While the release date for Fable Legends hasn’t been a totally known quantity as of yet, the game has officially been delayed out of its “Holiday” release window and into 2016. Along with this comes news that the planned open beta has also been pushed back, now happening in Spring 2016. The free-to-play game is still planned for release on PC and Xbox One, it’ll just be coming a bit later than originally planned.
Lionhead Studios explained the delay by discussing the deep gameplay that they are incorporating into Fable Legends. “Fable Legends is coming together well and it’s a lot of fun. But we think that we can make it even better…This means Fable Legends won’t release into open beta this holiday as previously announced. We realise this may be disappointing for those of you not currently playing, so we wanted to tell you why.
“To be honest, we didn’t anticipate just how big Fable Legends is becoming. It’s simply the most ambitious game we’ve ever created at Lionhead. We’ve built a unique and innovative multiplayer experience combining RPG and RTS gameplay which allows you to play, and use your gear seamlessly, across Xbox One and Windows 10. On top of this, we’ve built a beautiful new world full of grand stories and adventures. And it’s taking more time than we thought.”
Fable Legends has been shown multiple times at various conventions, with fans getting to go hands-on with the game at E3 and PAX. However, it seems that a lot of the development plans have shifted, with the game becoming a much more deep experience. The cross-platform features are also probably a technical challenge, with players able to interact whether they are on PC or Xbox One. As we’ve seen many games launch in a broken state over the last few years, perhaps it is better that they delay the game, work on it some more, and get a fully finished product out at launch, rather than rush it out the door.
