I’m starting to think that your best bet for ginormous, complex AAA open-world titles might be to wait until a week or two after launch to actually start playing it, thereby giving significant bug issues to rise to the surface and come to the attention of developers. Despite favorable reception, Fallout: New Vegas has produced no small amount of grumbling thanks to a laundry list of very noticeable bugs (some of which are bizarrely creepy). Now it appears Fable 3 is suffering the same fate (reported by Eurogamer).
Lionhead has set up a web page for players to report bugs and – just like Fallout: New Vegas developer Obsidian – has promised speedy and painless patches. In the meantime, Lionhead is powerless to do much of anything about your corrupt save game. In a post on the company’s website, a spokesman could do little more than shrug apologetically: “If you do experience a corrupt save game and there is no work around, then all I can personally recommend you do is start a new game and apologize for any stress this might cause. We really do feel for you if this happens!”
I love long, narratively intense games like Fable, but I tend not to go back and replay many of them. A corrupt save game is about the most frustrating glitch possible, and depending on when it happens, can make me walk away from a game entirely for months or even years – if I return at all. If more testing time is what’s needed, then I want developers to take it. I’d rather get a less buggy game a month from now than get a more buggy game today and have to wait for patches to make it truly complete.
