Of all possible futures for the Fable franchise, from the cancelled Fable Legends to development troubles with the reboot, Playground Games appears to arrived at the best possible one. Between the 1,000 handcrafted NPCs known as the Living Population, the ability to gain different reputations based on the location, and more, it looks to be a worthwhile successor to Lionhead’s legacy.
Granted, there’s still plenty of time for skepticism, especially with its launch scheduled for Fall 2025, but it certainly has Xbox Game Studios lead Craig Duncan buzzing. The former head of Rare told GamesRadar+ about Playground and its “relentless pursuit of excellence” after taking on the Fable franchise.
“When I think about Playground and their history with the Forza Horizon franchise, and their desire to take on Fable as a franchise, I think it’s really about this relentless pursuit of excellence. We all know what that means in Forza Horizon; we’ve all seen that franchise get bigger and bigger every year, but what does that mean for Fable?”
Apparently, an experience that makes Duncan’s brain pop. “I have played a bunch of the game, I’ve messed around with the combat and the Living Population, and it’s just mind-blowing. I’m so excited that we talked about it in the Developer Direct, because it’s something people wouldn’t expect.
“There were some really special ideas in the original Fable trilogy, but what I think Playground has done is take some of these ideas and modernized them – my brain pops every time I think about the Living Population, how it works, and what it adds to the overall game; it’s an incredible invention, and Fable is going to be an incredible RPG. It will be amazing to see what players do with it, and it’ll be massively shareable.”
High praise, especially for a game that still has a ways to go (and plenty of ways to slip up). Thus far, Playground has certainly been making all the right moves. The world design, for example, doesn’t crib from Forza Horizon – it’s smaller with “tons to explore,” and where players can enter every building. Its Living Population required no short amount of consideration because everyone needs a bed, a way to get to work and adequate city planning to ensure neither takes up much time.
Fable is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC at launch alongside Game Pass. A day-one launch on PlayStation is certainly odd, given that Forza Horizon 6’s PS5 version is out later this year instead of May but Duncan and his crew are aware.
