Player’s Club: Fable II reviewed
Video games gone wild
Fable II
Released Oct. 21
Xbox 360
Developed by Lionhead Studios
Published by Microsoft Game Studios
The concept of choice in video games is tricky. Does free will really exist in a situation where every possible decision has been programmed in by another person? Fable II wants to say it does, and the game impressively presents an illusion of meaningful decision making. At heart, though, no matter what the player chooses, he or she is merely treading down one of many branching paths laid by an overworked team of programmers and game designers. That doesn’t make Fable II a failure by any measure, but knowledge of the fundamental lack of free will does run somewhat counter to a large part of the game’s appeal.