Peter Molyneux has spent the last few years trying to rectify his public image. He’s admitted multiple times – at conventions and in personal interviews – that he used to get a bit too excited about the project he was working on at the time, and that he may have focussed on the wrong things when selling a game. It’s quite refreshing that someone who is obviously quite a capable speaker is now open to speak his mind a little more honestly, but his thoughts on Fable III are more brutal than you might expect.
Speaking with Develop, Molyneux discussed how his games never manage to live up to his imagination.
“In my mind, as a designer, whenever I’m making a game I have this perfect jewel in mind. Fable for me was this beautiful, incredible, amusing, funny, artistic, wonderful gem of a game that anyone could play, that tugged on the heartstrings and that was instantly engaging.”
“The gem that was in my mind has never come to be, it’s always flawed in some way. I thought Fable 1 – when you consider that it was the first game I ever did of that type – wasn’t bad. It was hugely flawed in some senses, there were technical issues like the animation didn’t work, but it wasn’t bad. I think Fable II was a step in the right direction, I think Fable III was a trainwreck. It was built to be much bigger than what it was constrained to be and eventually ended up as. If I had my time again, I’d take the advances we made from Fable 1 to Fable II, I’d make the same advances from Fable II to Fable III and spend another entire year working on Fable III. But would it be that perfect gem that’s in my mind? No.”
It was definitely a flawed game, and one that could have been so much better if it had been expanded on in several areas, but I’m not sure it was as bad a title as Molyneux remembers. Perhaps he’s gone a little too far the other way?
What do you think? Was Fable III an absolute trainwreck, or his Molyneux being too harsh? Sound off below!
