The Lionhead King Comments by Ellie Gibson

Eurogamer: Why are you at the Game Developers Conference?

Peter Molyneux: Firstly, networking.

What a fucking geek!

"...only pro comments are allowed..."

I think the point that was being made was that a lot of people are incapable of separating personal taste from objective analysis of, in this case, Lionheads games and Peters professional credentials.

On the dog being a great innovation (or not). I think it ended up not being, but I think I understand what the original objectives of the dog were.

What I mean is that, traditionally, games are very bad at portraying emotional relationships compared to other media. This is problematic as it's key to humans really buying into the experience (or book, or film etc.).
If you can create an emotional relationship between the player and, in this case the dog, then the experience as whole is much more satisfying. It's about creating links between you and the game world that help overcome the fact we're actually physically disconnected from it and just viewing it on a flat screen. If you can create an emotional attachment to something in the game, then the experience becomes more real.

I enjoyed Fable 2 a lot but the dog idea was really nothing more then what Miyamoto came up with for Link in the form of Navi waaaaay back in Ocarina of Time.

I tried to enjoy Fable 2, but it was so mediocre I couldn't. I bought it at launch and I played it through, did some side quests thinking something would kick start my enjoyment, but it never came.

Just a lot of walking around, kills some baddies, rinse repeat. The way the world adapted to your behaviour was shallow. Having to endlessly repeat actions to make ppl like or fear you etc. How it got 10/10 I don't know.

I really enjoyed that interview, thanks.

If I worked at Lionhead I would spend all day spewing out crazy ideas that Molyneux could talk up.... I'd like them to try an Elite style game.

Haven't read it all but the bit with you asking about Fable 3 is cringeworthy. His attempts to dodge the question are painful although they worked I guess :P

I don't see why they don't just come out and announce it.

Wonderful interview, really made me chuckle. nice one Ellie.

p.s yoiks at the tard fest in these comments

Great interview,i dont know why people dislike PM,alright he puts is foot in it some time but at least he care about the games he makes not like some developes.

Dear Peter,

Longtime Bullfrog Fan here. Though I feel you've lost your way (as you've probably heard many times already).

Please make Fable 3 a charming steampunk adventure, with twirling moustached gentlemen and steam powered everything... just as Fable 2 seemed to be clockpunk. Yes. Trains, airships, odd uses for electricity.

Speaking of Fable 2, very underwhelmed. Dog unendearing, pointless waste of time that just gets me to dig up used condoms in the woods and then gets hurt in fights. Sort the controls too, they're appallingly shit. One button does not work. And let us look the NPCs in the face more easily, it'll make us care about them more.

And finally. British humour. Very nice. But for god's sake, hire a better writer. Ben Elton even. Give us dialogue to match Blackadder or don't try at all.

Love,

Me

PS: Quit promising the world. Promise us less. And surprise us with more.

Great interview thanks,

I took a while to get into Fable 2, it was all a bit jumbled for the first few hours. I wanted to love it as I had the original, but I almost lost faith. Reviewers kept saying you will love it but only if you let it.

First thing I did was install it which made a huge difference....HUGE. I could hear the game fully and never dread a load screen between regions. The world of Ablion became alive and vibrant, I realised the reason for my lack of love was mostly down to the limitations of the DVD loading. A bit like the PSP version of the Sims (However there is no cure for that, interesting game rendered utterly unplayable by loading screens).

I fell in love with Fable 2 shortly after the install, the rest is history. My pick for the best game of 2008.

Fable II was a gem, imo. Never played another game like it and I'll be first in line for Fable III.

I've played games which had portions similar to portions of Fable II, but no game that was a complete clone.

Wow, how can you guys hate this guy, fable or it's sequel? Fucking morons.

I love Peter- and the fact that he seems candid, honest, intelligent and charmingly polite.

JammyPez - so it's Peter's fault that people are losing their jobs? Really?

Moulyneux is the Steve Jobs of computer gaming to me. Only gullible idiots still listen to his tinman stories.

*edit* same goes for anything star wars. It's a movie for kids ffs. Go on you fatties, go outside, see something of the world, enjoy good movies, food, people and just give the misplaced nostalgia a rest. You needn't suckle on thy mothers teeth forever, there is a life out there to be had! (a life preferably not littered with empty movies including wooden acting, a big CG budget, talking furry animals, a terrible.. terrible story, and which is solely made for the purpose of extorting merchandising money from the lesser thinking ones of our species.)

BUT! Interview made me chuckle, hur hur.

I'm calling an intervention. All the exposure to sh*t games has clearly affected poor Ellie, to the point that she can actually stand more than 30 seconds of Hayden Christiansen without needing to leave the room and exterminate several species of small cute furry animals. Ellie must be saved before she starts making positive comments about Jumper and is condemned to the depths of hell forever.

By the way - get your spelling right. It's WOSS!

Really good, funny interview. I've always liked Molyneux, unlike about 90% of Eurogamer, and I find his upbeat optimism very refreshing. I'm going to utterly read between the lines here and assume that Microsoft are buying OnLive and their next console will be played over the internet, and that Fable III will be a launch title ;-)

Also, kudos to Ellie for admitting liking the prequel trilogy. I'm a Jar Jar Apologist too. Incidentally, I'm aware SW is a kids' film. It's just a very, very good kids' film. WALL-E is a kids' film too, and one of the best films of last year (and, whilst I'm at it, better than at least five SW films, too).

I have to say that although he is a decent bloke, Mr Molyneux has left me feeling underwhelmed time and again over the last few years. Black and White was impressive at first, until you realised that certain aspects of the game simply didnt work (such as your creature and his reactions to certain things). Never played Black and White 2 after all the negative reviews it got so i cant comment on that one. Fable was very very good until the end which seemed to come far far too early for me. And unfortunately Fable 2 seemed to be Fable 1 with a few bits tacked on. And the end boss? Just awful. 1 hit and hes dead? WTF? Just ruin the entire build up to finally getting into the main part of his fortress by making the guy utterly defenseless.

Anyway i wont deny that he comes up with some good ideas/concepts, he just needs to make sure they actually work. Please bring back Syndicate/Wars, or Dungeon Keeper and we can remember how good he was at making games, not just how well he interviews.

Ellie you are awesome, thank you for writing the way you do!

@notmyrealname: suckle on thy mother's TEETH?! Would be interesting to watch, I guess. Also, that pic is not Molyneux yesterday no matter how badly you want to make the classic games mag caption joke. That pic is ancient.

Ellie's got that sense of humour that's been blipping on and off of EG's radar for a while.

Also, where the heck did all the concept reviews go? That's mostly why I started reading EG to begin with. :-/

Brilliant interview and brilliant article (yet again Ellie).

And everyone stop knocking The Molyneux, he's a fucking star. Been in the industry years and I hope he continues. And did I mention Syndicate?

syndicate and popoulous.. yeah.. it's been a while since he made a decent game hasn't it?

It seems that anytime PM opens his mouth the PM bashers come out in spades... hey PM bashers- nobody's forcing you to play his games- you don't like them then don't play them, it's really that simple.

I think some of his games are hit and miss, but the hits are excellent and the misses are only slightly off.

Great interview.

And re: prequels - for what's it worth I don't think the Phantom Menace was as bad as everyone likes to say - although it's far from being good. It did at least have some good ideas and some decent sections here and there though - with a bit of a re-write it could have been a decent SW film. The other two prequels have pretty much no redeeming features though, even the stars of the films clearly hated being there - I've never seen Ewan McGregor or Natalie Portman give such dreadful, half-hearted performances.

@Lemming81
"Ellie in drunken punch-up with Peter Molyneux over Star Wars prequels."

It could've been!

£50 on Ellie!

/whisper

Sweep the leg Ellie.

@ronuds
Never played another game like it and I'll be first in line for Fable III.

No, you'll be second in line, behind me. No queue jumping. :P

As for the anti-Peter brigade, I believe teabagger has it right when he said "a lot of people are incapable of separating personal taste from objective analysis of, in this case, Lionheads games and Peters professional credentials" but their personal taste and feelings colour everything to do with Peter and Lionhead.

I'd be happy if his next game just isn't so buggy. I already know I'm going to buy it (unless it's The Movies 2). Whatever it is (apart from The Movies 2). The main reason being that the man gave us Dungeon Keeper, Populous, Powermonger, Fable and other gems. Although his games are often (like everyone's) far from perfect they're always creative and lovingly crafted and a joy to play. I liked B&W and B&W2 a lot. They were flawed, yes, but damn good.

I suggest that, in the future, we all learn to manage our own expectations better. If it sounds too good to be true then you know it's just Peter getting over excited about something he loves the moment he stops feeling like that is the moment he may as well just stop coming to work. He's not a cock, he's passionate, you can nod along enthusiastically, knowing that he's obviously passionate about what he does (but that it probably won't be as good as he feels it will), or just continue to sit back and sneer derisively.

Huh, it seems that my personal taste and feelings colour everything to do with Peter and Lionhead too. Just in a positive way. Funny old world, huh.

But its just so fun to bash PM, Im sure nobody really hates him (part from net'tards) but I mean, come on, everyone does it, its the "thing" to do. & I like things...

what was that faux-quote in consolvania, again?

molyneux: 'you are god. you can do ANYTHING you want'
journalist: 'really?'
molyneux: 'no.'