Hi all,

Following Peter Molyneux's suggestion to involve casual gamers in the
review process for *Fable 2*, we have just published our "non-gamer"
review of the game** - if you could post a link on your site that would
be very much appreciated.

*Link:*
http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/2008/11/01/fable-2-non-gamer-review/1


*Picture:*
http://images.bit-tech.net/content_images/2008/11/fable-2-non-gamer-review/fp_img.jpg


*Quote:
*/We don't normally operate our reviews according to the whims of
manufacturers and developers, but this was an option that was far too
tempting to ignore.

For those who missed the original news story, the story behind this
ever-so-slightly-special review is that the lead designer of Fable 2 and
mildly legendary natterbox Peter Molyneux asked game reviewers get
casual or non-gamers to help in the review of Fable 2.

The game is designed in a way that takes casual and non-gamers into full
account, he argued. It is made to heavily appeal to that audience as
well as hardcore gamers, so he asked the critics to watch non-gamers
play a bit of the game and see what they think.

Well, we decided to go one step further and for the last week my little
sister has been in the office on a work experience placement, much of
which she has spent reviewing the game. We reckon she's pretty much the
ideal audience for Fable 2 by Molyneux's definition. She's played a few
games in her time -- namely The Sims and some Lucasarts adventure games
I bullied her into -- but she is far from what you'd call a true gamer
or a geek. She's never been that into consoles or PC games.

We decided that if we were going to do this as Molyneux and Co. thought
it should be done then we should try and get a pure review out of her
too. Thus, though we knew the game had things like online co-op and so
on, we didn't give her any instruction in them. We asked her to write a
review of the game as she saw it, gave her the game and the manual and
left her to her own devices./*

*Cheers guys!

Tim Smalley
www.bit-tech.net