Fable II - No Online Co-Op At Launch

Oooh. Bad sign. I thought they had this all worked out and had demoed it already? Or were thos more of Molyneux's lies?

awww

Wonder if it says it has Co-op on the box though....

Whaaat?!

Oh well, still going to be a great game.

"Fable 2 is finished."  - Peter Molyneux July 2008

Meh, it'll be a week before I'll want to try out co-op anyways, so no biggie.
But it's not acceptable to release an un-finished game.

Well, i think when this was demoed at E3, it was probably working, but they couldn't get it to production quality before launch.
So they will spend time to get that up to par from now till it launches, when it'll have online co-op.
Sucks though, as i think most websites will review the game based on lack of online co-op (and thats fair), but i think with the Co-op element added it will be an even better game.

Fable 2 Gone Gold! Guess not. What is this all about? You can not sell this game as having co-op anymore.

Though I'm still excited for this game. Hope is fun to play :) and that the most important things (like combat, etc.) work well.

This is a huge, HUGE hit to Fable 2. Last I checked, one of the biggest things they were touting about the game was online co-op, jump-in, jump-out style gameplay. Finish the game before you release it,, developers. That is the most basic piece to launching a game.

I won't be getting this game in the first week so this probably won't affect me.

Patcharama for the game that's never finished and lives on forever.

This game probably won't be gold until Fable 3 is on shelves.

How can a game possibly have gone gold when it's not even finshed yet? And if it'll take only a week to patch it in, why not postpone it for that one week? This just doesn't make any sense to me.

Actually I just thought of something. Perhaps online co-op is being left out of the game on purpose to semi-force people to play the single-player game first. That is really the only reason I can think of for them to release the game without it and patch it in within a week.

that sucks

sucks, but at least they're gonna patch it in.

why don't they just delay the game for 1 week then? i'm sure it's going to take longer then that, if not then expect a lot of bugs

Kinda messed up to ship it this way but, as long as it's being patched in for free, I have no major problems with it.

I don't want to sound like I'm nit-picking or something, I mean, it's "only" a week or so delay... but I'm getting pretty annoyed that it's becoming the norm that games are being shipped out when they're not even finished.  In fact, I don't think this bodes well for the game in general... especially after that Fable II pub games thing.  It's a bug, no it's not, yes it is, no it's not, patched!  I mean... if they're gonna lie, choose one and stick with it.

..or is this all part of Peter Molyneux('s?) sick and twisted vision, just as the xbla glitch?

I hope this patch comes a little faster than the online world tour patch for Rock Band came >_>

What're the chances this "patch" ends up coming out with the word "expansion" in the title and a $20 pricetag?

I don't like this one bit, but if they waited to go gold a week AFTER the street date, then they wouldn't be able to ship until early December.  And since they operate in a model that needs the whole "christmas season" to maximize their revenues, then I guess I can't blame them.  But at least they can now patch the features they've been touting in instead of cutting them altogether...

Wow, now I have my doubts about this game...

wow.
when they say its gone gold it should mean every feature they have promised is ready and present in the code

Ah, jeees, ahg, damnit, cmon Peter Molyneux...GET ON YOUR SHIT.

Yeah I echo the thoughts of others, why not just delay it a week or two? It won't hurt the game at this point, and it would make it feature complete. It makes me wonder if they actually need more time than they're saying.

Dude this is total rat poop. Seriously, wtf.

I thought the game was done Peter Molyneux?

Oopsie! Crappy news. Nothing looks worse than releasing an unfinished product (aside from never actually finishing a product). I can see Peter rubbing his temples as we speak. Maybe Lionhead should look into hiring another "Lyin'head" to promote their games.

"Fable 2 is finished."

Yeah. Uh huh. Sure Peter. Suuuuure.

more lies from PM

Gone gold mean's it's ready to be put on disc and boxed and subsequently ready to ship.  Typically it takes about a month or so for enough copies to be made to be able to fulfill the initial demand.  That means the patch that will come "within the first week" means it's something they'll be working on from now until then.  That's over 3 weeks worth of work.  The vocal minority who are bothered by this are far dwarfed by the number of people who don't mind waiting a few days for a feature while they spend their time playing the game solo.  On the other hand, if the game were delayed another 3 weeks while they work out this issue and then begin creating the discs there'd be a far larger number of people upset.  To be short, they made the wiser decision.

Also, software developers, obviously including game developers, will tell you that their software is never really "finished".   All software is in an "unfinished state" if you were to ask the people who made it.  Unforunately, it's almost never possible to put everything you want into a product and still release it on time, under budget, and with the quality you'd be satisifed with.  I could see having Peter Molyneux as your leader making it extra difficult since with him the scope of a project is enormous but you still have to balance it with time, cost, and quality.

Don't ship unfinished games...

I wasn't doing any co op until I finished the game anyways so ... I couldn't possibly care any less.

Total shite.  Keep working on the game until you're ready to ship a complete product.  As several others have said already, it's a disturbing trend to rush stuff out before it's really done only to hit some marketing target.

That is kind of sad.

Dear "All Those People Who I've Told Time and Time Again That Fable II Would Be A Ridiculous Disappointment All Around", 

Peter, you continue to disappoint me, I don't know why I ever buy into your false promises.

What the FUCK

yeah i agree with you tanuki...getting tired of all these bug fixes after launch..particularly with a predominately single player game...

I think i can wait a couple of weeks,i was gonna finish the game before I play coop anyway

Is anybody surprised? Fable2 is just a second chance for Moleneux to include features that were promised but didn't make it into the first Fable. Of course there has to be stuff to leave out so he can add it later.

lol, that's fucking bullshit. No excuse for that. None at all. Especially after 4 years in development.

Programming video games is a tricky business.

It's like a puzzle, wrapped in an enigma, wrapped in difficult to debug networking race conditions.

Good luck getting it all done, guys.

Fable 2 should still be great. From what it looks like it's not entirely Lionhead's fault...

Why is this such big news?  Seems like every site I go to has this plastered in their top stories.  So what you can't play online co-op on day one maybe!  It isn't like anybody without XBL had planned on playing online co-op anyway.  Sure it is weird but not that big a deal.  Why do I get the feeling it is becoming "cool" to hate Peter and Lionhead.