Fable: The Lost Chapters

The Good
The best aspects of Fable: The Lost Chapters to me was the music and audio. The main theme song was composed by Danny Elfman, a veteran of the movie soundtrack industry and it's such a fitting and memorable tune that you shouldn't be surprised if you find yourself whistling it to yourself every so often! Sound effects and voice-acting are also top notch so Lionhead definitely didn't fail in those regards.

The game itself is one in a small niche of games (including the likes of Knights of the Old Republic) that explores the ideas of moral alignment and which have virtual denizens that respond accordingly (i.e. cower in fear if you're evil, or cheer you on if you're good).

The amount of detail put into your character's physical appearance is also worthy of merit. If you get beaten up too much during fights, it will show in the form of battle scars over your body. You can also equip your character with different clothes, hair styles and tattoos (which you can make yourself if you're the creative sort). Your character also ages with time, so as you approach 60, you'll start noticing more wrinkles and liver spots.

The Bad
Even though the game is apparently longer than the original Fable on X-Box, it is still rather short for a RPG. I finished the game in ~30 hours and that's after completing probably 90% of the quests for a particular alignment (good or evil). The ending was also slightly lackluster, hinting towards a sequel IMHO.

Even though the graphics overall are good, shading is a bit of a problem on modest video cards. I have a Radeon 9800 Pro and I couldn't put the maximum shadows setting on. The reason I was attempting to was that the shadows looked rather blocky on the models, even though everything else looks exceptional.

For a PC RPG, there may be the impression of limited freedom when compared to its counterparts. As this game was ported from an X-Box, areas tend to be small and there'll be a lot of loading screens to go from one location to the next (however this is reportedly much quicker on PCs than the X-Box, so it's not too much of an issue). Most of the times you pick to do good or evil things only have two choices rather than games like Knights of the Old Republic 2 where you have multiple choices and where the good choices don't necessarily turn out that way.

The Bottom Line
Fable: The Lost Chapters would appeal to console gamers out there who want to try an RPG with slightly more freedom than standard fare or for PC role-playing enthusiasts who want a short but fun action-oriented RPG. It is nothing revolutionary but it does manage to carve its own niche by borrowing some of the "good vs evil" elements from games like Knights of the Old Republic and some of the simulated life antics found in games like The Sims. Not exactly "the greatest RPG of all time" as Peter Molyneux would lead you to believe, but a fun game in its own right.

The Good
The new content, more quests, more areas to go and just more than the original game

The dragon quest was amazing, with great graphics and fluid movements. It was challenging and felt better of an ending boss than the original games ending boss.

Avo's Tear was really cool because i was always good and really wanted the Sword of Aeons in the original game but i had to throw it away.

The money glitch is really cool in TLC and is (probably) better than the glitch in the original. When you get level 7 guile, sell all gems to any trader and than buy them back and you get 100+ gold for each.

Also, during the souls quest, if you go through the demon door in Darkwood Bordello, look around for a digging spot and when you dig there, you will find an exp. augmentation.

The Bad
You couldn't do the glitches as in the first game such as the dig glitch.

It is really hard to get the 30 key chest since one of the keys you need to get requires you to marry lady grey but that isn't the end of the quest since there is more to lady grey ( i wont spoil what she did but if you tell the guard about it you get good points and become the mayor of Bowerstone but if you marry lady grey you have to (i believe) accept to cover up the incident and get evil points for it).

ONE VERY BAD THING: They brought down the damage of every weapon in the game so the Sword of Aeons in the original game (550) was brought down significantly in the new game (230) and now the weapon with the most damage is the Solus great sword (315)

The Bottom Line
A game that should be in all gamers libraries and is defiantly worth the money (xbox version is 30$ less than the original's price on release).

The Good
The music is beautiful and lovely to listen to. A soundtrack might be a good seller. Graphics, for the most part, are good.

The Bad
There's nothing really "bad", per se, about Lost Chapters, but I just couldn't get "into" it. I'm an adventure and RPG fan, and this game doesn't fit neatly into either of those genres.

I installed it and played for about 8 hours. Then left it there waiting, telling myself that there must be something to like there. There are so many "rave" professional reviews after all. But, the "big-head" kid who doesn't talk to anyone (really he has absolutely no dialog!) turned me off. The story (the little I saw of it) didn't keep me going either. The icon remained on my desktop for about a month but I always found something else to do. In the long run, I realized that I had no interest in continuing and uninstalled it.

I didn't "hate" it, though, so I guess that's saying something.

The Bottom Line
It's really difficult to write a lengthy review about a game you don't like. Sometimes it's just a feeling one gets or an irritating interface that stops the "fun" factor in its tracks. A buggy game, naturally, can be the culprit. For others, it's the lack of story or interesting characters that the player can relate to. Fable: The Lost Chapters fits into the latter category.

This is definitely NOT an adventure game .. and NOT a role-playing game either. At least in the traditional sense of those words. What IS it then? It is an action/adventure with the emphasis on action.

I should have known better. I didn't even look at the screenshots of the original Xbox Fable before buying Lost Chapters. I just took for granted that if other adventure gamers liked it, that I would too. I think I've learned a valuable lesson - don't buy anything that originally started out as a console game. And, of course, do a little more research before plunking down my hard-earned dollar.