's but no vision.

Sometimes i feel like I'm the only one who loved fable 1, 2, and 3 and didn't disparage them for what they did different from the others.

The dog was awesome

I think part of the reason for the time skip is they wanted to advertise guns in the trailers

I remember playing this game one time at my cousin’s house in London during the Olympics of 2012. I played the entire prologue before my mom forced me to go to a crappy looking carnival. If I was an Xbox guy, I would have played this game again and again. Here are my heroes of Bowerstone if I played Fable 2. 1. Male Sparrow. Good aligned, married to Alex and I chose to resurrect her. Two handed axe and rifle 2. Female Sparrow. Good aligned, married to Alex but chose to revive all of the lives lost in making the Spire. Long sword and pistol.

I loved every fable game even 3. The ideas were ahead of its time with real consequences to your actions. I hope they don’t fuck yo the reboot but i have a feeling it won’t be good. I hope im wrong

To me, the breadcrumb trail was a sign Molyneux was losing it completely. Not only this didn't solve the problem, it increased it tenfold! I've played the stupid game with my eyes glued to the trail, because unlike a map, you not only couldn't even see where you're going, because the trail wouldn't go far and would often change directions, but I felt miserable and barely even took in the world around me - I'm sure the artists really appreciated this decision. You missed on all the important icons on the map and generally it was worse in every way. And this guy sat around the idea with developers for moths and couldn't see the issue. Thanks Peter, you delusional hack.

I remember this was the game spells were just completely bonkers op in. I rented the game and beat it in a week with my patented run up and press B then progressively hold B longer till everything was dead combo.

5:09 🇧🇷

You have great content, and I am subscribing. I really enjoyed this video and it's beautifully scripted. If I could do so without offending anyone, I'd like to offer some constructive criticism. And I hope I don't sound like a boomer, but I think you need to enunciate better. Your delivery is fast but that is okay. I am just saying you sound like you're trying to talk so fast you leave out a word here and there. Or sometimes you just skip the end of a word. Just trying to help as respectfully as possible. That said, keep up the good work.

Guns were fun

It should be pretty obvious that creating games for people that hate games is a losing strategy.

I wonder if that Associate Producer who hated making cutscenes in Fable 1 is the reason 2 has very little of them.

Yah to be honest i only loved fable one ☝️ played fable two which story wise is almost identical to fable one with less magical options and less weapons. Then by fable 3 there were so many better RPGS or even action RPGS. I hope this new fable that has been shown for the last several years comes to fruition!! But I won’t hold my breath great content as always keep it up you’ll get more subs the algorithm will work eventually! Thanks bro 😎

I love Fable TLC but the series was always casual. Compare it to cRPGs from the late 90's for example. For some reason, the Devs simplified the formula further to the point of it just feeling completely hollow. Speaking as a Brit, the game was less of a cultural representation than the original. While I don't get hung up on identity politics I will say that one of Fable's keystones was it's uniquely British atmosphere. This was lost in the sequels in favour of an Americanised view of "how Britain is/how British people are" and the atmosphere of the game suffered as a result.

10:00 too 10:09 what game is that??

Didn't follow the hype for fable 1 at all and I discovered it pretty young so I was just getting into RPGs so it was a good starting point and I loved it. Unfortunately I followed all of the hype for fable 2 so i was pretty disappointed when it wasn't not only 'the best rpg ever made' but inferior to most rpgs that came before it. Also molyneaux may not have lied about as many features but he 100% overstated the depth those features would have.

Is that opening ai generated? It looks weird as hell

Let's be honest fable 2 is good but we all got made when we realized you couldn't throw a god damn punch,that's why fable 1 is my favorite,peter says they wanted to expand yet combat was drastically cut down especially the spells

I love fable 2 but wish it was available to play on pc

After coming from Fable Lost Chapters, I thought Fable 2 was trash… until I played 3.

You can find apples in chests,that is the word reward ever i would be happier to find a mimic.

The original Fable was my favorite. Fable 2 was a good follow up, but there were sections that I hated. The prison bit was the worst part in both games, but Fable 2's prison bit was soooo much worse for me. I hated wasting so much of my life rotting in the prison. I hated being taken out of the world, away from my family.

Fable 1 was better and I liked the time period it was set in, before all of the industrialist stuff that 2 and 3 started moving towards. But I do enjoy Fable 2. I've played it so much that I can't seem to get into it anymore, but maybe I'm just not quite in the mood for it right now. Not to mention the game's resolution is quite dated, whereas with Fable 1, since it's available on PC, you can sort of get around that kind of limitation. Fable 2 is purely on 360 and has not yet been ported to modern consoles. Though there are backwards compatibility patches and I think it works on Xbox One, no one owns or wants a modern Xbox console.

Ok, loved both the fable videos.. But... Are you hopefull for fable 3?

Wait. They hired real script writers and Fable 2's story was weaker?

After watching this, I feel like Peter was an outlier for the bad gaming decisions we see today.

36:29 Okay my memory is a little fuzzy but what certain themes were lacking delicacy? Nothing is springing to my mind

fable 2 is my favorite game, and one I've always been sad wasn't on pc. turning orbs on to see other players and joining them on their journey was always fun, it really made bowers tone market feel so lively. I didn't realize the dog developed so much based off emotes to change it's combat features. I wasn't really aware it could help in combat, because I don't ever remember it doing that, but if pampering him and calling him a good boy makes him avoid combat, then I'd gladly lose out on combat rather than be mean to him. the breadcrumb trail was a favorite of mine, like moleneau said, I was happy to wander on my way knowing I could find my way back. I enjoyed that you didn't need to be at a high level of button mashing and combos, to me needing to smash special combos to do powerful skills just ruins the mood. One button combat was excellent, I really enjoyed the timing system. it doesn't require expert controller input, simply being alert enough to time things. it was less about players physical ability to input and more about the players mental ability to understand how they wanted to play. co op was great, and something missing from modern games. linking you together really made it about the journey together rather than 2 separate journeys in the same world. I also loved finding the glitch where if you get a mercenary hero to join you, unlearn their skills, all their experience went back to the main character. The game shines in its ability to express yourself and interact with the world. Its your world and journey. it hit quite a good balance, and is sadly still the best game in the series, though I always holdout hope for rumors of a new game.

Foilage?

@2:28 Peak male performance

I might not work in a nucular power plant but I think I know how to pronounce "foilage"

the big joke of the video game industry is that, when they have a big hit, a lot of the time they have a game paid for board meeting about how they are going to fundamentally change the game to "appeal to a wider age and audience". they literally ruined the franchise making fable 2,3, the kinect game, and the currently to be released game. they didn't make it appeal to a wider audience, they just made it for younger people. which alienated their core audience. not to mention the medieval RPG audience that was fully rooted out with 2-3. gone were the spriggans abducting children held up inside a cave stockpiled with human body parts, murdered villages, sisters who cut out their own eyes, hookers and STDs, sacrificing your own children to a dark lord, etc.. shot themselves in the foot and basically locked Lionheads studio doors figuratively years before it finally actually closed

So just like Fable?

"You know what's perfect for our fable rpg ? The industrial revolution setting" What a bunch of idiots