QCF: Fable: The Journey

The Kinect is still a concept that’s fairly challenging to grasp. Since its release in 2010, developers have excitedly tasked themselves to produce compelling features that generate experiences involving full body motion unlike anything we’ve ever seen beyond the limitations of a tactile interface like a controller. The reality, however, is ironic in its own right. All of the restrictions Kinect enforces through strict regulated motions lack the access of multiple utilities of the very same interface it wishes to advance from, resulting in the production of a few successful titles from its integration, and some dreadful failures to match.

Enter Lionhead Studios’ crack at the hardware, Fable: The Journey, the newest entry of a series striving to deliver the familiar charm and nuances of the Fable franchise through the fundamentals and design of motion-driven gameplay through Kinect. Despite the apprehension behind the concept of a Kinect only Fable title, the implementation of Fable the Journey’s mechanics introduce unique takes on the familiar gesture-based formula seen in the previous Kinect titles, the overall execution, however, falls far from the intended mark.

With a franchise influenced by the scope of its story like Fable, one may wonder where Fable: The Journey fits in. It’s 50 years after the events of Fable 3, but most of you may not know that, and it isn’t your fault either. Fable: The Journey does a really lousy job with exposition towards any worthwhile narrative for its story. The plot simply references the hero bloodline of the past titles. Players assume the role of Gabriel, a nomadic dweller separated from his caravan, highlighting the appearance of the very first established protagonist in a scripted plot and it’s a shaky start to say the least. Even stranger, The Journey all but abandons the binary morality system the series is infamous for. Instead, players witness a more linear approach in the game flow, only differentiating in terms of dialogue and some obtuse visual states of some environments that completely depend on actions transmitted from any Fable 3 save file within the hard drive. Because of this, the story of The Journey falls flat, burdened by the clichés of fantasy story that the complexity of decision-making was able to compensate for in the series. Instead, there’s some apocalyptic event brewing that you must stop along with the company of characters you build little attachment with (sans a few brief moments but nothing that sticks with you after completing the story). Fable: The Journey contains voice acting with novel dialogue and delivery, and the few nuggets of lore spared by Theresa are refreshing when trying to justify what you’re doing. Unfortunately, when it comes to saving the plot, it doesn’t help.

The Journey attempts to mask the absent plot structure, and instead focuses on the reverence of tropes that define the world of Fable with what feels like a tour of Albion. Expect familiar characters like Theresa or Hobbes, but the pacing of their introduction and overall purpose serves to only pander to fans and alienate newcomers within one fell swoop.

Environments and the characters in Fable: The Journey do justice for the graphic design. In terms of visuals, Albion has never been more stunning to see in movement, and still possesses some fractions of magic on a purely optical level. The Journey exists as one of the more shallow entries to the series, blemishing deep and engrossing fairy-tale influenced lore that makes it a bad Fable game; it does a much better job at being a Kinect game, but unfortunately this isn’t saying too much.

Despite the history of Lionhead’s claims towards the misconception that The Journey is not an On-Rails game, I can assure you that it's On-Rails by every definition of the term. The venture feels out of place for the label of a Fable entry, but it’s not without merit towards what’s done with the On-Rails movement. Primary travel takes place behind the perspective of a horse-and-buggy coach as you man the reigns of your trusty steed.

In fact, the most consistent use of Kinect functionality in the game involves aspects behind the coach driving. You’re constantly moving forward with the option of changing speeds and even coming to a complete stop for optional points of exploration before returning back to the main route. Whipping the reigns to shift your speed from a trot to a sprint is seamless and responsive. The steering of shifting back one arm behind the other to alternate left and right maneuvering through the terrain is engaging and manages to successfully emulate an extension of what I  would imagine driving a Horse ‘n buggy would feel like in real life. The charm does tarnish shortly after the onset of the game as the tedium of monotony that extensive travel  sets in and starts to drag on as you progress without the luxury of a feature like Fast travel (even though the presence of the Cullis Gates are shown from narrative dialogue in a cruel twist of fate.) Combat and on-foot travel doesn’t fare as well when it comes to Kinect operation.

Acquiring magic gauntlets, you’re able to deploy one of two spells delegated specifically to your right and left hands, with your left hand being responsible for physical interaction and the manipulation of physics in general, and the right being the shoot-hard-and-fast hand. In theory, this setup should work to the strengths of the Kinect and deliver frenetic action achieving that same sensation of being extension of the player. However, spotty execution prevents it from doing such. The biggest flaw is the lack of any aiming alias or even on-screen reticle to determine where you can launch your projectiles or ethereal grapples. The outcome is disastrous -- what will happen more often than not -- even to the point of frustration during some moments -- is that the intended target of your spell will wildly land off course of whatever you could best construct an aim out of with the thrust of your palm. These misfires are more common towards any effort of performing a spell that contrasts to the other end of the screen from the respective hand that launches the spell, meaning you’ll have a needlessly difficult time shooting enemies to the left or trying to push them away from the right. These shortcomings can’t simply be attributed to the limitations of the hardware either as it could of all been avoided with proper shot aliasing and perspective management of shooting range. A faint and subtle indication of anything that would resemble crosshairs would have done this game wonders and it’s frustrating that this isn’t a part of one of the most essential mechanics behind Fable The Journey’s gameplay because when the shooting work, it feels satisfying.

The stage design resonates well in terms of contextual areas that provide additional attack opportunities to support your odds in combat and gradually becomes more intuitive as the game advances, being one of the few functionally consistent dynamics in The Journey. Flinging Balverines off tree trunks with your force spell or shooting a Hobbe mount into an open ravine is enchanting and can even stand as the most faithful translation of Fable into the realm of Kinect; but then you’re unable to counter Balverine lunges and the 13th stab at aftershock ability finally kicks in. Puzzles also suffer since you’re mainly sliding tiles and doors, and encountering various points of interaction for puzzles that require precision and the chore of thrusting your hands in vein towards the hope of being able to move on is inexcusable. These inconsistencies occur with such a frequency that they just can’t be ignored. And after so much of it, it’ll be a matter of time before you’re inches away from reaching towards the power button.

The more light-hearted activities of The Journey have more polish in their practice but only by a slim margin. The emphasis on the relationship with your horse as example, which hearkens back to the dog companion mechanic of Fable 2, has you dictating when you can make an optional pit stop at the horse stable along your travels in order to heal by petting it. Though slightly awkward, the petting controls work and slowly plucking an arrow out of your horse to then follow up with a healing touch is rewarding and consistently effective, which is more than what can be said for the game’s other dynamics. But when you’re camping, attempting to clean your filthy mare is a feat more exhausting than it should be. The reason why is just another example of Lionhead’s lack of polish for a significant amount of the motion features. In order to clean your horse, your hands must be up and constantly swiveling in order to get that dirt off, and putting your hands down will stop the cleaning and return you back to the campsite. However, your cleaning session can get abruptly interrupted, regardless of where your hands are at. I found myself coming in and out of the cleaning function. I finally overcame this issue when deciding to just hold one arm up in the air while primarily dedicating the other to cleaning. I can assure you that I ran my Kinect in the optimum setting, positioning and environment, double-checking all of these factors three to four times and fully recalibrating it before coming to my makeshift solution.

So where do I stand on Fable: the Journey? Well, let me make this point and it’s simply a point to enforce the context of the score and nothing more. In issue 125 of Electronic Gaming Monthly, Dan Hsu (now currently editor-in-chief for GamesBeat) reviewed House of The Dead 2 for the Sega Dreamcast and his review came to a very interesting conclusion: He gave the game an overall 7.5/10 and stated that if there were no issues with the light gun calibration (which the game was infamous for having flawed light-gun integration) then to add a point, but if there were constant issues then subtract 1.5 points. Either way you look at it, a concession was made for a game that tried executing unique mechanics outside of the confines of a traditional controller, despite the inconsistency of functionality.

Fast-forward to 2012. We're in a very similar situation where we have a game that manages to become enjoyable through these unique uses of the Kinect, but only within the small windows of the device effectively delivering what it’s made to do. There should be no such concessions made or tolerated to the scope of what’s promoted because of the hardware or concept to the game's scale as an overall experience. Delivering polished (let alone working) mechanics that go above and beyond the use of a controller in order to provide a unique play system should be the standard for every Kinect game entertaining the idea of deep, methodical mechanics. The game needs to work. This just doesn’t cut it anymore, especially after two years no less.