Fable’s British humour could help it to stay afloat in today’s sea of open-world action RPGs
2026 preview: A lot has changed with the genre in the 15 years since Fable 3
“While I know that’s not maybe the news people want to hear, what I want to assure people of is that it’s definitely worth the wait.”
These were the words of Craig Duncan, head of Xbox Game Studios, when he announced back in February that Fable would be getting delayed to 2026.
It’s been a long road for the reboot of the much-loved action RPG series, and in a sense a further delay wasn’t entirely unexpected. Microsoft originally announced the game way back in 2020, at the same time it initially revealed the Xbox Series X/S consoles, after which it disappeared for years.
A cinematic trailer starring Richard Ayoade appeared in 2023, setting the tone and at least confirming the game was still a going concern, but it would be another full year before we saw it again, with a second trailer confirming that the game would star Matt ‘Super Hans’ King from Peep Show, and had a 2025 release window.
Which brings us to Craig Duncan’s not entirely jaw-dropping announcement that this release window has now been pushed back a year, to give the development team at Playground Games more time to nail a genre that’s new to the studio.
It may seem odd to have the studio best known for the fantastic Forza Horizon games take on an action RPG, but Playground has already proved that its ability to make a detailed open world can’t be questioned, and support from Eidos Montreal (which worked with Crystal Dynamics on the Tomb Raider reboot trilogy) should hopefully tighten other elements like combat.
We did at least get a brief look at the gameplay, including combat, when Duncan announced the delay. The short sample of pre-alpha footage (timestamped at 15:53 here) showed brilliantly detailed environments, a sport of horse riding through some flowery fields, and an outstandingly lit cave fight with fire magic.
“I have unequivocal confidence in the Playground team,” Duncan said when announcing the delay to 2026. “If you think about their history and legacy for Forza Horizon, the last two games critically acclaimed, 92 Metacritic, award-winning, beautiful, played great, and just what they’re bringing to Fable as a franchise.
“Just think of the visuals of what you expect of Playground Games, plus amazing gameplay, British humor, Playground’s version of Albion, so inspired by what’s gone before with the franchise, but their take in quite frankly, the most beautifully realized version of Albion you’ve ever seen.”
“The short sample of pre-alpha footage showed brilliantly detailed environments, a sport of horse riding through some flowery fields, and an outstandingly lit cave fight with fire magic.”
That British humour will be key to differentiating Fable from the numerous other action RPGs that have spawned into centre stage in the 17 years(!) since the last entirely original, proper Fable game (we’re not counting card game Fable Fortune or the odd on-rails Kinect game Fable: The Journey here).
When Fable 3 was released back in 2010 it was a different time. These days the open-world action RPG genre includes the likes of The Witcher, Dragon’s Dogma, Skyrim, Breath of the Wild, Xbox’s own Avowed and most modern Assassin’s Creed games. It’s a more crowded space, so Fable’s going to have to work hard to stand out.
That’s before you consider the inevitability that at some point a PS5 port will also be announced, meaning it will also be compared with the likes of Horizon and God of War. With so many alternatives doing the rounds, that British sense of humour will be even more crucial to keeping Fable relevant. Thankfully, the two trailers seen so far give the strong impression that Playground is leaning heavily into that side of things.
It might not be long until we get to see more gameplay than what was shown back in February. Lost among all The Game Awards hullabaloo was confirmation that Xbox will be hosting a Developer Direct at some time in January, and that Playground Games will have a presence at it. It’s not yet clear whether that’ll be for Forza Horizon 6 or Fable, but if it’s the latter we could hopefully see more of the game in action, and maybe even a narrower release window.
