Peter Molyneux: My Next Game a ‘Significant Scientific Achievement’

The first Fable, released on the Xbox and PC, was a critical hit that sold 3.5 million units worldwide. It’s the sort of success that many developers would have been delighted with. "But I’m essentially a very greedy person," Molyneux says. "I was disappointed with how the game was received."

Molyneux blames himself for the game not doing better: "I did an awful job of promoting the game. I would talk to journalists about the things I wanted to do, the stuff that was exciting me in design terms, and I ended up disappointing them."

That rings true. Game journos adore Molyneux because his enthusiasm is so palpable, and he’ll get so carried away that he talks to them about incredibly ambitious features he’s not yet implemented in the game. Then, when he has to retreat from that, the same journos tend to downplay the very real innovations in his games, and rake him over the coals for whatever he wasn’t able to pull off.