Microsoft had an hour to convince everyone that all the studios they bought are indeed making good exclusives for the future. Though whether they sold you either on that or the Xbox Series X itself may depend on the preferences you already held, as I’m not sure how much was in the actual show to change minds.

Probably the biggest “surprise” to come out of the show was, as expected, its closer. It was revealed that Playground Games, of Forza Horizon fame, is indeed making a new Fable game, with Fable 3 last being released in 2010. This has been a rumor for a long, long time, but now that it’s official, all we have are even more questions.

First, the game was debuted as Fable, not Fable 4, which has led many to ask whether it’s a remake or not. Second, the game only arrived with a short, cinematic trailer, no gameplay and no launch window. As such, it seems that we are likely still years away from release.

This was kind of a common theme throughout the show, with new games looking promising, but being way, way off in the future. We saw that with Forza, with Hellbade 2 and with Obsidian’s new Skyrim-ish RPG Avowed. All potentially huge games in the future, but we don’t have any idea when they’ll arrive, and we just have short, cinematic teasers for them so far. Sony’s Horizon Forbidden West, in contrast, at least said that it will be out next year.

The game that we know is coming out this holiday, Halo Infinite, finally showed gameplay, but that’s all it showed, a pretty short segment revealing a grappling hook, an open world, a Combat Evolved color palette and not much else. A bit odd for a game out in just a few more months, and I think most fans were hoping for more.

Personally, I am more invested in the return of Fable over Halo these days, and I was happy to see it at least teased here. Though again, this seems like a Starfield/Elden Ring/Diablo 4 situation where the final product is still years and years off. Microsoft is indeed launching strong with Infinite, probably one of the strongest launch titles (at least in theory) in the last few console generations. But I don’t know if you can compare this and Sony’s show side by side and say that they had the more impressive set of offerings.

I am excited to see what Playground does with Fable. But if we hear anything else about it in less than a year, I would be surprised after how little was contained in that tease.



Posted: Aug 14, 2020 5:52 am
Last Updated: Sep 01, 2020 12:14 pm
Related Forum: Xbox Forum