So says this.

Fable franchise owner Microsoft has tasked UK developer Playground, which makes the Forza Horizon racing games for Xbox and PC, with creating this new Fable, sources close to the project have told Eurogamer. Microsoft said in a statement it does not comment on rumour or speculation.

We've heard the new Fable is planned as a story and character-focussed open-world action RPG. A significant investment in its development is also planned, with some 200 people set to work on the game at Playground's newly-established second office in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire.

Sounds like it's a long ways off, but I'd be interested to see what they do with it. I don't know if Fable has much cachet as a brand after Fable III and the long time off from the franchise, but I'd give it a whirl!

If true, I'm more worried about what this means for the future of the Forza Horizon series than I am optimistic about the future of the Fable series.

What else do you want from Forza Horizon at this point? They could take a long break and I think it would actually be good for the series. Forza should be an every 4-5 years thing, but MS seems hellbent on making Motorsport/Horizon an annual franchise. Follow the money, I guess. I think it's healthy for studios to do something different for a while. They can always revisit it later. As for Fable, I've never played any of them, but when I read this all I could think was MS wants their own Witcher franchise.

Maybe the loot-boxes will tease the player.

@hippie_genocide: Then who will make our good arcade racing games? Will this pause in Horizon combined with NFS's shittiness be what will finally trigger EA to pull Burnout out from underneath its ass and somehow produce a good racing game?

I wouldn't be entirely opposed to the regular Forza series taking a break for a bit (especially after 7 dipped a bit in quality and needlessly forced in microtransactions), but the Forza Horizon games have been fucking fantastic and I want them to keep making those forever.

I'd think it would be a bit of a departure from their skillset anyway. This feels like an EA sort of move, a "hey, you're a good studio who have proven yourselves to be great at this thing, now make something else entirely because we say so!" I don't know that it will pay dividends for the Fable series. It seems like a hard IP to resurrect at this point. I loved the old Fable games, but that was a long-ass time ago and most of the current gaming market probably doesn't even know this was a series.

Meanwhile, I fear that it will force the Horizon games to be put on hiatus or dip in quality, which is the opposite direction MS needs to take with arguably its best first-party property right now. Just my $.02.

This is amazing news. Hopefully they can pull of a great Fable game and can kickstart into a whole better franchise that can compete with modern RPGs just like Fable 1 was the right fit for people that wanted to have something between of what the Gothic and TES crowd wanted.

Fable 2 and 3 weren't exactly the best but it were fun games that did value your time with not walking around aimlessly all the time. If they're able to make it an open world game but with lots of enemies to fight and a fluid combat progression system (the xp-multiplier system was great in my opinion) then Its not too far off that it can find a simular userbase.

Just don't copy everything from other games.

@notnert427: I disagree, all it needs is a hype trailer and if they showcase that the gameplay is great with genuine gameplay footage then I do believe that it will find a large audience. Just make the combat as refreshing as it was with the old Fable.

Even right before release, where even a lot of ignorant AC fans laughed Black Flag off but its obvious that they've never looked at the gameplay footage and just wrote off AC entirely look what has happened. Weird that nobody even cared about the millions of people getting hyped for the game all over at places like youtube, the game did rocket off pretty hard and its impossible not to saw that coming.

Same with Origins, the hype train was practically impossible to stop once Gamescom has happened.

The only thing that is a little bit worrying in the artstyle, which I don't think a lot of people enjoy right now, but dunno, if they make it beautiful then I'm sure that a lot of people will care more about it.

I don't mind Horizon taking a break, but they might still be able to push out a Horizon 4 this year if the Fable project is a recent thing.

I really like this! They have a talented team there and I am more than happy to see them give something completely different from Forza a chance. I loved the Fable series and while it may not have the Moleneux magic, it may have something equally as good but different. This is exciting!

As far as Forza, they could do with a break. There's been a lot of Forza lately and a few years off may really spark it again. I wouldn't worry about Forza horizon, its been great but a break for that series would be good too. I enjoyed Forza Horizon 3 but I did start feeling the "concept age" so to speak. A break from that may be nice.

I'd be down for a new Fable! A reason to use my Xbox One again.

As well made as the Forza games are, racing games aren't for me.

Can I interest you in The Crew 2?

I don't know if a fable without peter molyneux will be a good or bad thing. either way i'm interested in what will come of this.

Fable II is real good, y'all.

The original article and the portion Rorie quoted VERY CLEARLY STATES that Playground opened a second office to make this game. Millions of people play Forza now, thanks in no small part to the Horizon portion of the franchise. No way in hell Microsoft would let them take a break on that series.

Just please make it a real Fable game and not some on-rails cart sim or a four-player co-op hero-versus-boss thing. Oh, who am I kidding?

I'll take an anime themed paintjob for my dog, and do sick burnouts in Albion while my dog barks La Cucaracha.

I really never cared for actually playing Fable; it was always a series that seemed a lot better than it was until I picked up the controller. There weren't any serious flaws with it, but I couldn't find a single thing about it that I really liked, either. It definitely had some neat ideas, so I'm glad to see someone else getting a shot at it. Maybe this one will appeal to me.

Big if true.

is peter molyneux going to have any involvement at all?

@marino: I kinda disagree, but yeah Fable 2 is still alright, at least from what I remember. I thought that the combat in Fable 1 has been the best the franchise had to offer. It is fluid, has tons of good updates and it fit the artstyle. All that good stuff was missing in Fable 2.

Fable 2 didn't feel like a good step in the right direction but it still was good in its own regard and compared to Fable 3 (which was kinda bad at places, but also because of the port I think) it is the superior Fable. And compared to what Fable 1 did the two felt a bit lacking as they didn't add much and had worse UI. At least thats what I've basically meant when I wrote my stuff a few days back.

I might pick up Fable 2 again at some point though to see if it holds up. The first Fable didn't fully age well, though the bow and arrow and some of the magic gameplay is alright.

I haven't touched the remaster but I'm not exactly caring about graphics anyway. All of this just makes me more excited for a new Fable game.

@jamesr9000: Not that we know off. I would also say probably no.

I like the Horizon games but like Jeff i've been having less and less fun with each one. I'd to see another Fable game and if nothing else Playground games have proved they can make great looking open worlds.

I'm a big fan of the fine folks at Playground Games. It's exciting to see the studio take on a project outside of its wheelhouse--har har--but I remain curious to see what their take on a different genre piece will look like. Probably worth being thankful for the fact that this isn't a repeat of the Bizarre Creations situation, wherein that studio was strong-armed to make action games in lieu of its racing game focus.