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Lionhead launches new Fable forums with suspicious timing [update]
Lionhead Studios has launched a brand new set of Fable-related forums, now available on the developer's website for users to discuss and dissect the popular series of role-playing games. Lionhead's also giving away virtual founders' medals to anyone who signs up in the forums' first two weeks of existence, and you can log right in using your Xbox Live ID. The last game in the series, Fable: The Journey, arrived back in October of 2012, which raises the question of why the Microsoft-owned developer would announce brand new forums for an IP that's all but fallen off of the radar. Don't forget, though, that E3 is next week, and Microsoft has $1 billion worth of games coming to the Xbox One. The fates may dictate a return to Albion very soon. Update: That didn't take long. Lionhead is teasing a Fable HD remake.
Lionhead layoffs part of natural cycle, says Microsoft
Microsoft's Lionhead Studios, which most recently launched Fable: The Journey, has been hit with layoffs. Microsoft tells Develop that the downsizing represents less than 10 percent of Lionhead's head count and the publisher still intends to hire 100 people over the next year across its UK studios."Following the completion of Fable: The Journey, Lionhead Studios has begun work on its next projects," the statement to Develop notes. "As is common in the games industry, a smaller headcount is needed as projects kick-off and ramp up as full-production gets underway. At this time a small number of positions have been identified as at risk of redundancy and the affected employees were notified today."Fable: The Journey and Fable: Heroes have been the latest from the studio Peter Molyneux founded, who left in March to create new studio 22 Cans.
Fable: The Journey review: On the road again
If you're a fan of the long-running Fable series, you're probably wondering how designer Peter Molyneux's swan song for the franchise turned out. The good news is that Fable: The Journey finally fulfills some of Molyneux's infamous promises. The bad news is that few of them are the promises he made for Fable: The Journey.The Journey puts the player in the fur-lined boots of Gabriel, a young and adventurous Dweller, Albion's version of a gypsy traveler, who sits behind the reins of his beloved and loyal horse, Seren. Gabriel is anxious for a life of more than driving a cart through a caravan, hoping to find a life of adventure and heroism, presumably the same way the player is supposed to feel. Using the Kinect, players control Gabriel as he drives Seren on the roads of Albion. Before long, Gabriel is separated from his clan and comes across Theresa, the blind seer who has been a Fable mainstay since the beginning. Theresa tells Gabriel of his destiny and the magic he will wield.%Gallery-167908%
Fable: The Journey to find testimonials
This video tells us just how hardcore these hardcore gamers were before Fable: The Journey magically turned them into hand-waving casuals. Or maybe we're missing the point. Should you need more convincing and have access to a Kinect, you can download the demo to try for yourself.
PSA - Fable: The Journey demo reaches XBLM today
Last month Microsoft and Lionhead described the Fable: The Journey demo as filled with "heart-pounding action." Should you wish to pound your heart with some Kinect-ified fantasy, the 1.22GB trial file is up on Xbox Live Marketplace today.The fully-fledged game is set to reach retail shelves on October 9. As we saw at E3, Lionhead isn't letting any skeptics stop it from trying to make The Journey "awesome" on Kinect.
Grab the reins of Fable: The Journey's demo on September 17
Fable: The Journey may not launch until early October, but you'll be able to take its virtual reins on September 17 when a demo for the game goes live worldwide on Xbox 360. Microsoft and Lionhead describe the demo as filled with "heart-pounding action," so, uh, maybe take some heart medication ahead of playing the game.Should the potential for heart failure caused by playing a demo worry you too much, you could always just watch the new "ViDoc" above. It's a lot like a trailer, but with a weird name. Take a look!
Fable: The Journey could be a rough one
Lionhead designer Ted Timmons says he learned a lesson after showing off Fable: The Journey to the public for the first time at E3 2011. "It's fine to be on rails," he says a year later, at the tail end of E3 2012. The spin-off was famously labeled as "on rails" by the public thanks to an early demo, and Timmons told Joystiq that while the team was surprised at the response, they eventually got a different message out of the whole thing: "We shouldn't be distracted by the whole 'on rails' issue," he says now. "We just want to make an awesome Kinect game."The Journey's awesomeness is yet to be determined, but it is certainly a Kinect game. The E3 2012 demo featured about ten minutes of two different levels in the game. You use Microsoft's all-seeing camera to snap and steer a horse's reins, throw a magical spear and open a locked door with magic spells.But while it all works (once you're shown how to do it - the tutorial is still a work in progress), the real question here is whether this journey is one worth taking.%Gallery-125521%
Fable: The Journey out fall 2012 [Update: Trailer added!]
Fable: The Journey will come out during the holiday season this year, a video at Microsoft's E3 conference revealed.
Peter Molyneux 'not that interested' in retail
Who goes into a store to buy games anymore? A lot of people, surprisingly, but Peter Molyneux ain't feeling it. For him, it's all about digital distribution."The incentives for driving me out of my seat and into a shop is becoming increasingly limited. I don't go to retail to buy a film. I don't go to retail to buy music. I don't go to buy books any more. And I'm certainly not that interested in buying games in shops, myself," he told Develop. "If you look at everything that's exciting, from the resurgence of PC to iPad and iPhones, it's hard to see where retail fits into that."Molyneux, who recently left Microsoft and started up his own studio, 22 Cans, is hard at work on his first game under the new roof. It's unclear whether that title will rely entirely on digital distribution, but Molyneux has gone on record as saying it'll be his "best" game ever. We wouldn't take that at face value, though; he says that about every one of his games.
Molyneux: Microsoft was a 'creative padded cell;' 22 Cans will see his 'best' game ever
Peter Molyneux, creator of Fable and famously parodied developer, left Microsoft and Lionhead Studios last month to establish 22 Cans, a brand new development house. 22 Cans marks Molyneux's fifth studio founding, but there's something different about this one, he told Develop:"I believe it has all led me to this point. I believe the greatest game I've ever made is still ahead of me."Molyneux is adamant that he is building something special with 22 Cans, in both the structure of the company and the games it will produce. So far he has co-founder and former Lionhead programmer Dimitri Mavrikakis, data miner Paul Knight and IT director Tim Rance on board, but Molyneux is looking to have 22 people total from various industries, including architects, veterans, fresh faces and people who know nothing about the video game world.These people will help Molyneux make his "best" game ever; a game he couldn't create while at Microsoft. "I was in a creative padded cell," Molyneux said. "Microsoft was so safe. Microsoft was so nice. You're so supported. Everything I did couldn't hurt me, both creatively and physically. The danger was long gone. I had this huge desire to make something truly special, and I felt like I was being suffocated creatively a little bit."
Peter Molyneux leaves Lionhead and Microsoft to found 22 Cans
Peter Molyneux will leave Microsoft Game / Lionhead Studios once he's finished developing Fable: The Journey for Kinect. He'll be replaced by co-founder Mark Webley at the studio, with Redmond yet to name his successor at corporate level. Molyneux will partner with (Lionhead's) former CTO Tim Rance and Director Peter Murphy on 22 Cans, developing games under their own flag as he did when founding Lionhead and Bullfrog before that. The new company is based in Farnborough, 12 miles west of Lionhead's Guildford location and was registered on February 20th of this year. Given our childhood love of both Bullfrog and Lionhead's games, we wish both parties the very best -- you can check out when he visited The Engadget Show here.
Peter Molyneux leaves Microsoft, off on 'new independent venture'
Fabled game developer Peter Molyneux has left Microsoft and Lionhead Studios for startup 22 Cans. In a statement to Kotaku, the creative lead of Microsoft Studios Europe said he will conclude his work on the latest Fable before going off on the next great adventure."It is with mixed emotions that I made the decision to leave Microsoft and Lionhead Studios, the company that I co-founded in 1997, at the conclusion of development of Fable: The Journey," Molyneux said in the statement. "I remain extremely passionate and proud of the people, products and experiences that we created."Molyneux expressed the departure was amicable and Microsoft noted the ever-quotable developer "has made an indelible mark on the games industry and we wish him all the best of luck in his future endeavors."
Fable: The Journey dares us to steer a relationship in the right direction
"Your horse pays the price for your mistakes," Peter Molyneux says during a demo for Fable: The Journey, Lionhead's upcoming Kinect-powered spin-off. The Journey is centered around a young man and his trusty steed and sets out to forge a bond between the two, similar to the relationship players had with their dog in Fable 2.%Gallery-125521%
'Fable Heroes' revealed by Xbox Live Marketplace
Apparently, Fable Heroes is a forthcoming XBLA game from Lionhead Studios that has been unceremoniously leaked by the Xbox Live Marketplace. The screenshots in the gallery below show the rather cartoony game's four-player multiplayer, which the title's blurb describes as simultaneously cooperative and competitive.Said screenshots also show a distinctly board-game-esque game board, which makes us think that Fable Heroes may be a Mario Party-ish friendship ruiner couch multiplayer game. Players will earn gold coins that can be spent on "upgrades, characters, and items in both this game and Fable: The Journey for Kinect for Xbox 360." We wouldn't be surprised if Fable Heroes' actual announcement happens during this week's Game Developers Conference.%Gallery-149430%
Fable: The Journey won't have swords or guns due to lack of feedback
If you tend to stick to the trees of Strength and Skill in the Fable series, you'll be out of your element in the series' Kinect-based installment, Fable: The Journey. In an interview with OXM, Peter Molyneux explained the player's bag of tricks would be limited strictly to magic. He added, "We could have done melee weapons, but the one thing I hate about melee weapons, and guns as well, is that the human brain is encoded to expect recoil from those things." Molyneux said that satisfying that expectation of physical feedback was necessary, and that "visuals and the sound isn't enough." It's that weakness that makes the game's robust magic system work. Molyneux explained, "The thing about magic is there's nothing encoded in your mind about how it should feel." That's true! The only preconception we have in mind about magic is that it probably requires a lot of gesticulation; something we know for a fact the Kinect excels at.
Buy Peter Molyneux's E3 badge for a good cause
Looking for the perfect accessory for that "Peter Molyneux at E3 2011" costume you've been putting together for the last week or so? Good news: you can buy Molyneux's E3 badge on eBay, and all the proceeds go to charity.
Molyneux declares Fable: The Journey 'definitely not on rails'
"My name's Peter Molyneux and I made this horrendous mistake." With that emblematic phrase, Lionhead creative director Peter Molyneux kicks off a hilarious public service announcement he created with the help of OXM UK. According to him, the Fable: The Journey demo he showed off at E3 2011 gave the impression that the game is "on rails," an idea he's quick to dispel. Apparently, the team at Lionhead working on the Kinect-based Fable title decided to remove navigation controls from the press demo, the same snippet shown during Microsoft's presser, effectively putting the game on rails and giving everyone the wrong impression. "I will just say on record now that Fable: The Journey is definitely not on rails," he specifies, even going so far as to ask for journalists' signatures before they exit the demo room. If you look really hard, you can spot one of our own among them. It's like Where's Waldo with squiggly pen marks!
Fable: The Journey preview: Speak and spell
Shortly after Fable 3 was first announced, Peter Molyneux announced that it would include support for what was then called Project Natal. Of course, the final game abandoned that ambition with Molyneux explaining that in order to do right by both Kinect and Fable, his team at Lionhead simply needed more development time. So when Microsoft announced a Kinect-exclusive Fable game during yesterday's press conference – titled Fable: The Journey – it might seem obvious that some of that jettisoned Fable 3 content had been repackaged as a standalone Kinect title ... except it hasn't. "Whilst we thought about doing a gimmick or two for Fable 3, it was always in the back of my mind that it would be great to do a Fable for Kinect," Molyneux explained in his second demo ever for the new title. In fact, the team working on The Journey isn't even the same as the team that made Fable 3. When he explained that the Journey team had two years worth of experience developing for Kinect, we had to ask you know what. "A lot of the team were working on Milo," Peter admitted after getting a nod from the game's marketing manager in the back of the room. "A lot of the Milo tech we're not showing off. This is the first outing of this so we're keeping some of our big stuff safe behind. A lot of the stuff you can do in Fable: The Journey is some of the stuff that was originally found in Milo."%Gallery-125521%
Fable: The Journey conjures up a trailer
While you won't see any Kinect-enabled spells casted in this pre-rendered trailer for Fable: The Journey, there may be a few morsels of info in here. The trailer stars the series longtime prognosticator and narrator, Theresa, as she flees from a very The Nothing-like cloud of evil. Dare we say it, she looks a little younger than her previous iterations. Do we smell a prequel? Check it out after the break.
Fable: The Journey utilizes Unreal Engine 3
The cheerful hobbe you see above has been rendered in Unreal Engine 3. Lionhead Studios is using Epic's technology to power Fable: The Journey, a first-person Kinect game set in the land of Albion. We'll ask Lionhead what user-side benefits the technology offers for this game in particular (which is a major departure from the franchise), but you'll be pleased to know that Peter Molyneux's already giving it the hyperbolic treatment in the press release. "Already we are seeing a more beautiful, vivid and unique world full of dramatic moments and have crafted new, never seen before gameplay experiences." Fable 3 was built on Lionhead's own technology, which could be fairly described as "rickety." %Gallery-125521%
