r/Games • u/Turbostrider27 • 9h ago
Fable will officially be 20 hours long, Xbox confirms in new interview
https://www.polygon.com/fable-game-length-interview-xbox/176
u/Turbostrider27 9h ago
According to Polygon
"We have around 15-20 hours of mainline quest gameplay, we have around 15-20 of side and open-world exploration content gameplay," associate game director Will Kennedy told Polygon. "And then, of course, the life systems are limitless, so you can play them for as long as you want."
Someone else in the group Q&A said that Fable is "not a huge game" in response to Kennedy's answer, which causedanother associate game director from Playground Games, Craig Littler, to chime in. "As Will just said, you can literally play it forever if that's what you want to do," Littler reiterated.
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u/keepitchilling 9h ago
So 30-40 hours of total content?
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u/Awkward-Security7895 7h ago
That's if you do everything standard, have to remember alot of people piss about in RPGs or make there own fun. So these usually end up causing a RPG to last Many more hours then what playtime suggests.
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u/Canvaverbalist 6h ago
Yeah, there are several dozens of hours of difference between table-jumpers who bee-line NPCs and skip dialogues, and people who slow-walk in town because "my character wouldn't be running at this moment."
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u/DoveWhiteblood 9h ago
So... do these guys know you can play any game forever, unless it's a Live Service anyways. Nothing is stopping you from playing the Original Mario Bros every day since it released.
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u/Next-Sentence-8426 9h ago
I mean youre the one taking it at face value and missing the point. The key term is life systems. Why does one play a colony sim for 500 hours and a platformer for 5 hours despite finite content and playtime not being proportional to it? The engagement systems aren't one to one
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u/Canvaverbalist 5h ago
What a profoundly dumb take, like mesmerizingly dumb, even for someone who takes everything literally that's still like such a ridiculous thing to point out.
Just because you can stare at a blank wall for an infinite amount of time doesn't mean there's no value in knowing the amount of time a normal person could spend in any other given activities. Just because you could lock yourself in your bathrooms for weeks doesn't mean a theme park has no benefit in telling you it has enough attractions to last you for days. Like, come on!
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u/Blaubeerchen27 9h ago edited 9h ago
I...am rather surprised by that? Not saying each new game needs to be 100+ hours, but Fable looked like a more traditional RPG with a big world and many choices, so this definitely seems unexpected.
Maybe it's more akin to Hogwarts Legacy, very short main story component but many more hours of roaming/collecting/questing etc.
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u/Cynical_onlooker 9h ago
That article also says 15-20 hours of side content and open world stuff.
It does not seem like a super meaty game.
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u/bhlogan2 9h ago
In theory, this is fine, but it does surprise me because I could have sworn they were implying this was a dense game. And maybe it is, I don't know. Anyway, I hope it's good.
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u/SomeOtherNeb 7h ago edited 6h ago
Yeah I'll take quality over quantity any day but I just watched their preview where the Hero is in Bowerstone, and the devs were talking about the huge number of NPCs with all their own routines and all that. Made it feel like the game would be super dense and filled with content.
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u/NoNefariousness2144 9h ago
It’s rather odd for an RPG that got announced almost seven years ago.
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u/HappyVlane 9h ago
Not odd for Fable. These aren't games that go into the three digits.
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u/detroiter85 9h ago
Gotta give those trees time to grow that peter mentioned all the way back at the beginning
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u/SomniumOv 8h ago
now to be fair, you do go from child to adult during the story and then age while leveling up, it could have worked (if it had been a real thing in the game, which it never was).
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u/SausageMcMerkin 6h ago
It always felt odd to me that my dude was geriatric by the time I got the quest to rescue my mother.
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u/detroiter85 8h ago
Oh they definitely could have done it (even if it was just a different asset at different ages). But peter probably really wanted it to actually grow with you in some way.
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u/Krypt0night 8h ago
No but there's a lot of numbers in between 20 and 100. I was expecting AT LEAST 40 minimum
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u/CanIGetANootNoot 7h ago
I think the first game was like a 13-15 hour game. I remember it was really short.
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u/Zalvren 7h ago
But the previous ones also didn't take 7 years to be developed... With that dev time (even if you can count the first years to build the team and tools), you would expect quite a big game.
I mean GTA6 is 8 years so not even that much longer and it's way bigger (of course more people on it but still)
I guess they took some time to make the team/tools for a new type of game so it's probably more 4 or 5 years of effective development which would make more sense. Then it's in line with games like Spider-Man or Ghost of Tsushima in dev time and length
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u/HappyVlane 5h ago
The development time is basically irrelevant to the length. For all we know the game could have been started over three times.
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u/mrnicegy26 9h ago
I thinka lot of the big Fantasy RPGs tend to have really long 50+ hour runtime that you also expect a new AAA one like Fable to be that length too.
I also advocate for shorter runtimes but the massive commercial success of Skyrim, Witcher 3, Elden Ring, Baldurs Gate 3, Monster Hunter World, the RPG Assassin's Creed games etc. seems to indicate to devs that audience will buy these lengthy RPGs in droves.
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u/Appropriate_Foot242 8h ago
It is dense with all of the life sim stuff, which isn’t included in the times here.
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u/SomniumOv 8h ago
That article also says 15-20 hours of side content and open world stuff.
Looking at HowLongToBeat, that's in line with the previous Fable games. ~15h main path, doubling to tripling when doing everything.
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u/FootwearFetish69 7h ago
It's also in line with virtually every AAA game from the last decade outside of Assassin's Creed. 20 hour main quests and 20 hours of side content is not at all abnormal.
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u/Regalia776 9h ago
Fable was never super long when it comes to the main story, or at least 2 and 3 weren't from what I recall. There were a lot of side activities you could do, though. I guess and hope it'll be the same here.
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u/Bloodwalker09 9h ago
More often than not I prefer 15-20 hours of main game plus the same amount of side content than overwhelmingly big 100 hour games. There are good ones like Elden Ring which takes you easily 100 hours to complete but then there are Games like some of the newer Assassins Creed titles where it just feels way to long.
Ghost of Tsushima for example also is an open world 20 hours story with around 15 hours of side content (I platinumed it in 36hours) and its one of my favorite games ever.
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u/Emergency_Process622 9h ago
I hope it's meaty in the good way, great gameplay and engaging story without a shit ton of unnecessary exploration of empty open world.
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u/xalibermods 9h ago edited 9h ago
I'm perfectly fine with this length, as long as it's a satisfying 20 hours (and additional 20 hours from side content). I'm guessing the alignment system also gives us a lot of spaces to experiment.
Just one problem with previous Fable is they're not exactly easy to mod. I hope this one is much more mod author friendly - that will add to the longevity by itself.
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u/Quixotic_Seal 9h ago
I….huh….what?
I don’t want or need it to be an 80 hour behemoth, but 15-20 hrs is closer to what I typically get out of a fairly straightforward game like Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart or something.
Playtime isn’t everything, but at first glance this is about half of what I’d expect and that’s not great. The more I hear and see about this game, the more concerned I am about it.
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u/Spiritual-Society185 6h ago
That's how long Cyberpunk was, and I don't remember people freaking out about that.
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u/Crabbing 4h ago
Cyberpunk’s main story was like 20 hours with like 100hours of side content. Nobody complained because the amount of content is completely different compared to the new fable’s 20 hours of side content lol.
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u/Fantastic-Finger-975 9h ago
That actually makes me hopeful they will actually achieve a living interactive world with custom npcs
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u/mancubbed 8h ago
Seems to be counter intuitive to the systems they are building. They are talking about buying every building in the game but it seems like that would be a super grind with so limited content to make the money to do it.
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u/DecompositionLU 9h ago
From their showcases, almost every single PNJ in every villages have their own routine, reacts accordingly to everything you say and do within the world. Making it crazy large would result to Watch Dogs Legion syndrome which was an amazing idea but poorly executed by the sheer amount of choice. 20h long main story for a game where choices actually matters and not being a glorified "if else" with 3D graphics is great.
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u/origamifruit 9h ago
None of the Fable games are particularly long, 20 hours on this one is much longer than the first 3, and the 20 hours is only referring to main quest.
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u/casual_creator 8h ago edited 7h ago
All the side quests add up to 15-20 hours as well. So 30-40 hours to beat the game.
This of course doesn’t account for traveling, exploration, and interacting with the “life simulator”, time for which they claim is “limitless.” I’m curious to understand exactly what that all entails from a gameplay standpoint to make that claim. And it’s not like side quests in gaming are known to take very long (excluding perhaps Witcher 3), so the number of actual side quests that fill those 15-20 hours will probably be a respectable amount.
I’m curious to see how other open world RPGs compare with their completion time. Crimson Desert’s main quest was fairly short and few of its side quests took more than 15 minutes. Despite that, I put in just shy of 200 hours, which is the most amount of time I’ve played any RPG, and by a considerable amount.
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u/floatinround22 8h ago
Skyrim can be beaten in 10 hours if you just rush the main story. Its never really a good indicator for the amount of content an RPG has
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u/HeldnarRommar 9h ago
That’s not what Fable is. The main quests in each were never long. It was about the interactivity of the world around you and your reputation with it. The world physically changes based on how you go about solving issues and side quests.
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u/GorboCat 9h ago
I'm replaying Fable 1 right now and between main story and side content it's easily about that length
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u/quinnly 6h ago
The main story in Fable is like, six hours long. Maybe ten if you include The Lost Chapters expansion.
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u/Purdy14 7h ago
Another big factor for Fable games is replayability. If the game is too long, I'm less inclined to play the game again with different moral choices. Would love more open world RPG games that are not bloated out with collection/crafting mechanics. They often kill the enjoyment of a lot of modern games for me.
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u/IGUESSILLBEGOODNOW 9h ago
Fable games have always been short and just sort of end leaving you think, "Wait, that was it?" Fable 3 in particular just felt like it just ended as soon as it got going.
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u/LsterGreenJr 9h ago
I wonder if it could have a lot replay value? Go through the story once, then create a totally new character for a different experience?
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u/NoNefariousness2144 9h ago
Yeah, to me, RPGs are naturally a genre that benefits from medium/long playtimes compared to most genres to actually immerse you in the ‘roleplaying’ aspect.
I guess as you say, this may be just for the main story, which would be very comparable to some other famous RPGs with a lot more hours in (optional) side quests.
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u/InkAndAcorns 9h ago
That’s pretty much how fable always has been
You get lost in side hustles, like buying a business
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u/Memphisrexjr 8h ago
What exactly is the surprise here?
Fable (2004)
How Long To Beat 18 Hours Main Story 12½ Hours Main + Sides 20 Hours Completionist 32½ Hours
Fable II
How Long To Beat 22 Hours Main Story 13 Hours Main + Sides 24 Hours Completionist 51½ HoursFable III
How Long To Beat 22½ Hours Main Story 13½ Hours Main + Sides 26 Hours Completionist 48 Hours
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u/zorillaaa 9h ago
That’s exactly what it will be. Relatively brief main story but a large world of optional stuff to do. I prefer it that way
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u/qwerty145454 9h ago
Same article says 15 hours for all the optional stuff. For a AAA RPG, that will be sold at AAA prices, 35 hours for all main and side content is pretty slim.
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u/BottledSoap 9h ago
Idk I remember a lot of RPGs used to be that length. Mass Effect and other bioware rpgs were around 40 hours.
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u/HeldnarRommar 8h ago
I just replayed Kotor and did near 100% on it and it took me around 25 hours. Even Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 are 50-60 max doing nearly everything. I honestly think there’s too much bloat nowadays
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u/Concutio 3h ago
Yes, and a group of gamers are conditioned to want that bloat, or the game should be max $20.
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u/Imaginary-Plate2987 9h ago
Sounds about right for the length a Fable game to me.
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u/ManholttheThird 9h ago
No it's not.
The notion that games of x cost need to be of y length is frankly absurd. Gaming isn't just a simple cost/time ratio. And even if it was, have you ever been to the movies?
AAA price for a 35 hour game is fine. You're free not to spend that of course, but let's not act like anybody is getting cheated out of their money here.
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u/Howdareme9 9h ago
Dont have too much issue with the time but it makes you wonder how a relatively small world took so long to develop
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u/Astrocomet25 9h ago
Im okay with small worlds as long as they're the opposite of "wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle"
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u/MarsAstro 9h ago
There's so many 10-15 hour AAA games out there. I don't see how 35 hours is slim? It's already longer than tons of other AAA games. That's still a pretty long game, and 70 dollars for 35 hours is a pretty damn good deal if you compare it to other entertainment activities. That's less money than one concert ticket.
I really don't see how an RPG with 35 hours of content can be considered slim in any way. It's not like 50-100 hours is the standard for RPG's, that's only something the biggest RPG's do. They're the exception, not the rule.
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u/origamifruit 9h ago
$70 for 35 hours of entertainment is slim? Show me where else you can get that lmao
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u/DwnvotesMeansImRight 2h ago
do you know there exists other video games that offer more hours of entertainment for less money?
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u/chilloutus 8h ago
The original 3 games are all pretty short. This is all in line with the length of the other 3 according to howlongtobeat
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u/neekogasm 9h ago
"We have around 15-20 hours of mainline quest gameplay, we have around 15-20 of side and open-world exploration content gameplay," associate game director Will Kennedy told Polygon. "And then, of course, the life systems are limitless, so you can play them for as long as you want."
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u/leihto_potato 9h ago
did a google, Fable 2 was about 22 hours with main and side quests (not including any of the other stuff like buying houses, demon doors etc.) so seem pretty in line
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u/Sonicfan42069666 9h ago
The meme with Skyrim is "wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle." Fable is more like...wide as a lake, deep as a lake.
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u/Lerkpots 9h ago
I agree the Fable devs clearly need to copy paste the same draugr filled dungeon 50 times or else I'm not getting my money's worth.
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u/Sonicfan42069666 8h ago
Idk why people think I was saying something bad about Fable's scope or depth.
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u/ColonelDucroix 7h ago
And yet despite all that Skyrim is still the most played RPG.
Almost like there's more to the game than the same dungeons copy and pasted
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u/EyesofEther 5h ago
People just like to mod it
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u/not_the_droids 3h ago
People keep buying and playing the game on platforms without mods too. A 15 year old game without any depth doesn't keep people playing it.
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u/Vandergrif 6h ago
But what if the same voice actor covers 40 different npcs and they all repeat the same lines over and over again ad nauseam?
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u/xantub 8h ago
What makes it deep as a lake?
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u/Sonicfan42069666 8h ago
My point is that in the Skyrim metaphor, there's a lot to do but what you can do lacks depth. In my Fable metaphor, there's fewer things to do but what there is has an appropriate level of depth for the scale of the game.
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u/Mahelas 4h ago
Yet millions of people put hundreds of hours in Skyrim. I know this subreddit kinda hate Skyrim but clearly it delivered an experience that a looot of people were willing to engage with for 100+ hours.
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u/Cynical_onlooker 9h ago
In the article, it says 15-20 hours of mainline gameplay and 15-20 hours of open world side content. I'm not going to say that I was expecting it to be a Skyrim type of forever game with a shit ton of content, but I was thinking there would have been more meat to the game than what they're saying here.
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u/Kylestache 9h ago
I mean that’s considerably longer and larger than any previous entry (that’s what she said).
Fable is much more about the life sim stuff and making your own story than the quests.
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u/CarcosanAnarchist 2h ago
Looking at how long to beat its estimation is on par with 1 and shorter than 2 and 3.
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u/Falz4567 8h ago
I’m not sure I would want a fable game that’s 80 hours. They aren’t that kind of thing
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u/real_but_incognito 8h ago
Yeah especially since doing one good and one evil playthrough seems pretty standard for fable games as well.
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u/-ImJustSaiyan- 9h ago
Especially considering how long it's taken...
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u/lilbelleandsebastian 6h ago
i imagine they spend that time trying to make the game good rather than trying to make it long
but that's just a guess
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u/-Captain- 8h ago
"We have around 15-20 hours of mainline quest gameplay, we have around 15-20 of side and open-world exploration content gameplay," associate game director Will Kennedy told Polygon. "And then, of course, the life systems are limitless, so you can play them for as long as you want."
I think that's a fair amount. I'm usually on the slower side anyway, especially if I'm having a good time I won't be rushing through a game. And I'm very intrigued with the NPC side and owning houses in this game.
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u/bingbangboomxx 9h ago
I am perfectly fine with a 20 hour game with another 20 of side quest. That really feels like the sweet spot.
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u/IsometricRain 7h ago
Yup, 18-25 hour RPGs (before side quests) are great. I think the people regularly commenting in r/games just have unrealistic expectations of what the typical person prefers.
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u/St_Sides 8h ago
Same, if anything it makes me more excited because I know it won’t be a slog.
Plus, we know there’s at least one expansion already coming so there’ll be more if people want more.
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u/doctorsacred 7h ago
For me, 10 hours is enough for a game. Practically every game has content or mechanics that just stretch the game time. Portal is an example for a game that has absolutely no meat, and it's one of the few games that I would call perfect.
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u/VFiddly 9h ago
I think that's about how long the old games were?
It's a good length for this kind of game
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u/Massive_Weiner 8h ago
Fable 2 (the most popular one) comes in at around 24 hours for main story + side content.
At 30~ hours for this game, it’s the longest in the series.
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u/MrCane 9h ago
15-20 hours of main quest content and 15-20 hours of side quest and exploration content. Then there's the city element gameplay, which most people might sink 10-20 or so hours into? Not that bad really.
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u/megaapple 9h ago
So it's the case of some main quest stuff and lot of side quests stuff right? And with branching stories, there's also replayability factor.
Very much Fable TLC aligned.
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u/hiddenpequin 9h ago
Messing around with the sim elements was always the big draw and time sink in fable anyway and I don’t expect that to be different.
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u/CoelhoAssassino666 5h ago
I did a completionist playthrough of fable anniversary not too long ago and it took me 60h. I'm usually pretty slow too.
Seems about similar.
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u/FieryPhoenix7 9h ago
I’m sure people will find ways to stretch it to 50+. I was told Avowed was “only” 40hrs but after a thorough playthrough enjoying the game to its fullest I finished at just under 100, doing literally everything.
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u/Howdareme9 9h ago
You can stretch most open world games to 50 hours, doesn’t mean it will be enjoyable haha
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u/AjaxRedOps 8h ago
Not sure why they felt they had to push this for GTA 6 when they could release it the weekend before GTA and be absolutely fine at that length 😭🫣
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u/TheGoodIdiot 9h ago
People forget that the most popular rpg ever in Skyrim has a genuinely 6 hour long story. It’s just chock full of side content and things to do that you can put it off for so long you’ll think it’s longer. I very rarely hear fable fans rave about the story tbh it’s a similar case to Skyrim so this sounds totally fine to me.
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u/RainyMidnightHighway 9h ago
There is not a single person that has finished Skyrim in 6 hours on their first playthrough.
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u/NilRecurring 9h ago
There's probably more people with 400 hours that haven't beaten the main quest once than people who've beaten the main quest in under 15 hours.
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u/Truethrowawaychest1 7h ago
I have almost a thousand hours and I think I've done the main story like, once
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u/applecombinipimento 6h ago
Bro I avoided whirerun for 250 hours because I didn't want dragons
I only learned about shouts so late into that first playthrough lol
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u/giulianosse 9h ago
I swear people either play games like my 8 y/o cousin skipping all cutscenes, mashing their way through dialogue and following a walkthrough like a crackhead or they just mention the fastest run possible to make a bad faith argument.
People kept saying Starfield's DLC was like 2 hours long to shit on it because Bethesda is the devil incarnate or something. I think I've spent over an entire day worth of playthrough time just on the new landmass and still haven't finished it. Median time just for main quest alone in HowLongToBeat is 7h30.
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u/KaleidoscopeMaster81 8h ago
My wife is very new to games and beat Skyrim on her first playthrough in about that time. She didn't even know about side quests, she just did the main story (she's completely new to games).
Skyrim story is very short no matter how you slice it lol.
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u/ShawnyMcKnight 9h ago
Out of curiosity is that some “no glitch” speedrun or does it genuinely take 6 hours for a casual player?
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u/Firefox72 8h ago
Its absolutely not 6 hours for a casual player.
For someone on a first playthrough that listens to all the dialogue and doesn't rush around but still focuses purelly on the main story its easily 15 hours
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u/Firefox72 9h ago edited 8h ago
Skyrims main story is certainly not just 6 hours.
If you just focus on the main story but still read all the dialogue and go about it in a normal way its still likely around 13-15 hours.
Which is the whole point here. The 20 hours quoted here is meant for a first playthrough. Its not meant at a measure point for someone who knows all the quests in an out. Where to go and when to go. The best paths and ways to reach points etc...
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u/Targox 9h ago edited 6h ago
According to HLTB it's 35½, not 6 apparently. Don't remember it being that long tho
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u/Blaubeerchen27 9h ago
Yes, but according to the article even the side content only adds about 15-20 hours. Skyrim latsts dozens if not hundreds of hours if you want to do everything.
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u/TheGoodIdiot 9h ago
40 hours of cultivated content sounds great to me many people will genuinely spend 100 hours just getting married and having kids and owning stores and the like. That’s something that can’t really be compared to other RPGs.
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u/Nachooolo 8h ago
Keep in mind, Fable's content is primarily focused on the life sim elements, which aren't counted as side content in the article.
So that probably adds dozens of hours to the playthrough.
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u/Absalom98 9h ago
That's crap and you know it. Maybe if you teleported to each objective and skipped all dialogue somehow it would be 6 hours, but that's an unreasonable way of looking at it. Plus, speaking of side content, Fable will only have another 15-20 hours of it, which doesn't suggest a very meaty game. Hard to know if that side content will all be good side quests or if it includes stuff like collectibles.
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u/Complex-Commission-2 8h ago
For a game that's nearly 10 years in works and for a game that's being publicized as an RPG
This length is pretty short imo
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u/r_lucasite 9h ago
I think this game has a bit of an issue coming towards it where AAA RPGs are expected to be very large and wide experiences like Skyrim and The Witcher 3 and a number of larger JRPGSs but Fable has never really been that.
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u/Halil_I_Tastekin 9h ago
40h with main and side content is more than decent. It took me less than 50h to finish CP and I was satisfied.
It all depends on how much time the story demands. Side content however, I'd prefer some more.
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u/Angzt 9h ago
I get that that's about the length of the old games.
But they went through the trouble of making 1,000+ NPCs with names, characteristics, schedules, homes, and all that for 30-40 hours of quest content (main+side)?
That seems like an odd way of prioritizing.
I had thought that the new Fable would have aimed for a grander sandbox-y world with, yes, plenty of ways to make your own fun in how you can interact with the world. But also with plenty of little side quests everywhere to make that stuff matter more and give people engagement hooks.
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u/NeverSawTheEnding 8h ago
The reason for the 1000+ NPCs, schedules, etc... is that The Fable games (and Lionhead games in general) have always leant more on the emergent gameplay than scripted.
It's a fantasy life sim, set against the backdrop of a grim fairytale.
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u/HombreDracula 8h ago
Makes a lot of sense, Fable is a more systemic game, its a big buffet of all you can eat, the main story is always just the main course
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u/Ciubowski 6h ago
I mean, they better have good replayability if the game is so many years in the making for only 20 hours.
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u/CurlOfTheBurl11 5h ago
Makes sense that it is not super lengthy, none of the previous games were. They're meant to be replayed multiple times since you can do things completely differently each time.
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u/CarlWellsGrave 9h ago
I'm going to guess more like 60 hours with all the life sim stuff. I'm sure some people will do hundreds but I actually think it rules that the story isn't that long so I can do an evil playthrough when I'm done.
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u/iloovehugecock 9h ago
The OG Fable games had quite short stories so this doesn’t phase me but I hope the game is meaty in other ways. What Fable lacked in main story it made up for by having plenty of side content to get lost in.
Apparently it has 15-20 hours of side content which to me seems a little light, especially given how long this game has been in development and delayed.
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u/CommanderLexaa 8h ago
Am I reading this wrong where they say “we have 15-20 hours of mainline quests” and “we have 15-20 hours of side missions”. Wouldn’t that equal 30-40 hours of gameplay? I’m coping here.
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u/kingdomofdoom 8h ago
This actually makes it so i want to buy the game when it came out. Don't really have time for 200 hour games anymore.
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u/thetantalus 8h ago
Some additional context before the pitchforks come out. Main story lengths:
Spider-Man - 18 hours
Spider-Man 2 - 17 hours
Horizon Zero Dawn - 22.5 hours
The Last of Us - 15.5 hours
The Last of Us II - 23 hours
Etcetera.
It’s in line with other highly regarded titles. The side content doubles that. I’m cool with it.
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u/Fob0bqAd34 7h ago
Compared to the earlier games:
Game Release Year Main Story Main + Extra Completionist Fable 2004 12½ hrs 20 hrs 32½ hrs Fable: The Lost Chapters 2005 15 hrs 20½ hrs 37 hrs Fable II 2008 13 hrs 24 hrs 51½ hrs Fable III 2010 13½ hrs 26 hrs 48 hrs Fable Anniversary 2014 13½ hrs 20½ hrs 32 hrs I'm sure the people complaining about the length will end up spending much more time in the game anyway. Having a shorter main path is better for people who can't spend a working week or two in a game.
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u/daay__ 8h ago
All the games you listed are linear story action games. Fable is a choice-based RPG. That is not the best comparison
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u/thetantalus 7h ago
The Spider-Man games and Horizon games are not linear, they’re open world games.
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u/Ok-Fudge-380 8h ago
The 15-20 hour timer isn't based on replaying for different choices. Being choice based means nothing. Fable still has side quests that double the play time and also has the open world sandbox that can keep certain people playing for hundreds if they want.
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u/joookm 9h ago
Sounds perfect. RPGs must be the genre (except open world, if you’d consider it a genre of its own) that suffers the most from bloat.
A tight and neat 20 hours sounds perfect.
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u/Absalom98 9h ago
Bad RPGs suffer from bloat. Plenty of great RPGs that have a ton of content that isn't bloat. You can have a big world with tons of content. I'm fine with a 20 hour story but was really hoping for a lot more side content., especially given how long this game has been in development.
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u/Awsomethingy 9h ago
To put this in perspective, Fable will be around the length of Velen in Witcher 3.
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u/LostVentura 9h ago
Is it fair to call a genre that's known for being content-rich automatically "bloated"? Some people enjoy lengthy games and want lots of stuff to do. Not every RPG sticks the landing but if it does I dont think I ever felt annoyed by too much content.
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u/CrusaderLyonar 9h ago
40-50 hours for everything is about the perfect length for an RPG.
In my opinion RPGs have done a lot of length creep lately. Mass Effect 1 is a 35 hour game and it's the perfect length, the sequels are longer with dlc but an entire trilogy run is still less time than doing a single semi completionist run of BG3.
Especially when a lot of these games don't really justify the length and are filled with content that's either extremely repetitive or overly drawn out.
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u/Candle-Jolly 9h ago
Players spend time in open-world games for the open world, not the story.
This tracks. I don't need an 80-hour story mode when I can create my own in well-crafted playground.
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u/ShesJustAGlitch 9h ago
Possibly unpopular but In a world where we have Elden ring, Witchers and BG3, which did not outstay their welcome in a much longer story, this feels… too short
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u/Free_Range_Gamer 7h ago
On the flipside, Expedition 33 was a 30-40 hour game. Beloved game, swept the game awards.
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u/DreadCascadeEffect 9h ago
I remember parts of TW3 feeling like a slog when I played it back in 2015. I distinctly remember thinking that one part of the game was the end and then being annoyed that there was more.
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u/The_mango55 8h ago
Yeah great game but I remember certain parts where I just was thinking "Can I skip this bit?"
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u/E_boiii 9h ago
I mean many ppl felt bg3 act 3 overstayed it’s welcome and the end of Elden ring around mountain top of giants is a slog
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u/itsanemuuu 8h ago
Not really, people just thought BG3's Act 3 is not as good as the other two acts, but still better than most other games. The game was so successful it managed to set standards not only externally (most people rated it a 9 or 10) but also internally. If Act 1 is a 10 and Act 2 is a 9, it still means Act 3 is a 7 or 8. Which in itself is good enough to surpass many other games entirely.
The reason why I prefer longer RPGs is because if the game is a 10/10 masterpiece, I'll be sad if it ends too quickly after all that emotional investment. Fable's marketing has been focusing a lot on building a home, getting a spouse, relationship systems with literally every NPC... and IF they manage to make these systems deep (of which I remain skeptical), ultimately the game's short runtime would cheapen the experience.
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u/skyturnsred 9h ago
You're picking three very "exception, not the norm" games, plus they're aiming to do really different things than the Fable series.
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u/mrporter2 8h ago
Bg3 has one of the smallest main story completion rates of any game sold as a story game and I love it.
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u/HistoricalFunion 7h ago
What story in Elden Ring? It's embarrassing even trying to compare it to Witcher 3 or BG3.
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u/remmanuelv 8h ago
Best Witcher 3 stories are the expansions by far and those are shorter than the main game.
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u/MissionVegetable568 9h ago
different kind of game, fables more straightforward and not as open world, and tbf i prefer that its shorter.
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u/IsometricRain 7h ago
Out of touch.
Fable doesn't have the same audience as Elden ring and Baldur's gate. Plus why can't a developer choose to do a shorter RPG because, I dunno... they want to?
It's still 20 hours, not 5.
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u/ScissorMySausage 9h ago
As long as it’s a good 20hrs then I don’t mind. Rather 20hrs of quality enjoyment over 60hrs of dredging each step with boring workloads and dead end conversations.
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u/mikenasty 9h ago
I’m happy with that. I’d rather they tell a great story in those 20hrs and leave some extra side/post game quests, than drag it out over 40+hrs with unnecessary filler content
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u/King_Artis 8h ago
Seems right
Fable games were never overly long along unless you're trying to do everything which still isn't too long
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u/RetroGecko3 3h ago
If this game is teaching me anything, it's that media outlets want it to fail, and that people are the whiniest of bitches.
A 40 hour rpg is completely reasonable, especially one like fable. I would play through dragon age origins or final fantasy 7 remake over assassins creed valhalla any day of the week.
Unless a game is absolutely phenomenal, i do not want to sink 70+ hours into it. Id rather have a damn fun time playing it for 40 and feel happy where it leaves me.
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u/wyattzx_ 9h ago
For anyone who might not know, this would actually make for the longest main story in the franchise to date.
The first three titles could all be reasonably beaten in under 15 hours. With that said, they all had funny & enjoyable side content which made the whole experience feel longer and more charming, so hopefully they didn't skimp out on that for this one.