At the end of Fable I, we sat down and we kind of thought, firstly the reviews were... some of the reviews were very mixed. We asked ourselves, "How did we disappoint people?" — with those reviews.

The second thing, the boards were unbelievably passionate about some things. Incredibly passionate and very focused on, "Why isn't there free roaming? I thought there was free roaming, this should have free roaming, it's supposed to be an open world." That was 100%, everybody was passionate about that.

There were some other things that were very confusing. The length of the story was immensely confusing because a lot of people said it was far, far, far too short and a lot more people said, "Actually, it's just the right length, and it was the only game I finished because it was that length."

It's not a massive interview, though there's a lot of discussion packed into four pages, but it's an interesting look behind the scenes — and it's definitely interesting to see Molyneux's position on some of the criticisms aimed at the Fables.

Peter Molyneux: Fable II, From Conception To Reality [Gamasutra]

*Actual LCE does not match picture. Subtract, like everything.

It looks like Peter Molyneux's ability to promise features for his games that never arrive extends in the world of retail box sets as well. (We kid because we care)

Due to a "supply chain issue" the Fable II Limited Collector's Edition will no longer include the premium box, five printed fate cards and Hobbe figure, Lionhead Studios today. To make up for the missing feature set, the collector's edition will now run for about $70, instead of $80.

The Collector's Edition is expected to hit on October 21 in North America and Asia and October 24 for Europe and will include:

* Fable II game disc
* Bonus DVD with new ‘Making-of’ Feature
* Bonus in-game content (requires Xbox LIVE®)
o ‘The Hall of the Dead’ Dungeon
o ‘The Wreckager’ Legendary Cutlass Weapon
o Spartan armor and energy sword

Lionhead is also giving away a Fable album they created for the game as a free download. The download includes a selection of music from Fable 1 and three brand new tracks from the upcoming Fable II soundtrack.

To grab the music go to this link starting on Oct. 6 and enter “FableCollection” as a promotion code.

Rumor has it that Molyneux is currently working on Denis Dyack II, which is said to feature more realistic gameplay, and possibly a dog.

Hold on a moment...I just actually read the full article instead of skimming it, and it turns out that Molyneux simply feels sorry for the flack that Denis Dyack is catching over Too Human.

"I feel sorry for Denis Dyack because you know, I think a few things were said wrong, there was that really unfortunate showing at E3 a few years ago. Everyone got on the bandwagon of saying things about Too Human. Now I've played it and, you know, it's a good game. It doesn't deserve a lot of that harsh criticism.

It all makes sense now! Molyneux of course caught a lot of flack himself when he released Fable on the original Xbox, a game that decidedly did not live up to his creative vision. You can see where I could get confused.

I kind of apologised at the end of Fable 1 about actually saying things that didn't end up in the game. I've tried to be really really careful about what I show and I think everything I've talked about in Fable 2 you can now play in there, so that was really important. But what I realise over time is that talking about a game before it's released is a dangerous game.

Sort of like writing out a news post before fully reading and understanding the source article, which I would never, ever do.

Peter Molyneux: 'I feel sorry for Denis Dyack' [Videogamer.Com]

I can tell you definitively that there is absolutely an acorn and it does absolutely grow into a tree. And it is actually part of the story now. We decided we got into so much trouble over acorns and trees that we are going to make it part of the main thread of the story in "Fable 2".

Xbox Originals Manuals and Controller layouts (and free themes and picture packs) [Microsoft]

"To get tough and frank questions from gamers is what I am looking forward to this Friday. I don't mind whether they are about Fable 2, Lionhead's other games or the industry in general." said Lionhead boss Peter Molyneux.

I'm sure that Microsoft—and many third parties—would love to add these options to older Xbox re-releases. The cash revenue from achievement whores could make even Psychonauts finally turn a healthy profit.

Will Xbox Originals have Achievements? [Microsoft]

He teased us about death back in May, but this time he actually elaborates. There is no death. Instead, your character gets beaten until he collapses. Then he (or she) gets beaten some more. And more. Continuously beaten until you get up. How do you get up? By paying for it in either experience or gold. How fast you get up, and presumably continue fighting and killing your enemies, depends on how much money you pay. Pay a lot, get up fast. Pay a little, lie on the ground for, say, sixty seconds.

So what's the consequence of not getting up fast? You get scarred. SCARRED. Irreversibly scarred. And the more scars you have, the more townsfolk, villagers, barristers and women despise you. Unless they're in some kinda weird scar club, which is still as of yet not confirmed to be in the game.

The inspiration for all this is, strangely enough, birthed from the scene in the latest James Bond movie where Bond is repeatedly punished in the genital area. Hard. And did we say repeatedly? Molyneux saw that Hollywood took their heroes beat them to a pulp, but never killed them. They would be scarred, sometimes irreversibly so, but never killed (unless you work with Jack Bauer). So why not take this mechanic and put it into Fable 2?

Since most of the game is spent in an effort to not die, let's talk about combat next. Molyneux says that in an RPG game, at least 50% of your playtime is going to be in combat. So he wanted to make a combat system that was both robust and accessible. The way he did that was by mapping just about every attack function (melee, at least) to the A button. It's definitely simple, and it's definitely button masher friendly—something P. M. said he wanted to embrace—but there's also a lot to do.

First, mashing the button just keeps you swinging and swinging. The AI will figure out your patterns and block most of your attacks, but some may get through. Timing presses correctly, while the enemy isn't blocking, is the key. Then there's blocking, which consists of holding down X. Holding down the attack button for a while gives you flourishes, which are essentially charged up moves.

If you want to get fancy, there's A and a direction for thrusts, and if you time everything correctly (A, hold A, or thrust A) you'll get a cool camera change that zooms in on the action. There's even a narrow focus to give it even more "dramatic effect". And on top of that, the battle music changes and adds drums, which supposedly is controlled by the rhythm of your attacks—or button mashes. It all comes together pretty cohesively.

However, Molyneux claims that the system is on par with say, a Virtua Fighter, but we don't quite agree. It's deep, sure, but it's not exactly at a Soul Calibur-esque level. But you do get to break items and throw stuff at enemies all with the same attack button. And although magic and ranged weapons weren't demoed, he says they work in much the same context-sensitive way as melee attacks.

As for the engine itself, it's also looking pretty good. Lips, as he pointed out himself, look like rubbish. And so does lighting on certain characters. But buildings, streets, breakable objects, flowers, character animations, and the general environment looked fantastic.

Is this the second of the big three things Peter Molyneux has in store for Fable 2? What's the third thing? I can't wait to find out.

Other speakers include:

• Jason Manley, Massive Black (USA)
• Christopher Schmitz, 10Tacle Studios (Germany)
• Jennifer MacLean, Comcast Interactive Media (USA)
• Dr. Michael Wimmer, The University of Vienna (Austria)
• Alexander Fernández, Streamline Studios (The Netherlands)
• Cindy Armstrong, Webzen (USA)
• Amir Taaki, Crystalspace (Finland)
• Jeff Strain, ArenaNet (USA)
• Vlad Ihora, Telia Sonora (Sweden)
• Barbara Lippe, Avaloop IT Solutions (The Netherlands)
• Pamela Kato The GamerX (USA)
• Uwe Nikl, Level 3 (United Kingdom)
• Matt Firor, Ultra Mega Games (USA)
• Konstantin Ewald, Osborne Clarke (Germany)

Eggebrecht has the honor of making the opening keynote speech at the conference. Don't choke, Julian! Kim Phu

Leipzig's Keynote Speakers Revealed [Advanced MN]

One of the thing I liked about the original Fable was the ability to purchase different titles for yourself. Once your title was bought, the townsfolk would start calling you by that name every time you strolled into town. That same mechanic is going to be used in Fable 2 and Lionhead Studios is letting their forum members pick one of the names.

A few weeks ago, members were asked to submit possible names for inclusion in the game. The developers then chose twenty of their favorites which are now posted int he forums for members to vote on. You can view the list here, but you must be a forum member to actually cast a vote.

As of now, "Lionheart" is in the lead, followed swiftly by "Wanderer" and "Gunslinger." While all those are great, I can't help thinking whatever happened to names like "Arse Face" "Rat Bastard" and just plain old "Jerk." Sometimes the classics are the best. Flynn De Marco

Hero Title Competition PHASE #2 [Lionhead Studios]

Two high honors, games like Populous, Dungeon Keeper and Fable under his belt, not to mention a studio buy out from Microsoft might lead you to believe Pete's got an out of control ego at this point, but you'd be wrong! Upon accepting the honor, Molyneux gave props to the rest of the Lionhead staff, saying:

I am extremely proud to have received this honour and would like to thank the French Ministry of Culture for this recognition. I would also like to say that I see this as a credit for everyone at Lionhead Studios, all our games are a team effort. I am just the figurehead.

What a swell guy. We've already forgotten about Black & White. Michael McWhertor

Microsoft's Peter Molyneux was sniffed out on a train by the Kikizo folks, who immediately pestered him. Good on 'em. Previously, Peter's musings made it seem like the upcoming Fable 2 was much like his uber secret game Dimitri. So the question was put forth if the games are actually one and the same? Peter's answer:

Ah yes. I can see where you get that from. Here's the thing, Fable 2 and Dimitri are not the same game, Dimitri has been in development for a very long time, but when we started on Fable 2 we decided that some of the technology or ideas from Dimitri should be in Fable 2 as well, and we haven't started to talk about the specifics of that yet. With Dimitri, we still need to decide on a final name, because as you know, this is just a project name that is the name of my godson...

He did confirm that these are the only two projects he is currently working on, but wouldn't say if Dimitri would be a PC title, 360 game or both. Yet, he did say the game was temporarily named after his godson, taking all badassady away from the title whatsoever. Better than naming it after his dog, but still. Brian Ashcraft

Peter Talks Dimitri [Kikizo]

I have realised I've got the PR equivalent of Tourette's. I can't help myself. It's the inability to downplay stuff - I have to get excited!

Oh my god, I am so, so stoked. Seriously you guys, have you seen this?! It's Fable 2! You all remember how totally sweet Fable was, yeah? Me too! Cause I made it! Ha ha!

I don't believe in going out and saying: 'we're going to create quite a good game.' I believe that what we're doing, with Fable 2, is thinking, right we've got to address all those things we did slightly wrong on Fable 1; we've got to make a bigger, better story, it's got to be an amazing world.

One of the main things is we've got to make this game jaw-droppingly beautiful. Sometimes darkly beautiful; beauty doesn't only mean green fields, but just stunningly beautiful. I came away from E3 just sick of seeing gunmetal shiny things and sewers.

Like, remember how we made your eyes all big and shiny in Fable, and everyone's faces kinda blocky like a Pink Pearl eraser, and then you could like, buy hair trading cards so you could have a totally badass ponytail? Right, so I had NO clue how we were gonna top that. But one night I totally had this brainstorm, and the security guys went out and got internet superstar Brian Peppers and we totally just scanned him with lasers like, right into the game! I know!

There has to be one big, big thing about Fable 2 that is going to shock and surprise people and that's what we've got, that's the exciting thing. And we're not ready to show it yet. I think it's going to be next year if I'm honest with you. It's a very, very big thing and if I told you about it, it's one word, and if I told you about it then you'd say: 'what are you talking about? It's another one of those Peter Molyneux moments.'

I'm serious, I totally can't tell you! Okay look...I'm just gonna pull a Molyneux here and totally blow off the NDA, because like, whatever, and you guys are totally my peeps, right? Okay, so get ready for this...the word, the ONE word? Is "otterpops".

Eliza Gauger

Interview with Peter Molyneux [Eurogamer, thanks Joooooonas]

Rumors also indicate an announcement could be coming "within the coming days" and that said studio purchase would prevent any further lay offs.

Molyneux denies layoff rumours as Microsoft closes in on Lionhead [GamesIndustry.biz]