Players want to be good guys.

Brian Fleming, president of Sucker Punch, the studio behind June's dark super-hero game "Infamous," didn't believe it.

He'd heard this from Peter Molyneux, the outspoken head of Lionhead Studios, who said that players of the Xbox series "Fable," tended to steer their characters toward the side of angels. Technically, they could have made their characters evil and gained just as many benefits. But Molyneux said players ultimately preferred to complete their adventure as a good person.
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Gamers who played last fall's Xbox 360 hit "Fable II" were supposed to feel an emotional connection to the virtual canine that faithfully followed their hero throughout the game.

The dog was mostly self-sufficient - following, leading and fighting on its own - though it did do tricks with the press of a button.

What if players could talk to that dog?
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Ruffian Games have put out a final call for developers to join their merry band on a journey to make awesome games. Having established their studio in 2009 Ruffian's recruitment drive is near an end and the places remaining are few.
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BeefJack writes: "It's not often that a politician sings the praises of the video game industry, which is why a big deal should be made of it when it does happen.

Edward Vaizey, a Conservative MP, has requested the motion that the UK government recognise the importance of the UK Video Game Industry and in particular those games created by UK developers."
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1UP writes: "Large-scale game development might have a certain structure to it, but at the Game Developers Conference, you often hear stories about a game progressing along just fine until some jackass comes in towards the end and pushes for some neat feature to be put in, which steals everyone's focus. Peter Molyneux admits he's one of those people, and as the founder of Lionhead, that was a particularly big problem in their first game, Black & White. When a journalist was interviewing him about the game, Molyneux got the idea to put in a realistic weather system. He got it into the game, but the game itself wasn't being worked on during that time; everybody was pitching in trying to get the weather right."
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VG247: Why not? The Lionhead boss has already said he's not going to announce a new game at GDC this year, but he's always worth watching.
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Adrian P from AnalogHype reports: GDC 09 is filled with more surprises. Lionhead announced the "See the Future" DLC will be released within the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned for more information.
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Kotaku writes: "See the Future, the next downloadable content from Lionhead Studios for Fable II, will be hitting in weeks, Peter Molyneux told Kotaku today.

"The next DLC comes out in the spring," he said. "We're in the spring now so don't think months, think more like weeks. It's called See the Future".
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OXM UK writes: "Peter Molyneux has admitted that Fable 1 "destroyed the team" that worked on it, while the sequel did not.

"If I'm honest, on Fable we just burnt people's lives; we destroyed the team," Molyneux admits. "Week after week, month after month, they worked 50, 60, 70, 80 hour weeks. It destroyed their lives and destroyed their marriages. You just can't do that anymore..."
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Announced on Major Nelson's podcast, the next Deal of the Week will be the Xbox Original Fable.

Available for download for only 800 points instead of 1200 points, Fable 1 will be only available at the special price for the week of March 16th.
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Via CVG: "We are working on new DLC for Fable II," says Lionhead
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There's little doubt as to the four key titles that look set to dominate proceedings at this year's ELAN Awards, with Left 4 Dead, Fallout 3, Gears of War 2 and Fable II all nominated in the majority of the nine categories.

In with a chance of winning seven awards apiece are Valve's zombie shooter Left 4 Dead and Bethesda's dark future RPG Fallout 3, while Epic's FPS sequel Gears of War 2 and Lionhead's fantasy adventure Fable II are both up for six awards.

In fact, of the nine categories - which each contain four nominations - those exact four will battle it out in four, while other prominent titles to be nominated just once include Crysis: Warhead, Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria, Call of Duty: World at War and Too Human.

The awards, which also present prizes for the animation and visual effects industries, will take place in April and be hosted by the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, Tom Kenny.

The full list of categories and nominations is as follows:
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Ve3tro writes: "Today, Xbox 360 and Lionhead Studios are thrilled to announce that the blockbuster "Fable II" claimed the prestigious accolade of "Action and Adventure" award at the Video Game BAFTAs, held last night in central London.

"For us the BAFTA's are one of the most important video games awards with its British and film association – our BAFTA for Fable II will take pride of place in our offices'' commented Peter Molyneux, Studio Director, Lionhead Studios. ''The team at Lionhead put a great deal of passion, hard work and care into making Fable II, so it is fantastic to get this kind of recognition from both fans and the judges.""
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Via CVG: "Lionhead sends word that ones of its senior artists is flogging a one-of-kind Fable II Hobbe mask on eBay. Not for charity of anything - he's skint.

'Jamie our resident Senior Artists and Sculptor is selling some of his items on Ebay (probably to make space in the loft). One of the items that will undoubtely be of interest to any Fable II fan is this Hobbe Creature Mask (link) in Latex that can actually be worn by the owner,' reads the not on the Lionhead community site."
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Gamasutra writes:

"Media Molecule's LittleBigPlanet leads the nominees for the ninth annual Game Developers Choice Awards with seven nominations, organizers have revealed.

Number None's Braid follows closely with five nominations. Among the nominations for LittleBigPlanet is the coveted Game of the Year award.

Other nominees for that category include Fallout 3 and Left 4 Dead, each of which received a total of four award nominations; Rockstar North's Grand Theft Auto IV, which earned a total of three nominations, and Lionhead Studios' Fable 2. Winners will be honored at an awards show taking place during the 2009 Game Developers Conference."
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Lionhead writes:

"Many people have emailed us about it and we've seen plenty of requests on the forums; people want a copy of the Fable II map of Albion! And as you know, when our community asks, we deliver.

So we asked our artists to render a copy of the Albion map for the web and here is what they came up with. It's in huge quality so can be printed to put on your wall in Ultra High Definition."
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Kotaku writes: "Microsoft released three first-party games towards the end of 2008. Gears of War 2, we know, is a smashing success. But what of the other two games, Fable II and Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts?

Sales data released by the NPD Group today reveals that the games' experience on store shelves couldn't have been more diffierent. Fable II was a surprising success, by January 1 selling a respectable 1.2 million copies in the US. Not too shabby.

But Banjo? Seems Rare's stab at innovation by introducing customisable vehicles to the game was a flop with consumers, as the game had only sold a meagre 140,000 copies by new year's day."
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Lionhead has posted on its developer forums stating that the recent PC port rumour on WhatIFGaming has no substance.

"We're not working on a PC version of Fable II," said Lionhead employee. "If this changes we'll make sure you know about it."

Move along. Nothing to see here.
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WhatIfGaming: "Lionhead Studios just sent word over to us that Fable II might not be officially confirmed by the publisher Microsoft, but they pretty much can give everyone the good news:

"Fable II has been an enormous success on the Xbox 360. A Fable II for PC users would be likely imminent. Keep checking back with us for more updates."

There you have it. PC users get ready for a new game soon from Lionhead Studios."
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www.pushingplay.com writes "Fable 2 was fun. So much fun that when the DLC was released today I thought, "Sure, I'm in for some more of that." I handed over my 800 points and downloaded the mysterious, new Knothole Island, a land of, what I thought, would be fun adventure. Hit the jump and read about what got in the way of my fun…"
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