Fable II: Game Episodes just hit the Xbox 360 this morning. If you haven’t heard of this experiment in episodic gaming, it’s actually a pretty ingenious idea.
Basically, instead of offering a demo to try out the game Peter Molyneux and Lionhead Studios have decided to give you the first portion of the game absolutely free, with four more (paid) chapters to follow. This is a fully featured section of the game, with all the achievements, challenges and co-op play from the full title. Should you choose to continue you can purchase the chapters as you go, or just grab the retail disc and pick up your progress from where you last saved it.
It’s such a smart idea and I’d love to see more games implement this system. Who wouldn’t want to try the first part of the game absolutely free? It makes sense for developers as well, because gamers are more likely to continue playing a game if they’ve already invested time in it.
You can add the first episode to your queue right here. Keep in mind that it’s a hefty 2 gigs!