Fable II Limited Edition Guide (Bradygames Limited Edition Guides) [Deluxe Edition] [Paperback]

BradyGames (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 14, 2008 | Series: Bradygames Limited Edition Guides

The Ultimate Collectible - Two Books Inside!

 

Exclusive Art Book

Gorgeous concept art combined with commentary straight from the Lionhead artists provides a unique behind-the-scenes perspective about the inspirations, direction, and choices that brought Fable II to life.

 

Signature Series Strategy Guide - Four Collectible Covers!

Each Signature Series guide comes with one of four outrageous covers straight from the world of Albion!

 

Strategy Guide Includes:

ALBION ATLAS! Detailed data sections reveal Spotlight Homes and Businesses, Collectibles, Jobs, Pub Games, and More!

 

COMPLETE QUEST GUIDE! Full strategy on completing the game and finishing Every Quest!

 

GOOD VS. EVIL! Detailed morality tables indicate how each quest result will affect your Hero!

 

EVERY SECRET! Gargoyles, Chests, Silver Keys, Dig Spots, Dive Spots, and Demon Doors!

 

EXCLUSIVE DOUBLE-SIDED FOLDOUT! Complete Xbox 360 Achievement Listing with strategies and tips.

 

LOADS OF EXTRAS! “Happily Ever After” Diary, Item and Weapon Lists, Developer Tips, Expert Boss Strategy, and Much More

 

 

Platform: Xbox 360

Genre: Role-Playing Game

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: BRADY GAMES; Limited edition (October 14, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0744010500
• ISBN-13: 978-0744010503
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #376,967 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Poor at best, December 27, 2008

By 

M. DuBois - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fable II Limited Edition Guide (Bradygames Limited Edition Guides) (Paperback)

I bought this guide when I heard that it had maps of the different regions in Fable 2. Given that the in-game maps are so poor and unusable, I jumped at the news that there was help available.

I was sadly disappointed by the maps. There is no overview of how all the regions are connected together. There is no listing of how many houses and businesses there are to buy in each area, etc. In addition, for several areas, many of the statistics that are there, such as the number of keys or dig spots or gargoyles, disagree with the in-game statistics that provide the overall count.

I can say that the art book is awfully pretty. If you're looking to be a completionist, chances are the info on gargoyles and keys can at least get you most of the way there. It isn't as though you can't find the rest on your own, especially since the game will tell you which areas you've missed one of those in. The quest descriptions are largely useless though. The quests in this game aren't rocket science, and the game itself shows you exactly where to go more than 95% of the time. On the whole, I was disappointed in the amount of information provided, and expecially disappointed in the maps.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Mediocre Book for a Mediocre Game, December 1, 2008

By 

Lindsay E. Andrews "Freelance Artist" (Dekalb, IL, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Fable II Limited Edition Guide (Bradygames Limited Edition Guides) (Paperback)

I feel it is only appropriate that I begin with the problems that I had with this strategy guide and move on into the few points that I liked. This strategy guide suffers from several large problems ranging from inadequate indexes to obvious misprints. I am under the impression that the editors did not spend any time reading through their own guide before they sent it to press.

Many descriptions in the guide are printed under pictures that they don't belong to, and this is not an isolated problem. Every other page of this guide has very simple mistakes that could have easily been corrected, but for some strange reason never were. Strangely I haven't found many typos, which means that there was someone around to edit the text, but that the graphic design team didn't bother to check their work when it came to placing text and images together.

The guide also suffers from a problem that I have found in many guides lately, which is that they do not seem to understand why customers want to buy their guides. With-holding information in a strategy guide because you want the player to discover things on their own is hypocritical. If you're going to sell a strategy guide you should accept the fact that your players aren't going to blindly stumble through the game on their own. You're helping them do it, so you might as well help them do it right.

The guide goes through a lot of trouble to give you information you don't need, but neglects to give you the information you want, or at the very least index it in a way that is convenient to find and use. For example, the main reason anyone would want a strategy guide for an xbox 360 game is to acquire all the achievements. This guide gives you the achievements on a fold-out poster in the back, which you have to take out if you don't want to accidentally rip it. This means you have separate sheet four pages long that you have to find and fiddle with every time you want to check an achievement, while you also keep the strategy guide close because the technical designer thought it would be a great idea to make you flip through one hundred pages of of the Albion Atlas to discover how to find every silver key or gargoyle instead of simply making an index for these quests/achievements.

With the exception of the many many misprints the Albion Atlas was the most useful part of this guide, even though it would have been much easier if I just had a section for the gargoyle and silver keys to themselves.

The artbook is very nice and worth the price on Amazon. It is the minimum size that I expect from a video games artbook that is sold rather than used as a giveaway. It is smaller than it could be, considering the volume of sketches and c.g. that must have gone into the creation of this game, but it does give an interesting insight into the process. The only disappointing element of the artwork is the fact that all of the effort and talent put into the artwork for Fable II is wasted on the terrible story and game play.

In short, buy this guide for the artbook and sell the guide after you trade in the game. Because there really isn't a reason to keep Fable II around after you beat the game and get all the achievements you want. It's an amusing game that seems really grand at first and quickly turns into a miserable glitch-filled experience. So, if you're not going to keep the game, there's no real reason to keep the guide.

8 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Buy the Fable 2 Signature Series Guide instead!, October 24, 2008

By 

D. Crawford "danielc_1978" (Hoover, AL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Fable II Limited Edition Guide (Bradygames Limited Edition Guides) (Paperback)

Unless you are a diehard fan that has to buy limited edition everything, and it's alright if you are but if you are like me, just the average joe, don't buy this product. It is not worth the extra money. Buy the standard Signiture Guide instead. The Standard Guide covers all of the needed information and that is really the only thing a gamer needs.